The Aircraft Carrier Intrepid

The Essex-class aircraft carriers are famous for their effectiveness and reliability as warships and the mammoth construction programs they initiated. Built in 1941, the Intrepid (CV11) was one of the class of twenty-four vessels constructed during and immediately after World War II. Carrying ninety aircraft each, they formed the main air strength and striking power of the U.S. Pacific Fleet against the Japanese from 1943 to 1945. Written by well-known warship historian John Roberts, this classic reference on this classic ship features the extensive diagrams and photographs that this series has become Justify famous for it also offers an authoritative description of the concepts, design, modifications, and operational history of the Intrepid and a new large-scale fold-out plan.

"The story of the Intrepid (CV-11) began when she was ordered in May 1940 as a member of the Essex class. She would be among one of the most advanced class of warships of her day, with speed, armament, newer and more capable aircraft, and modern radars that spelled victory in the Pacific. Although the third ship of her class, her sisters the Essex (CV-9), Yorktown (CV-10), Lexington (CV-16), and Bunker Hill (CV-17) all were commissioned before her. The Intrepid's first significant milestone was when her keel was laid at the Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Company on 1 December 1941"--

The first official history of the legendary aircraft carrier that fought in World War II and Vietnam and continues to serve as a major air and space museum in New York City The USS Intrepid is a warship unlike any other. Since her launching in 1943, the 27,000-ton, Essex-class aircraft carrier has sailed into harm’s way around the globe. During World War II, she fought her way across the Pacific—Kwajalein, Truk, Peleliu, Formosa, the Philippines, Okinawa—surviving kamikaze and torpedo attacks and covering herself with glory. The famous ship endured to become a Cold War attack carrier, recovery ship for America’s first astronauts, and a three-tour combatant in Vietnam. In a riveting narrative based on archival research and interviews with surviving crewmen, authors Bill White and Robert Gandt take us inside the war in the Pacific. We join Intrepid’s airmen at the Battle of Leyte Gulf, in October 1944, as they gaze in awe at the apparitions beneath them: five Japanese battleships, including the dreadnoughts Yamato and Musashi, plus a fleet of heavily armored cruisers and destroyers. The sky fills with multihued bursts of anti-aircraft fire. The flak, a Helldiver pilot would write in his action report, “was so thick you could get out and walk on it.” Half a dozen Intrepid aircraft are blown from the sky, but they sink the Musashi. A few months later, off Okinawa, they again meet her sister ship, the mighty Yamato. In a two-hour tableau of hellfire and towering explosions, Intrepid’s warplanes help send the super-battleship and 3,000 Japanese crewmen to the bottom of the sea. We’re next to nineteen-year-old Alonzo Swann in Gun Tub 10 aboard Intrepid as he peers over the breech of a 20-mm anti-aircraft gun. He’s heard of kamikazes, but until today he’s never seen one. Swann and his fellow gunners are among the few African Americans assigned to combat duty in the U.S. Navy of 1944. Blazing away at the diving Japanese Zero, Swann realizes with a dreadful certainty where it will strike: directly into Gun Tub 10. The authors follow Intrepid’s journey to Vietnam. “MiG-21 high!” crackles the voice of Lt. Tony Nargi in his F-8 Crusader. It is 1968, and Intrepid is again at war. Launching from Yankee Station in the Tonkin Gulf, Nargi and his wingman have intercepted a flight of Russian-built supersonic fighters. Minutes later, after a swirling dogfight over North Vietnam, Nargi—and Intrepid—have added another downed enemy airplane to their credit. Intrepid: The Epic Story of America’s Most Legendary Warship brings a renowned ship to life in a stirring tribute complete with the personal recollections of those who served aboard her, dramatic photographs, time lines, maps, and vivid descriptions of Intrepid’s deadly conflicts. More than a numbers-and-dates narrative, Intrepid is the story of people—those who sailed in her, fought to keep her alive, perished in her defense—and powerfully captures the human element in this saga of American heroism.

The Essex-class aircraft carrier Intrepid (CV-11) is an iconic American naval vessel and a National Historic Landmark. Intrepid was built to defeat the Empire of Japan, but frequent overhauls and refits extended her service through the Cold War, the Space Race, and the Vietnam War. Her contributions to history are ultimately stories of technological innovation and human achievement under extraordinary circumstances. USS Intrepid: The Humanity Behind the Hardware illuminates the experiences of the 50,000 men who served aboard Intrepid during her three-decade career in the U.S. Navy. The book seeks to create a personal connection between readers and the men who lived and worked aboard the ship from 1943 through 1974. The text is organized thematically, with each chapter dedicated to a group of men who comprised the ship's crew: aviators, officers, enlisted sailors, and Marines. USS Intrepid: Humanity behind the Hardware will be richly illustrated with material from the Museum's collections. In addition to historic photographs, artifacts, and archival materials such as diaries, division patches, the ship's newspapers and other items will paint a detailed picture of life aboard the ship. Contemporary photographs of the ship's restored historic spaces--workspaces, mess deck, and sleeping quarters--will reveal the actual environments where these men lived and worked.

A visual history of USS Intrepid, one of the most visited museum ships in the world.

From a writer “whose genre-jumping refusal to be pinned down [makes him] an exemplar of our era” (NPR), a new book that confirms his power to astound readers. As a child Geoff Dyer spent long hours making and blotchily painting model fighter planes. So the adult Dyer jumped at the chance of a residency aboard an aircraft carrier. Another Great Day at Sea chronicles Dyer’s experiences on the USS George H.W. Bush as he navigates the routines and protocols of “carrier-world,” from the elaborate choreography of the flight deck through miles of walkways and hatches to kitchens serving meals for a crew of five thousand to the deafening complexity of catapult and arresting gear. Meeting the Captain, the F-18 pilots and the dentists, experiencing everything from a man-overboard alert to the Steel Beach Party, Dyer guides us through the most AIE (acronym intensive environment) imaginable. A lanky Englishman (could he really be both the tallest and the oldest person on the ship?) in a deeply American world, with its constant exhortations to improve, to do better, Dyer brilliantly records the daily life on board the ship, revealing it to be a prism for understanding a society where discipline and conformity, dedication and optimism, become forms of self-expression. In the process it becomes clear why Geoff Dyer has been widely praised as one of the most original—and funniest—voices in literature. Another Great Day at Sea is the definitive work of an author whose books defy definition.

Winner of the 2011 Samuel Eliot Morison Award for Naval Literature, The Twilight Warriors is the engrossing, page-turning saga of a tightly knit band of naval aviators who are thrust into the final—and most brutal—battle of the Pacific war during World War II: Okinawa. April 1945. The end of World War II finally appears to be nearing. The Third Reich is collapsing in Europe, and the Americans are overpowering the once-mighty Japanese Empire in the Pacific. For a group of young pilots trained in the twilight of the war, their greatest worry is that it will end before they have a chance to face the enemy. They call themselves Tail End Charlies: They fly at the tail end of formations, stand at the tail end of chow lines, and now they are catching the tail end of the war. What they don’t know is that they will be key players in the bloodiest and most difficult of naval battles—not only of World War II but in all of American history. The Twilight Warriors relives the drama of the world’s last great naval campaign. From the cockpit of a Corsair fighter we gaze down at the Japanese task force racing to destroy the American amphibious force at Okinawa. Through the eyes of the men on the destroyers assigned to picket ship duty, we experience the terror as wave after wave of kamikazes crash into their ships. Standing on the deck of the legendary superbattleship Yamato, we watch Japan’s last hope for victory die in a tableau of gunfire and explosions. The fate of the Americans at Okinawa, including a twenty-two-year-old former art student, an intrepid fighter pilot whose life abruptly changes when his Corsair goes down off the enemy shore, and a young Texan lieutenant who volunteers for the most dangerous flying job in the fleet—intercepting kamikazes at night over the blackened Pacific—is intertwined with the lives of the “young gods”: the honor-bound kamikaes forces who swarm like killer bees toward the U.S. ships. The ferocity of the Okinawa fighting stuns the world. Before it ends, the long battle will cost more American lives, ships, and aircraft than any naval engagement in U.S. history. More than simply the account of a historic battle, The Twilight Warriors brings to life the human side of an epic conflict. It is the story of young Americans at war in the air and on the sea—and of their enigmatic, fanatically courageous enemy.

Journals are great for writing down ideas, taking notes, writing about travels and adventures, describing good and bad times. Writing down your thoughts and ideas is a great way to relieve stress. Journals are good for the soul!