USS Shark (SS-8)

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For other ships with the same name, see USS Shark.
USS Shark (SS-8)
History
United States
NameUSS Shark
Builder
Laid down11 January 1901
Launched19 October 1901
Commissioned19 September 1903
Decommissioned12 December 1919
Stricken16 January 1922
FateSunk as a target
General characteristics
Class and typePlunger-class submarine
Displacement107 long tons (109 t)
Length64 ft (20 m)
Beam12 ft (3.7 m)
Draft11 ft (3.4 m)
Speed
  • 8 kn (9.2 mph; 15 km/h) surfaced
  • 7 kn (8.1 mph; 13 km/h) submerged
Complement7
Armament1 ×
18 inch (450 mm) torpedo tube
USS Porpoise (right) and sister ship USS Shark at New York, 1905

USS Shark (SS-8) was the third vessel of the U.S. Navy to bear the name. She was an early Plunger-class submarine in the service of the United States Navy, later renamed as A-7.

Shark was laid down on 11 January 1901 at

Elizabethport, New Jersey in the Crescent Shipyard under the direction of Crescent's superintendent, Arthur Leopold Busch. She was launched on 19 October 1901, and commissioned on 19 September 1903 at New Suffolk, New York with Lieutenant Charles P. Nelson
in command.

Early service

Over the next three and a half years, Shark operated locally at the

Naval Torpedo Station at Newport, conducting firing tests with torpedoes, and participating in early research and development efforts in the field of undersea warfare. Assigned to the First Submarine Flotilla in March 1907, Shark was stationed at the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland
in the spring of 1907.

Taken to the

collier Caesar, Shark and her sister ship Porpoise comprised the auxiliary's deck cargo as she proceeded, via the Suez Canal, to the Philippines. Shark was launched soon after her arrival at Cavite
in July and was recommissioned on 14 August 1908.

Over the next several years, the submarine torpedo boat operated out of Cavite, interspersing training with periodic upkeep and repair work. On 17 November 1911, Shark was renamed A-7.

World War I

During

Arnold Marcus
assumed command of A-7. On 24 July 1917, shortly after her engine had been overhauled, gasoline fumes ignited and caused an explosion and fire while in the course of a patrol in Manila Bay.

After Marcus and his men had battled the blaze, he ordered the crew topside and into the boats that had been summoned alongside. The last man to emerge from the interior of the crippled submersible, Marcus sent up distress signals to the nearby monitor Monadnock and then took the helm himself in an attempt to beach the ship. He refused medical treatment until all his men had been attended to and he had to be ordered to leave his post. Marcus and six of his crew died the next day, 25 July 1917, from the effects of the explosion and fire that had ravaged A-7. The last remaining member of the crew, Fireman Second Class Arthur M. Jacobs, succumbed to his injuries on 1 August 1917. The Navy recognized Marcus' heroism by naming the destroyer Marcus in his honor.

Later service

Placed

16th Naval District — was subsequently authorized for use as a target in 1921. She was struck from the Naval Vessel Register
on 16 January 1922.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to USS Shark (Submarine Torpedo Boat No. 8) (submarine, 1903).

References

  • Wright, C. C. (2003). "Question 40/02: Submarines Expended as Targets 1922". Warship International. XL (4): 286–298.
    ISSN 0043-0374
    .

Public Domain This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be found here.

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