martes, 9 de octubre de 2018

EFEMÉRIDES MARÍTIMAS Y NAVALES


Colaboración del C. de N. Edgardo Loret de Mola
Responsable de la edición: Rosario Yika Uribe

Fuente: Cinco siglos del destino marítimo  del Perú, de Esperanza Navarro Pantac: Instituto de Estudios Histórico-Marítimos del Perú, 2016

Efemérides Navales de Hoy 04 octubre




4 de octubre 1867: Se firma el discutido contrato de adquisiciones de los monitores Oneota y Catawba, por el coronel Mariano Pío Cornejo, ministro de Guerra y Marina del gobierno de Mariano Ignacio Prado.





ONEOTA (Manco Capac) y Catawba (Atahualpa)
USS Oneota was a single-turreted Canonicus-class monitor built for the Union Navy during the American Civil War. Completed shortly after the end of the war, Oneota was laid up until sold to her builders in 1868, and then resold to Peru. Renamed Manco Cápac, the ship participated in the defense of Arica during the War of the Pacific. When the town was taken by Chilean troops in 1880, she was scuttled to prevent her capture. Her wreck was rediscovered in 1960 and it has been heavily looted.

USS Catawba was a single-turreted Canonicus-class monitor built for the Union Navy during the American Civil War. Completed shortly after the end of the war, Catawba was laid up until sold to her builders in 1868, and then resold to Peru. Renamed Atahualpa, the ship participated in the defense of Callao during the War of the Pacific. When the town was taken by Chilean troops in 1881, she was scuttled to prevent her capture. Atahualpa was later refloated and used as a storage hulk until scrapped in the early 20th century.

The Canonicus class ships were the second series of Ericsson monitors built during the Civil War. This class was again an improvement in design based on experience gained by both the original Monitor and the Passaic class ships. The Canonicus was slightly longer measuring 225 feet in length, but slightly narrower than the Passaic. This was done to give the new monitors greater performance. Ventilation, always a problem aboard monitors, particularly when on duty in the South was improved by the installation of more powerful blowers. In armament the Canonicus carried two massive fifteen inch smooth bore Dahlgrens. In all, nine Canonicus class monitors were built: Canonicus, Catawba, Mahoptac, Manayunk, Manhattan, Oneota, Saugus, Tecumseh and the Tippicanoe.

Because of the similarity of the exteriors of these monitors, visual identification of individual monitors was not always easy. To make identification easier, it was common practice to paint the turrets of the monitor with unique patterns colored stripes.

The ships were 225 feet (68.6 m) long overall, had a beam of 43 feet 3 inches (13.2 m) and had a maximum draft of 13 feet 6 inches (4.1 m). They had a tonnage of 1,034 tons burthen and displaced 2,100 long tons (2,100 t). Her crew consisted of 100 officers and enlisted men.[2]

They were powered by a two-cylinder horizontal vibrating-lever steam engine that drove one propeller using steam generated by two Stimers horizontal fire-tube boilers. The 320-indicated-horsepower (240 kW) engine gave the ship a top speed of 8 knots (15 km/h; 9.2 mph). They carried 140–150 long tons (140–150 t) of coal. Their main armament consisted of two smoothbore, muzzle-loading, 15-inch (381 mm) Dahlgren guns mounted in a single gun turret. Each gun weighed approximately 43,000 pounds (20,000 kg). They could fire a 350-pound (158.8 kg) shell up to a range of 2,100 yards (1,900 m) at an elevation of +7°.

The exposed sides of the hull were protected by five layers of 1-inch (25 mm) wrought iron plates, backed by wood. The armor of the gun turret and the pilot house consisted of ten layers of one-inch plates. The ship's deck was protected by armor 1.5 inches (38 mm) thick. A 5-by-15-inch (130 by 380 mm) soft iron band was fitted around the base of the turret to prevent shells and fragments from jamming the turret as had happened to earlier monitors during the First Battle of Charleston Harbor in April 1863. The base of the funnel was protected to a height of 6 feet (1.8 m) by 8 inches (200 mm) of armor. A "rifle screen" of 1⁄2-inch (13 mm) armor 3 feet (0.9 m) high was installed on the top of the turret to protect the crew against Confederate snipers based on a suggestion by Commander Tunis A. M. Craven, captain of their sister ship Tecumseh.

The contract for Oneota, the only Navy ship to be named after the Oneota Tribe of the Sioux Indians, and that for 
Catawba, the first Navy ship to be named after the Catawba River in North Carolina
were awarded to Alexander Swift & Company; the ships were laid down in 1862 at their Cincinnati, Ohio shipyard. Oneota was launched on 21 May 1864 and completed on 10 June 1865. Catawba was launched on 13 April 1864 and turned over to the Navy on 7 June 1865. The ships' construction was delayed by multiple changes ordered while they were being built—reflecting battle experience with earlier monitors. This included the rebuilding of the turrets and pilot houses to increase their armor thickness from 8 inches (203 mm) to 10 inches and to replace the bolts that secured their armor plates together with rivets to prevent them from being knocked loose by the shock of impact from shells striking the turret. Other changes included deepening the hull by 18 inches (457 mm) to increase the ship's buoyancy, moving the position of the turret to balance the ship's trim and replacing all of the ship's deck armor. Completion of the ships was further delayed by the low depth of the Ohio River which prevented her movement from Cincinnati in December 1864 to finish fitting out. The river finally rose in March 1865 which allowed the ship to reach Mound City, Illinois on 7 March, where Oneota and Catawba were placed in ordinary after completion, together with their sister Tippecanoe.

The ships needed a deep-water berth and were moved opposite Cairo, Illinois in mid-1865 even though they still had to be anchored in the main channel where they were often struck by debris, drifting ice, and vulnerable to accidents. Tippecanoe's anchor chain was broken on 27 March 1866 when she was struck by a steamboat towing barges and the monitor collided with Oneota and the two ships were dragged 2 miles (3.2 km) downstream before they could be brought under control. This was a persistent problem and the Navy finally decided to move the ships down to New Orleans in May 1866. In August 1867, the Navy turned over Oneota and Catawba to Swift & Co. contingent on a guarantee that they would be returned in good shape if they could not be sold, and the company began refitting them for Peruvian service.

In October 1867, an agent for Swift & Co. negotiated a deal with Peru to purchase Oneota and her sister Catawba for a million dollars apiece. Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy, initially indicated that the company could repurchase the two if it refunded the government's costs to build them, but changed his mind and said that he had no authority to do that. Congress debated the issue and ultimately decided that they would be appraised by a board of officers and that the highest competitive bid in equal to or in excess of the appraised value would be accepted. Each ship was appraised at $375,000 and sold for that amount, possibly after a rigged bid, on 11 April 1868.


4 de octubre 1869: En Iquitos se inicia la expedición de Manuel Melitón Carvajal Ambulódegui, que lo llevará a surcar el Pongo de Manseriche. (La pintura que acompaña esta efemérides adornó la Cámara de Oficiales de la fragata misilera portahelicópteros BAP Carvajal (FM-51) habiendo sido comisionada por el primer Comandante de esta Unidad Naval, CdeN Francisco Vainstein Borrani, a un artista italiano que luego de leer la historia de este héroe naval y ver una foto de el, produjo esta interpretación artística, que muestra al Almirante Carvajal durante la Guerra con Chile, pleno de serenidad)

Cuando el BAP CARVAJAL cumplió 30 años, se celebró una ceremonia a bordo en la que su comandante, Sr. CdeN Santiago LLop, hizo un alocución sobre el Vicealmirante Carvajal.  De ella se ha tomado lo referente a la trayectoria y servicio en Iquitos y la Amazonía del Almirante Carvajal:






4 de octubre 1979: El ministro de Marina, vicealmirante Carlos Tirado Alcorta entrega la condecoración del Mérito Naval a los gestores y autores de la Historia Marítima del Perú.





4 de octubre 1991: Se firma en Madrid un acuerdo por el que se designa a la Antártida reserva natural para la paz y la ciencia. Las naciones signatarias se comprometen a regular sus actividades en la zona, a fin de asegurar la minimización de cualquier tipo de impacto ambiental. 




4 de octubre 2011: La Marina de Guerra y Telefónica anuncian el lanzamiento de la Campaña “Somos Grau, Seámoslo Siempre” y el Premio Nacional Almirante Grau. La ceremonia se realiza a bordo del BAP Almirante Grau. El objetivo es desarrollar valores cívicos patrióticos y morales en la sociedad, similares a los que distinguieron al héroe.


4 de octubre 2016: A raíz de las protestas de los pobladores de las comunidades nativas de Saramurillo, en Loreto, cuyos pobladores se encuentran deteniendo embarcaciones en el río Marañón, la Marina de Guerra dispone el envío de la cañonera fluvial BAP Ucayali y la patrullera fluvial Río Itaya con el fin de asegurar la libre navegación. A las 14:00 horas de este día, la patrullera fluvial Río Itaya brinda seguridad a las embarcaciones que navegan por la zona, entre ellas a la embarcación de pasajeros y carga Eduardo X. 

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