At 'Em Arizona Fans!

[Jeff Sharp]

Dan, Sean,
Per your request, here is almost the entire ship. Had to splice two shots together to get as much of the ship in one shot as possible. Was able to get a slightly cleaner look at her. Trying now to determine what the object is on the main deck between the main mast post and the back of turret #3. It's pretty tall, almost as tall as the large vents in this area.

[Jeff Sharp]

Another interesting thing about this pic is that she is missing her forward bell.

[Dan K]

Excellent photo. Thx for posting, Jeff.

Looks like some kind of canvas rig to me. You can see the deck underneath, assuming I'm looking at the same thing.

[SeanF]

That's a great shot! Thanks for sharing!

Looks like the range clocks are gone at this point.

- Sean F.

[Jeff Sharp]

Port side

[Dan K]

Dynamic photo.Thx for posting.

[Jeff Sharp]

Here are some rare looks inside Arizona's Deck Office, courtesy of the movie "Here Comes the Navy". This office was for the Officer of the Deck to use for daily operations and communications.
On 12/7/41, just before 8am, the Junior Officer of the Deck, Ensign Henry Davison, sounded the "Air Raid Alarm" from this office. Then he sounded "General Quarters" a few minutes later.
Shortly after that, a bomb glanced off turret #4 on the starboard side and exploded below decks. At this same time, another bomb went through the Executive Officer's Office on the Port Side but failed to detonate. It did start fires there however.
Lt. Comdr. Sam Fuqua then ordered Ensign Davison to call the central engine room to get pressure on the fire mains so that they could extinguish both fires.
As Ensign Davison and the Boatswain's Mate of the Watch entered the Deck Office to call the engine room, the ship exploded. They both survived the explosion and jumped over the side of the ship.

[Tracy White]

OK, who's going to add this compartment to their 1/350 build?

[Jeff Sharp]

This look is a somber one!

This is a view of Crew A-704, main deck level, frames 38-41. In this view we see barbette #1 on the left, W.R.S. 30x36 on the deck, the port side ladder that goes up to the Upper Deck, then on the far right is barbette #2.
The blue dot on this plan marks the location of the camera.



This area was basically ground zero for the explosion.

[Tracy White]

Worth noting that we are looking athwartship from port to starboard and at the far end is one of the portholes in the plated-over removed 5"/51 casemate guns. Jeff stated this was a somber one - for those who haven't paid close attention to the wreck, this area was literally right above the large explosion that doomed Arizona. The blast was contained in large part by the added structure of the blisters below, but blew out the sides of the ship in this area and lifted the overhead (Forecastle deck above) up momentarily before it all collapsed back down into the void left and more or less came to rest on the tops of the torpedo blisters and the support of the barbettes.

[Jeff Sharp]

The bomb went through this compartment on the starboard side.
Some other details worth noting, Barbette #1 is lined with laundry sacks and Barbette #2 is lined with storage lockers. At the base of Barbette #1 you can see a fire port.

This view shows "FR 41" on the upper I-beam.



This next view shows the exact area the bomb went through this compartment. Here we see the starboard ladder and the opening into the other section of A-704.

[Jeff Sharp]

Here's another look at CREW A-704. This shot is at Frame 70, right at the funnel uptake. In this shot, the crew is gathered around a radio, which is up against the 5" Anti-Aircraft ammunition hoist for guns 1-3. Also visible is the heater blower and the starboard forward mast leg.

[Jeff Sharp]

Here is a look at the Executive Officer's Office. As new crew members boarded the ship from one of the gangways on the Main Deck, their first order of business was to report to the Executive Officer's Office for further assignments. This is the location that the very first bomb to strike Arizona hit. It was dropped by the center plane in the V formation. It traveled through this office, went two more decks down into the meat locker and failed to detonate.



In this photo you can see a Marine standing guard next to the opened door. Behind him is a crew member looking through file cabinets which were lined up on that interior bulkhead. Not sure what the crew member that has his back to us is doing.

[El Santo]

My apologies if this has been addressed somewhere in the preceding 130 pages, but does anyone know the current thinking on which of Arizona's superstructure decks had linoleum cladding, and which were just painted steel? I'm focusing on the summer of 1941, so that I can sidestep the vexed question of whether or when she ever had her Dark Gray 5D painted over with Sea Blue 5S, and so that I can use the short-lived Non-Specular Light Gray color scheme on the spotting planes.

[Jeff Sharp]

Unfortunately, there has been no proof presented either way at this point. However you decide to paint her decks, nobody can prove you right or wrong yet. All I've seen at this point is brown decks on California and Idaho, gray decks on Colorado.

[El Santo]

Unfortunately, there has been no proof presented either way at this point. However you decide to paint her decks, nobody can prove you right or wrong yet. All I've seen at this point is brown decks on California and Idaho, gray decks on Colorado.

Do you recall whether all of California's unplanked decks had linoleum, or whether it was a mix of linoleum and painted steel?

[Tracy White]

It would have been a mixture of some sort. Somewhat complicating this is that there were multiple colors of Linoleum used by the Navy. I've been trying to get to an area of records at NARA that discuss decking - but no guarantees that it will actually have anything external, or other than wood or deck paint. As it is just going through camouflage and paint has been extremely slow. I was at NARA last week and made it through one (large) folder of camouflage documentation. It was my first time seeing some other researchers and authors for a while (since before the pandemic in one case) and I will admit to losing about four hours in just talking even if you take lunch out of the equation.

So, hopefully this fall?

For those that are new to this question of appearance - we know the US Navy used linoleum pre-war, and there is even a photo of what we strongly suspect is linoleum on BB Idaho in 1941 posted by Google and Life Magazine. Check out the platform with the flag bags the sailors are standing on.