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Italian aircraft carrier Sparviero

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Sparviero.jpg
Sparviero under construction
History
Italy
Name
  • 1939: Falco
  • 1940: Sparviero
BuilderAnsaldo, Genoa
Launched13 December 1926
CompletedNovember 1927
In service1939–1944
Renamed1939
FateTaken over by the Kriegsmarine
Germany
NameSparviero
FateScuttled in 1944; scrapped, 1946
General characteristics
TypeAircraft carrier
Displacement30418 tons
Length232.5 m (762 ft 10 in)
Beam29.4 m (96 ft 5 in)
Draught7.39 m (24 ft 3 in)
Installed power28,000 horsepower (21,000 kW)
Propulsiondiesels
Speed20 knots (37 km/h; 23 mph)
Capacity1,420 men (including 107 officers)
Armament
  • 8 × 135/45 mm
  • 12 × 65/64 mm
  • 22 machine guns 20/65 mm
Armour
  • 70 mm (vertical)
  • 80 mm (horizontal)
Aircraft carried

Sparviero (Italian: "Sparrowhawk") was an Italian aircraft carrier designed and built during World War II of the Regia Marina. She was originally the ocean liner MS Augustus built in 1927 for Navigazione Generale Italiana, but was transferred to the new Italian Line after the merger of Navigazione Generale Italiana. The conversion was started in 1942 originally under the name Falco but was never completed, and the ship was never delivered to the Regia Marina. She began to be scrapped in 1946, a process completed by 1952.[1]

Discover more about Italian aircraft carrier Sparviero related topics

Italian language

Italian language

Italian is a Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire. Together with Sardinian, Italian is the least divergent language from Latin. Spoken by about 85 million people (2022), Italian is an official language in Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, and Vatican City. It has official minority status in Croatia and in some areas of Slovenian Istria.

Aircraft carrier

Aircraft carrier

An aircraft carrier is a warship that serves as a seagoing airbase, equipped with a full-length flight deck and facilities for carrying, arming, deploying, and recovering aircraft. Typically, it is the capital ship of a fleet, as it allows a naval force to project air power worldwide without depending on local bases for staging aircraft operations. Carriers have evolved since their inception in the early twentieth century from wooden vessels used to deploy balloons to nuclear-powered warships that carry numerous fighters, strike aircraft, helicopters, and other types of aircraft. While heavier aircraft such as fixed-wing gunships and bombers have been launched from aircraft carriers, these aircraft have not landed on a carrier. By its diplomatic and tactical power, its mobility, its autonomy and the variety of its means, the aircraft carrier is often the centerpiece of modern combat fleets. Tactically or even strategically, it replaced the battleship in the role of flagship of a fleet. One of its great advantages is that, by sailing in international waters, it does not interfere with any territorial sovereignty and thus obviates the need for overflight authorizations from third-party countries, reduces the times and transit distances of aircraft and therefore significantly increase the time of availability on the combat zone.

World War II

World War II

World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a global conflict that lasted from 1939 to 1945. The vast majority of the world's countries, including all of the great powers, fought as part of two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis. Many participants threw their economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities behind this total war, blurring the distinction between civilian and military resources. Aircraft played a major role, enabling the strategic bombing of population centres and the delivery of the only two nuclear weapons ever used in war.

Regia Marina

Regia Marina

The Regia Marina or Royal Italian Navy was the navy of the Kingdom of Italy from 1861 to 1946. In 1946, with the birth of the Italian Republic, the Regia Marina changed its name to Marina Militare.

Ocean liner

Ocean liner

An ocean liner is a type of passenger ship primarily used for transportation across seas or oceans. Ocean liners may also carry cargo or mail, and may sometimes be used for other purposes. Only one ocean liner remains in service today.

MS Augustus (1926)

MS Augustus (1926)

MS Augustus was a combined ocean liner and cruise ship built in 1927 for Navigazione Generale Italiana. The ship was later transferred to the new Italian Line after the merger of Navigazione Generale Italiana. During World War 2 the Roma was converted into an aircraft carrier and renamed as Falco. In 1944, both ships were taken over by the German troops but, on 25 September of that year she was scuttled. After the war she was raised and scrapped in 1946. sister ship was SS Roma.

Navigazione Generale Italiana

Navigazione Generale Italiana

Navigazione Generale Italiana (NGI) was an Italian shipping company.

Italian Line

Italian Line

Italian Line and from 1992 Italia Line, whose official name was Italia di Navigazione S.p.A., was a passenger shipping line that operated regular transatlantic services between Italy and the United States, and Italy and South America. During the late 1960s the company turned to running cruises, and from 1981 it became a global freight operator.

Service History

As MS Augustus

MS Augustus and her sistership, were a group combined ocean liner and cruise ship built in 1927 for Navigazione Generale Italiana. She was launched in December 1926 at the Ansaldo Shipyard and was christened by Edda Mussolini (daughter of dictator Benito Mussolini). The ship was later transferred to the new Italian Line after the merger of Navigazione Generale Italiana. When the war started in 1939, she and her sister ship, the Roma were laid up before Commissioned by the Royal Italian Navy (Regia Marina).[2]

As Sparviero

The Sparviero in early 1943
The Sparviero in early 1943

In 1936, a project to transform the 30,418 GRT ocean liner Augustus into an auxiliary carrier was prepared. The idea was initially abandoned but then resumed in 1942.

The passenger ship Augustus was first renamed Falco in 1939 and then to Sparviero in 1940. The project resumed the one developed by the Colonel of the Naval Engineers Luigi Gagnotto and the transformation works began in September 1942 in the Ansaldo Shipyards in Genoa.

The superstructure was to be removed. She would have also been equipped with a single hangar with two lifts and fitted with a flight deck that ended 45 meters (148 ft) before the bow. The main armament would have been placed at the sides of the forecastle at the level of the hangar deck, and at the stern and there was no island structure because the exhaust gases of the diesel engines would have been expelled laterally below the level of the flight deck.[1]

She would have had a narrow flight deck. Her air group was to be either 34 fighters or 16 fighters and 9 torpedo bombers. The propulsion plant was to remain unchanged, the diesel engines giving an estimated speed of under 20 knots.[2]

The Sparviero was going to have an armament of six 152 mm guns and four of 102, as well as several anti-aircraft machine gun positions.

Wreck of Sparviero in Genoa, 1944
Wreck of Sparviero in Genoa, 1944

The conversion began in September 1942, the work undertaken by the Ansaldo Shipyard in Genoa. Apart from removing the superstructure little else was done before the Italian capitulation in September 1943.[1] The hull was captured by the Germans and was sunk on 5 October 1944 to block access to the port of Genoa. The wreckage was recovered after the war and finally scrapped in 1951.

Like Sparviero, the Italian aircraft carrier Aquila, a modification of the sister ship of Augustus, SS Roma, was scuttled and scrapped before the conversion into the aircraft carrier was finished.

These two ships were the last attempts to build aircraft carriers for the Italian Navy until 1981, when work began on Giuseppe Garibaldi.

Discover more about Service History related topics

MS Augustus (1926)

MS Augustus (1926)

MS Augustus was a combined ocean liner and cruise ship built in 1927 for Navigazione Generale Italiana. The ship was later transferred to the new Italian Line after the merger of Navigazione Generale Italiana. During World War 2 the Roma was converted into an aircraft carrier and renamed as Falco. In 1944, both ships were taken over by the German troops but, on 25 September of that year she was scuttled. After the war she was raised and scrapped in 1946. sister ship was SS Roma.

Ocean liner

Ocean liner

An ocean liner is a type of passenger ship primarily used for transportation across seas or oceans. Ocean liners may also carry cargo or mail, and may sometimes be used for other purposes. Only one ocean liner remains in service today.

Cruise ship

Cruise ship

Cruise ships are large passenger ships used mainly for vacationing. Unlike ocean liners, which are used for transport, cruise ships typically embark on round-trip voyages to various ports-of-call, where passengers may go on tours known as "shore excursions". On "cruises to nowhere" or "nowhere voyages", cruise ships make two- to three-night round trips without visiting any ports of call.

Navigazione Generale Italiana

Navigazione Generale Italiana

Navigazione Generale Italiana (NGI) was an Italian shipping company.

Edda Mussolini

Edda Mussolini

Edda Ciano, Countess of Cortellazzo and Buccari was the daughter of Benito Mussolini, Italy's fascist dictator from 1922 to 1943. Her husband, the fascist propagandist and Foreign Minister Galeazzo Ciano, was executed in January 1944 for his role in Mussolini's ouster. She strongly denied her involvement in the National Fascist Party regime after her father's execution by the Italian partisans in April 1945.

Benito Mussolini

Benito Mussolini

Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was an Italian dictator and journalist who founded and led the National Fascist Party (PNF). He was Prime Minister of Italy from the March on Rome in 1922 until his deposition in 1943, as well as "Duce" of Italian fascism from the establishment of the Italian Fasces of Combat in 1919 until his summary execution in 1945 by Italian partisans. As dictator of Italy and principal founder of fascism, Mussolini inspired and supported the international spread of fascist movements during the inter-war period.

Italian Line

Italian Line

Italian Line and from 1992 Italia Line, whose official name was Italia di Navigazione S.p.A., was a passenger shipping line that operated regular transatlantic services between Italy and the United States, and Italy and South America. During the late 1960s the company turned to running cruises, and from 1981 it became a global freight operator.

Genoa

Genoa

Genoa is a city in and the capital of the Italian region of Liguria, and the sixth-largest city in Italy. In 2015, 594,733 people lived within the city's administrative limits. As of the 2011 Italian census, the Province of Genoa, which in 2015 became the Metropolitan City of Genoa, had 855,834 resident persons. Over 1.5 million people live in the wider metropolitan area stretching along the Italian Riviera.

Hangar

Hangar

A hangar is a building or structure designed to hold aircraft or spacecraft. Hangars are built of metal, wood, or concrete. The word hangar comes from Middle French hanghart, of Germanic origin, from Frankish *haimgard, from *haim and gard ("yard"). The term, gard, comes from the Old Norse garðr.

Flight deck

Flight deck

The flight deck of an aircraft carrier is the surface from which its aircraft take off and land, essentially a miniature airfield at sea. On smaller naval ships which do not have aviation as a primary mission, the landing area for helicopters and other VTOL aircraft is also referred to as the flight deck. The official U.S. Navy term for these vessels is "air-capable ships".

Fighter aircraft

Fighter aircraft

Fighter aircraft are fixed-wing military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat. In military conflict, the role of fighter aircraft is to establish air superiority of the battlespace. Domination of the airspace above a battlefield permits bombers and attack aircraft to engage in tactical and strategic bombing of enemy targets.

Italian aircraft carrier Aquila

Italian aircraft carrier Aquila

Aquila was an Italian aircraft carrier converted from the trans-Atlantic passenger liner SS Roma. During World War II, Work on Aquila began in late 1941 at the Ansaldo shipyard in Genoa and continued for the next two years. With the signing of the Italian armistice on 8 September 1943, however, all work was halted and the vessel remained unfinished. Aquila was eventually scrapped in 1952.

Source: "Italian aircraft carrier Sparviero", Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, (2022, November 24th), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_aircraft_carrier_Sparviero.

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Notes
  1. ^ a b c Sparviero in summer 1943
  2. ^ a b "The Real Sparviero Aircraft Carrier".
Bibliography
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