1 FEB 44
February 1st found Princeton and TG 58.4 "steaming en route to a fueling rendezvous eastward of the Marshall Islands area, having completed three days of air strikes against WOTJE and TAROA ISLANDS. ... Air Group 23 is embarked, less operational loss of 1 VT and combat loss of 1 VF aircraft. Embarked in the capacity of an observer, is Captain William H. BURACKER, USN, awaiting orders from the Immediate Superior in Command to relieve Captain George R. HENDERSON, USN, as Commanding Officer."
From 1002 until 1234, Princeton was underway alongside USS CALIENTE engaged in UNREP, "having received 245,000 gallons of Navy special fuel oil and 29,000 gallons of aviation gasoline."
USS Caliente (AO-53) was commissioned in October 1943 and served for 30 years, being decommissioned and stricken from the rolls on the same day, 15 December, in 1973. She had arrived at Pearl Harbor one day prior to Princeton and shortly thereafter was underway in support of the planned assault on the Marshalls. During her illustrious career, she was awarded a total of 22 battle stars for her service in WWII, Korea and Vietnam. I would say American taxpayers got their money's worth from Caliente.
The majority of the day was spent flying CAP and A/S missions, with one F6F launched "to break in new engine*."
Throughout the day various fleet courses and periods of zigzagging were ordered as Princeton made her way to an intercept station at 10˚00'N, 164˚00'E to carry out "Secret Serial 009, dated 12 January 1944, denying the use of the airfield at ENGEBI ISLAND and ENIWETOK ATOLL in the western Marshall Islands to the enemy during the process of occupying and building an airfield on KWAJALEIN ATOLL by our forces."
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* In my day this hop would be called a "PMCF," or Post-Maintenance Check Flight. PMCFs were usually gobs of fun, assuming everything worked as it was supposed to. A checklist of items to test would be provided by the Maintenance Department's Quality Assurance folks and, once airborne and those items were methodically tested and ticked off as operating satisfactorily, whatever gas remaining could be used pretty much at the individual pilot's discretion. At sea in the Pacific there were more often than not always some good "puffies" around that provided the opportunity to do some "cloud roundup," flying straight up the sides of giant cumulus buildups, matching the curve over the top, and then straight down the other side. And yes, I sometimes felt like I was stealing.
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