Ulithi
Encyclopedia
Atoll
An atoll is a coral island that encircles a lagoon partially or completely.- Usage :The word atoll comes from the Dhivehi word atholhu OED...
in the Caroline Islands
Caroline Islands
The Caroline Islands are a widely scattered archipelago of tiny islands in the western Pacific Ocean, to the north of New Guinea. Politically they are divided between the Federated States of Micronesia in the eastern part of the group, and Palau at the extreme western end...
of the western Pacific Ocean
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.At 165.2 million square kilometres in area, this largest division of the World...
, about 191 km (103 nautical mi) east of Yap
Yap
Yap, also known as Wa'ab by locals, is an island in the Caroline Islands of the western Pacific Ocean. It is a state of the Federated States of Micronesia. Yap's indigenous cultures and traditions are still strong compared to other neighboring islands. The island of Yap actually consists of four...
. It consists of 40 islet
Islet
An islet is a very small island.- Types :As suggested by its origin as islette, an Old French diminutive of "isle", use of the term implies small size, but little attention is given to drawing an upper limit on its applicability....
s totalling 4.5 km² (1.7 sq mi), surrounding a lagoon
Lagoon
A lagoon is a body of shallow sea water or brackish water separated from the sea by some form of barrier. The EU's habitat directive defines lagoons as "expanses of shallow coastal salt water, of varying salinity or water volume, wholly or partially separated from the sea by sand banks or shingle,...
about 36 km (22.4 mi) long and up to 24 km (14.9 mi) wide—at 548 km² (211.6 sq mi) one of the largest in the world. It is administered by the state of Yap in the Federated States of Micronesia
Federated States of Micronesia
The Federated States of Micronesia or FSM is an independent, sovereign island nation, made up of four states from west to east: Yap, Chuuk, Pohnpei and Kosrae. It comprises approximately 607 islands with c...
. Ulithi's population was 773 in 2000. There are four inhabited islands on Ulithi Atoll. They are Falalop, Asor, Mogmog, and Fedarai. Falalop is the most accessible with an air strip, a small resort hotel, gas dealership, store and one of three public high schools in Yap state. Mogmog is the seat of the high chief of Ulithi Atoll though each island has its own chief.
Ulithi was a major staging area for the U.S. Navy in the final year of the Second World War. Several sunken warships rest at the bottom of the Ulithi lagoon, including the USS Mississinewa
USS Mississinewa (AO-59)
USS Mississinewa was the first of two United States Navy ships of the name. She was a T3-S2-A3 Auxiliary Oiler of the US Navy, laid down on 5 October 1943 by the Bethlehem Sparrows Point Shipyard, Inc., Sparrows Point, Maryland; launched on 28 March 1944; sponsored by Miss Margaret Pence; and...
, a fully loaded fleet oiler. The sunken tanker was found to be seeping oil into the lagoon. The United States Navy
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...
responded, locating the tanker, tapping her storage tanks, and pumping off her oil. The clean up operation was completed in February 2003.
The atoll offers good fishing and diving, though recent typhoons have eroded some of the reefs.
Census
Census
A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. It is a regularly occurring and official count of a particular population. The term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common...
records can be misleading because population can fluctuate during the year both because it is common for Ulithians to leave for work or school abroad and to return. This is particularly true during festive times like the Outer Island High School graduation ceremony, when the population can increase considerably. Additionally, during events like wedding
Wedding
A wedding is the ceremony in which two people are united in marriage or a similar institution. Wedding traditions and customs vary greatly between cultures, ethnic groups, religions, countries, and social classes...
s and funeral
Funeral
A funeral is a ceremony for celebrating, sanctifying, or remembering the life of a person who has died. Funerary customs comprise the complex of beliefs and practices used by a culture to remember the dead, from interment itself, to various monuments, prayers, and rituals undertaken in their honor...
s, Yasor's population may double.
Electricity is now available on some islands, and the advent of video players and cell phones
Mobile phone
A mobile phone is a device which can make and receive telephone calls over a radio link whilst moving around a wide geographic area. It does so by connecting to a cellular network provided by a mobile network operator...
have brought a touch of the outside world to this very isolated atoll. Occasional diving and adventure tours visit Ulithi from Yap.
History
The first European to find Ulithi was the PortuguesePortugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...
navigator Diego da Rocha, in 1526, but it remained undisturbed by Europeans until rediscovered by Captain Don Bernard de Egui in 1712, and later visited by Spanish Jesuit missionaries led by Juan Antonio Cantova in 1731.
Germany purchased the islands from Spain in 1898. They were occupied in 1914 by Japan at the outset of the First World War. Japan received them in 1920 as a League of Nations mandate.
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese had established a radio and weather station
Weather station
A weather station is a facility, either on land or sea, with instruments and equipment for observing atmospheric conditions to provide information for weather forecasts and to study the weather and climate. The measurements taken include temperature, barometric pressure, humidity, wind speed, wind...
on Ulithi and had used the lagoon as an anchorage occasionally early in the war, but had abandoned it by 1944.
Ulithi was perfectly positioned to act as a staging area for the US Navy's western Pacific operations. The atoll is in the westernmost of the Caroline Islands, 360 miles (579.4 km) southwest of Guam, 850 miles (1,367.9 km) east of the Philippines and 1300 miles (2,092.1 km) south of Tokyo. It is a typical volcanic atoll, with a coral reef, white sand beaches and palm trees. Ulithi's forty small islands barely rise above the sea, with the largest being only half a square mile in area. However the reef runs roughly twenty miles north and south by ten miles across, enclosing a vast anchorage with an average depth of 80 to 100 feet (30.5 m). The anchorage was well situated, but there were no port facilities to repair ships or re-supply the fleet.
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Seabee
Seabees are members of the United States Navy construction battalions. The word Seabee is a proper noun that comes from the initials of Construction Battalion, of the United States Navy...
s. The survey ship USS Sumner
USS Sumner (AGS-5)
USS Sumner was a survey ship in the United States Navy. She was named in honor of Thomas Sumner. She was originally commissioned as a submarine tender as USS Bushnell , in honor of David Bushnell, the inventor of the first American submarine.- USS Bushnell :Bushnell was launched 9 February 1915 by...
surveyed the lagoon and reported it capable of holding 700 vessels. It became the undisclosed Pacific base for the major operations late in the war, including Leyte Gulf
Battle of Leyte Gulf
The Battle of Leyte Gulf, also called the "Battles for Leyte Gulf", and formerly known as the "Second Battle of the Philippine Sea", is generally considered to be the largest naval battle of World War II and, by some criteria, possibly the largest naval battle in history.It was fought in waters...
and the Okinawa operation
Battle of Okinawa
The Battle of Okinawa, codenamed Operation Iceberg, was fought on the Ryukyu Islands of Okinawa and was the largest amphibious assault in the Pacific War of World War II. The 82-day-long battle lasted from early April until mid-June 1945...
. The huge anchorage capacity was greater than either Majuro
Majuro
Majuro , is a large coral atoll of 64 islands in the Pacific Ocean, and forms a legislative district of the Ratak Chain of the Marshall Islands. The atoll itself has a land area of and encloses a lagoon of...
or Pearl Harbor, and over seven hundred ships anchored there at a time.
The US Navy transferred the local islanders to Fedarai for the duration of their use of the lagoon. Next came what Admiral Nimitz called his "secret weapon", Service Squadron 10. Commanding officer Commodore Worrall R. Carter devised the miraculous mobile service force that made it possible for the Navy to create repair facilities and re-supply facilities thousands of miles away from an actual Naval port. Service Squadron 10 was called upon to convert the lagoon into a servicable naval station. Pontoon piers of a new design were built at Ulithi, each consisting of the 4-by-12-pontoon sections, filled with sand and gravel, and then sunk. The pontoons were anchored in place by guy ropes to deadmen on shore, and by iron rods driven into the coral. Connecting tie pieces ran across the tops of the pontoons to hold them together into a pier. Despite extremely heavy weather on several occasions these pontoon piers stood up remarkably well. They gave extensive service, with little requirement for repairs. Piers of this type were also installed by the 51st Battalion to be used as aviation-gasoline mooring piers near the main airfield on Falalop.
Within a month of the occupation of Ulithi, a whole floating base was in operation. Six thousand ship fitters, artificers, welders, carpenters, and electricians arrived aboard repair ships, destroyer tenders, and floating dry docks. The USS Ajax
USS Ajax (AR-6)
USS Ajax was the second Vulcan-class repair ship and the fourth ship in the United States Navy to bear the name.-1941-1945:Ajax was laid down on 7 May 1941 at San Pedro, California, by the Los Angeles Shipbuilding and Drydock Corp., launched on 22 August 1942; sponsored by Mrs. Isaac C. Johnson...
had an air-conditioned optical shop and a metal fabrication shop with a supply of base metals from which she could make any alloy to form any part needed. The USS Abatan
USS Abatan (AW-4)
USS Abatan was a Pasig-class distilling ship built for the United States Navy during World War II, named for a river located in the southwestern part of Bohol Island in the Philippines....
, which looked like a big tanker, really distilled fresh water and baked bread and pies. The ice cream barge made 500 gallons a shift. The dry docks towed to Ulithi were large enough to lift dry a 45,000 ton battleship. Fleet oilers sortied to and from Ulithi to meet the task forces at sea, refueling the warships a short distance from their combat operational areas. The result was something never seen before: a vast floating service station enabling the entire Pacific fleet to operate indefinitely at unprecedented distances from its mainland bases. Ulithi was as far away from the US Naval base at San Francisco as San Francisco was from London, England. The Japanese had considered that the vastness of the Pacific Ocean would make it very difficult for the US to sustain operations in the western Pacific. With the Ulithi naval base to refit, repair and resupply, many ships were able to deploy and operate in the western Pacific for a year or more without returning to the Naval base at Pearl Harbor.
The Japanese had built an airstrip on Falalop. It was expanded and resurfaced, the runway running the full width of the island. The east end of the strip was extended approximately twenty feet past the natural shoreline. A number of small strips for light aircraft were built on several of the smaller islands. The Seabees completed a fleet recreation center at Mogmog island that could accommodate 8,000 men and 1,000 officers daily. A 1,200-seat theatre, including a 25-by-40-foot stage with a Quonset hut
Quonset hut
A Quonset hut is a lightweight prefabricated structure of corrugated galvanized steel having a semicircular cross section. The design was based on the Nissen hut developed by the British during World War I...
roof was completed in 20 days. At the same time, a 500-seat chapel was built. A number of the larger islands were used as recreational facilities and used as bases to support naval vessels and facilities within the lagoon.
The Japanese still held Yap. Early after the US occupation they mounted a number of attacks but caused no damage to the Seabees working on the islands.
On 20 November 1944 the Ulithi harbor was attacked by Japanese kaiten human torpedoes launched from two nearby submarines. The destroyer USS Case
USS Case (DD-370)
USS Case was a in the United States Navy during World War II. She was the second ship named for Augustus Ludlow Case.Case was launched 14 September 1935 by Boston Navy Yard, Boston, Massachusetts; sponsored by Miss M. R. Case; commissioned 15 September 1936, Commander J. S...
rammed one in the early morning hours. At 5:47 the fleet oiler USS Mississinewa
USS Mississinewa (AO-59)
USS Mississinewa was the first of two United States Navy ships of the name. She was a T3-S2-A3 Auxiliary Oiler of the US Navy, laid down on 5 October 1943 by the Bethlehem Sparrows Point Shipyard, Inc., Sparrows Point, Maryland; launched on 28 March 1944; sponsored by Miss Margaret Pence; and...
, at anchor in the harbor, was struck and sunk. Destroyers began dropping depth charges throughout the anchorage. After the war Japanese naval officers said that two tender submarines each carrying four manned torpedoes had been sent to attack the fleet at Ulithi. Three of the suicide torpedoes were unable to launch due to mechanical problems and another ran aground on the reef. Two did make it into the lagoon, one of which sank the USS Mississinewa. A second kaiten attack in January 1945 was foiled when the I-48 was sunk by the destroyer escort USS Conklin
USS Conklin (DE-439)
USS Conklin was a John C. Butler-class destroyer escort acquired by the U.S. Navy during World War II. The primary purpose of the destroyer escort was to escort and protect ships in convoy, in addition to other tasks as assigned, such as patrol or radar picket...
. None of the 122 men aboard survived.
_under_repair.jpg)
Kamikaze
The were suicide attacks by military aviators from the Empire of Japan against Allied naval vessels in the closing stages of the Pacific campaign of World War II, designed to destroy as many warships as possible....
attack on the naval base in a mission called Operation Tan No. 2
Operation Tan No. 2
Operation Tan No. 2 was a long-range Kamikaze mission directed at the main Allied naval fleet anchorage at Ulithi atoll in the western Pacific on March 11, 1945 during the Pacific campaign of World War II. The Japanese hoped to take the U.S...
. One struck the Essex-class aircraft carrier USS Randolph
USS Randolph (CV-15)
USS Randolph was one of 24 s built during World War II for the United States Navy. The second US Navy ship to bear the name, she was named for Peyton Randolph, president of the First Continental Congress. Randolph was commissioned in October 1944, and served in several campaigns in the Pacific...
, causing moderate damage and killing a number of crewmen. The other mistook the baseball field on Mogmog for an aircraft carrier.
By March 13 there were 647 ships at anchor at Ulithi, and with the arrival of amphibious forces staging for the invasion of Okinawa the number of ships at anchor peaked at 722.
After Leyte Gulf was secured, the Pacific Fleet moved its forward staging area to Leyte, and Ulithi was all but abandoned. In the end, few US civilians ever heard of Ulithi. By the time Naval security cleared release of the name, there were no longer reasons to print stories about it. The war had moved on, but for seven months in late 1944 and early 1945, the large lagoon of the Ulithi atoll was the largest and most active anchorage in the world.
Language
In an annual report released in early 2010, the HabeleHabele
The Habele Outer Island Education Fund is a small South Carolina–based charitable organization serving the low-lying atolls of Yap State and Chuuk State in the Federated States of Micronesia...
charity announced plans to develop and distribute native language materials for educators and students in the outer islands of Yap State, Micronesia. The first project was a Ulithian to English dictionary. This was the first rigorous documentation of the Ulithian language
Ulithian language
Ulithian is the name of the language spoken on Ulithi atoll and neighboring islands. Ulithian is one of the 6 official languages of the Federated States of Micronesia. There are some 3,000 speakers, although only 700 of these live on Ulithi atoll....
and copies were provided to educators and students throughout Ulithi and Fais
Fais Island
Fais Island is a raised coral island in the eastern Caroline Islands in the Pacific Ocean, and forms a legislative district in Yap State in the Federated States of Micronesia...
The authors' stated aim was to create a consistent and intuitive pattern of Roman alphabet spelling useful for both native Ulithian and native English speakers.
External links
- Ulithi South Pacific Naval Base George Spangler, March 1998
- Community-2.webtv.net/ebb26/ULITHI (note factual inconsistencies with Morison)
- Ulithi World War II Project
- Account of the March 11, 1945 kamikaze attack on Randolph.
- Habele, an educational charity serving Ulithi