USS Hazard (AM-240)

USS Hazard (AM-240)

USS Hazard at Freedom Park in Omaha, Nebraska.
History
Name:	Hazard
Builder:	Winslow Marine Railway & Shipbuilding Company
Laid down:	1944
Launched:	21 May 1944
Commissioned:	21 October 1944
Decommissioned:	27 July 1946
Reclassified:	MSF-240 7 February 1955
Struck:	1971
Motto:	No Sweep, No Invasion
Honors and awards:	3 Battle Stars
Status:	Museum ship since 1971 at Freedom Park, Omaha, Nebraska
General characteristics
Class & type:	Admirable-class minesweeper
Displacement:	530 tons
Length:	184 ft 6 in (56.24 m)
Beam:	33 ft (10 m)
Draft:	9 ft 9 in (2.97 m)
Propulsion:	Two 1,710shp Cooper Bessemer GSB-8 diesel engines, National Supply Co. single reduction gear, two shafts.
Speed:	15 knots (27.8 km/h)
Complement:	104
Armament:	1 × 3"/50 caliber gun 6 × Oerlikon 20 mm cannon 4 × Bofors 40 mm guns (2×2) 2 × Depth charge projectors (K-guns) 2 × Depth charge tracks
Service record
Part of:	US Pacific Fleet (1944-1946)
Awards:	3 Battle stars
USS Hazard (AM-240)
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. National Historic Landmark
Coordinates
Built	1944
Architect	Winslow Marine Railway
Architectural style	Other
NRHP Reference #	79003712
Added to NRHP	1 January 1979

USS Hazard (AM-240) was an Admirable-class minesweeper that served in the United States Navy during World War II.

Hazard was launched on 1 October 1944 and was commissioned on 30 December 1944. The vessel was built by the Winslow Marine Railway and Shipbuilding Corporation of Winslow, Washington. Hazard was fitted for both wire and acoustic sweeping and could double as an anti-submarine warfare platform. The Admirable class of minesweepers were also used for patrol and escort duties.

Hazard first served in this capacity, escorting a convoy from San Francisco to Pearl Harbor, and then running with convoys to Eniwetok and Ulithi. In March 1945, the sweeper was sent to Okinawa, where she first performed anti-submarine patrols before sweeping the waters off Kerama Retto in keeping with the minesweeper's slogan, "No Sweep, No Invasion."

At the war's end the ship cleared the seas off Korea and Japan for the occupation forces.

Returning to the United States in 1946, Hazard was decommissioned and joined the reserve fleet. Stricken from the Navy Register in 1971, Hazard was purchased by a group of Omaha, Nebraska, businessmen and placed on public display. She also bears the camouflage paint she had during WWII. She is open to the public along with the submarine USS Marlin (SST-2), an A-4 Skyhawk, an A-7 Corsair II, and an HH-52A Seaguard US Coast Guard helicopter at Freedom Park on the Missouri River waterfront in East Omaha.

Hazard earned three battle stars for her World War II service.

Hazard is a National Historic Landmark, the only Admirable-class minesweeper left in the United States. Her sister ship, the USS Inaugural (AM-242) was a museum ship in St. Louis until she was destroyed in the Great Flood of 1993.

See also

• List of Admirable class minesweepers