Japanese cruiser Tatsuta
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 Japanese light cruiser Tatsuta |
|
| Career |  |
|---|---|
| Builder: | Sasebo Naval Yards, Japan |
| Ordered: | FY1915 |
| Laid down: | July 24, 1917 |
| Launched: | May 29, 1918 |
| Commissioned: | May 31, 1919 |
| Fate: | Torpedoed and sunk March 13, 1944 |
| General Characteristics (initial – final) | |
| Displacement: | 3,948 tons (normal); 4,350 tons (max) |
| Length: | 142.9 meters overall |
| Beam: | 12.3 meters |
| Draft: | 4.0 meters |
| Propulsion: | Three Shaft Geared Turbine Engines; 10 Kampon boilers; 51,000 shp |
| Speed: | 33 knots |
| Fuel & Range: | 920 tons oil, 150 tons coal 5,000 nm @ 14 knots |
| Complement: | 327 |
| Armament: | 4 × 5.5-inch (140mm) guns, 3 × 3.1-inch (80mm) guns, 2 x 13mm machine guns, 6 × 21-inch (550mm) torpedo tubes |
| Armor: | Belt 2" (50mm), deck 1" (25mm) |
IJN Tatsuta (龍田) was the second ship in the two-ship Tenryū class of light cruisers of the Imperial Japanese Navy. The Tatsuta had one sister ship, the IJN Tenryū. The Tatsuta is named after the Tatsuta River in Nara prefecture.
This design was essentially an enlarged destroyer, inspired by and designed with similar concept to the British Arethusa class and C class cruisers. These ships were designed to lead destroyer squadrons and act as flagships for destroyer flotillas. With oil-fired single-reduction Brown-Curtis geared turbine engines providing more than twice the horsepower of the engines in the previous Chikuma-class, the Tenryū-class cruisers were capable of the high speed of 33 knots. In terms of armaments, these ships were the first in the Imperial Japanese Navy to use 5.5-inch (140mm) guns and were also the first armed with triple 550mm torpedoes.
The gun layout was not particularly effective. Against targets ahead and astern of the ship, only one 140mm gun could be fired. The firing arcs of the No. 2 and No. 3 turrets were very limited. Anti-aircraft fire was also very limited, consisting of one 3.1-inch gun and two 13mm machine guns.
Tatsuta was refitted between March 1927 and March 1930, when she was given a tripod foremast. Two 13mm AA machine guns were added in 1939. Both the Tatsuta and the Tenryū, as part of the 18th Cruiser Squadron, supported the attack on Wake Island at the start of the Pacific War. They remained as part of the 4th Fleet in the Southwest Pacific in early 1942, and supported the landings at Kavieng and various operations around New Guinea. In May 1942 they supported the amphibious landings at Port Moresby and Tulagi.
After the Battle of Midway the Tatsuta and Tenryū were assigned to the 8th fleet, still operating as the 18th Cruiser Squadron, and landed troops to occupy Buna, New Guinea, in July.
The Tatsuta was torpedoed and sunk by the submarine USS Sand Lance (SS-381) off of Hachijojima, southwest of Yokosuka at on 13 March 1944. It was struck from the Navy list on 10 May 1944. Of her crew, 26 were lost, and the remainder rescued including Captain Torii Takemi and Rear Admiral Takama Tamotsu.
Contents |
[edit] References
[edit] Books
- Brown, David (1990). Warship Losses of World War Two. Naval Institute Press. ISBN 1-55750-914-X.
- D'Albas, Andrieu (1965). Death of a Navy: Japanese Naval Action in World War II. Devin-Adair Pub. ISBN 0-8159-5302-X.
- Dull, Paul S. (1978). A Battle History of the Imperial Japanese Navy, 1941-1945. Naval Institute Press. ISBN 0-87021-097-1.
- Lacroix, Eric; Linton Wells (1997). Japanese Cruisers of the Pacific War. Naval Institute Press. ISBN 0-87021-311-3.
[edit] External links
- Parshall, Jon; Bob Hackett, Sander Kingsepp, & Allyn Nevitt. Imperial Japanese Navy Page (Combinedfleet.com). Retrieved on June 14, 2006.
[edit] Gallery
Imperial Japanese Navy  |
||||||||||||
| Admirals | Battles | List of ships | List of aircraft | List of weapons | ||||||||||||
| Tenryū-class cruiser |
|
Tenryū | Tatsuta |
| List of ships of the Japanese Navy |
