Name USNS Titan (T-AGOS-15) Laid down 30 October 1986 Launched 18 June 1988 | Ordered 30 June 1986 Construction started 30 October 1986 | |
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Namesake A titan is something or someone of very large stature, greatness, or godliness Operator Military Sealift Command Builder VT Halter Marine, Inc., Moss Point, Mississippi | ||
USNS Titan (T-AGOS-15) was a Stalwart-class modified tactical auxiliary general ocean surveillance ship in service in the United States Navy from 1989 to 1993. From 1996 to 2014, she was in commission in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) fleet as the oceanographic research ship NOAAS Ka'imimoana (R 333).
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Construction
The U.S. Navy ordered Titan from VT Halter Marine, Inc., on 30 June 1986. VT Halter Marine laid her down at Moss Point, Mississippi, on 30 October 1986, launched her on 18 June 1988, and delivered her to the U.S. Navy on 8 March 1989.
United States Navy service
On the day of her delivery, the U.S. Navy placed the ship in non-commissioned service in the Military Sealift Command as USNS Titan (T-AGOS-15). Like the other Stalwart-class ships, she was designed to collect underwater acoustical data in support of Cold War anti-submarine warfare operations against Soviet Navy submarines using Surveillance Towed Array Sensor System (SURTASS) sonar equipment. She operated with a mixed crew of U.S. Navy personnel and civilian merchant mariners.
After the Cold War ended with the collapse of the Soviet Union in late December 1991, the requirement for SURTASS collection declined. The Navy took Titan out of service on 31 August 1993 and struck her from the Naval Vessel Register and transferred to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) the same day.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration service
The conversion of Titan into an oceanographic research ship began in May 1995 at the shipyard of Maritime Contractors, Inc., at Bellingham, Washington. Delivered to NOAA in April 1996 after completion of the conversion, the ship was commissioned into NOAA service as NOAAS Ka'imimoana (R 333) on 25 April 1996.
Capabilities
Ka'imimoana has berthing for 33 people in 21 single staterooms and six double staterooms providing her with the capacity to carry up to 12 scientists. She can seat 24 people at a time in two crew's mess rooms, eight in the forward room and 16 in the aft room. She has a medical treatment room with one bunk, overseen by a United States Public Health Service Health Programs Officer.
Ka'imimoana has 950 sq ft (88 m2) of laboratory space. On deck, she has a brailing winch, a CTD winch, three cranes, an A-frame, and a J-frame. She carries two boats, a 22 ft (6.7 m) rigid-hulled inflatable boat (RHIB) as a rescue boat and a 17 ft (5.2 m) inflatable utility boat. She is equipped with echosounders, a hull-mounted acoustic release transducer, a navigation fathometer, X-band and S-band radar, Global Positioning System receivers, a VHF radio direction finder, and a Sperry gyrocompass.
Career
Ka'imimoana was home-ported at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and was the only NOAA ship dedicated solely to climate research. She supported NOAA's Tropical Atmosphere Ocean project, which is designed to improve understanding of the role of the tropical ocean in modifying the world's climate.
Ka'imimoana deployed, recovered, and serviced the National Data Buoy Center's deep-sea moorings—which measure ocean currents, ocean temperatures, and atmospheric variables—in the equatorial Pacific Ocean and transmitted buoy measurements in real time to NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory in Seattle, Washington. She also continuously measured upper ocean currents, surface salinity, carbon dioxide content, and sea-level atmospheric conditions while underway.
Ka'imimoana was retired by NOAA on 18 June 2014. She had been inactive since 2012.