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Section Patrol Craft Photo Archive

USC&GS Surveyor



Call sign (1919):
George - Vice - Sail - Jig

ex-USS Surveyor

Surveyor served both the U. S. Navy and the Coast and Geodetic Survey.
Survey Ship:

  • Built in 1917 as USC&GS Surveyor by the Manitowoc Shipbuilding Co., Manitowoc, WI
  • Acquired by the Navy 24 September 1917
  • Commissioned USS Surveyor 22 October 1917
  • Struck from the Navy list 31 October 1919 and returned to the Coast and Geodetic Survey
  • She then proceeded to the West Coast via the Panama Canal. For the next 36 years Surveyor worked in the waters of the North Pacific and Bering Sea
  • During World War II it conducted defense related surveys in Aleutian waters
  • This vessel is commemorated by the naming a bay in Alaskan waters "Surveyor Bay"
  • Scrapped in 1956.

    Specifications:

  • Displacement 1,143 t.
    1919 - 1,000 t.
  • Length 186'
    1919 - 172.8'
  • Beam 34'
  • Draft 12'
  • Speed 13.3 kts.
    1919 - 12 kts.
  • Complement 85
    1919 - 69
  • Armament: Two 3" mounts and two machine guns
    World War II - One 3"/50 dual purpose mount and four 20mm mounts
  • Propulsion: Two 660.5ihp steam engines, two shafts.
    Click on thumbnail
    for full size image    		 Size Image Description Source
    Surveyor 71k Surveyor possibly photographed at the time of her completion at Manitowoc, Wisconsin, 1917
    Naval Historical Center photo NH 105641    		 Robert Hurst
    Surveyor 56k . Historical Collections of the Great Lakes
    Surveyor 150k c. 1927
    Prince William Sound, AK
    Courtesy of NOAA Photo Library, NOAA Central Library; Family of Rear Admiral Paul A. Smith, C&GS    		 NOAA Website
    Surveyor 146k c. 1942
    Sand Point, Shumagan Islands, AK
    Courtesy of NOAA Photo Library, NOAA Central Library; C&GS Season's Report Sosbee 1942-73
    Surveyor 126k c. Spring 1944
    Aleutian Islands, AK
    Courtesy of Captain Harry D. Reed, C&GS
    Surveyor 141k c. 1944
    Adak, Aleutian Islands, AK
    Courtesy of Captain Harry D. Reed, C&GS
    Surveyor 109k 2 October 1944
    Courtesy of NOAA Office of NOAA Corps Operations
    View the Surveyor
    DANFS history entry located on the Naval Historical Center website
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