Naval
Historical Center #NH 64508
| Displacement | 27,900 tons standard displacement |
| Dimensions | 558'9" by 106' by 31'10" 170.30m by 32.31m by 9.70m |
| Maximum speed | 21 knots |
| Complement | 1550 |
| Aircraft | 1 catapult 3 seaplanes |
| Armament | 6x2 12"/50
guns 10x1 5"/51 guns 12x1 3"/50 AA guns 9x4 40mm Bofors AA guns 2x4, 22x1 20mm Oerlikon AA guns |
| Protection | 8140 tons: 11" (279mm) belt 11" (279mm) forward bulkhead 9" (229mm) aft bulkhead 6.5" (165mm) casemates 1.5" (38mm) armor deck 4.75" (121mm) armor deck over boiler rooms 4.5 (114mm) armor deck over magazines 5" (127mm) steering side protection 12"/1.75" (305mm/44mm) turret front/roof 11" (279mm) barbettes 11.5" (292mm) conning tower 29'6" (9m) torpedo bulges |
| Machinery |
4-shaft Parsons turbine (28,000
shp) 4 White-Forster boilers |
| Bunkerage | 3768 tons fuel oil |
| Range | 5190 nautical miles (9590 km) at 12 knots |
| Sensors |
Radar |
| Modifications | 1944-12: Secondary armament consists of 5 5" guns; 12 3" guns; 9x4 40mm guns; 2x4, 28x1 20mm guns. |
The Arkansas was
the oldest battleship in the U.S.
Navy at the start of the war, with a design going back to 1908. She
would
doubtless have already been scrapped but for the increase in
international
tensions in the late 1930s. She had been modernized with deck
armor but
was otherwise completely obsolete. She served most of the war in the
Atlantic and was not committed to the
Pacific until November 1944.
Arkansas'
older sister, class namesake Wyoming,
had been converted to a target ship before hostilities broke out, and
she was not deemed worth converting back to a battleship.
References
The Pacific War Online Encyclopedia © 2006, 2008-2009 by Kent G. Budge. Index
