"The Mighty Stinger"-USS Wasp CV-18

Radio Control Boat Modeler, Jun 2004 by O'Byrne, Molly

FOUR RHODE ISLAND VETERANS joined forces in 2000 to re-create a slice of American history. Assisted by a fellow vet from Chicago, they worked to construct a 1/32-scale model of the aircraft carrier USS Wasp (CV-18). Commissioned in 1943, it was the ninth in a series of American fighting ships to carry the name "Wasp" (the first was commissioned in 1775).

The '43 Wasp was nearly 1,000 feet long and had a 192-foot-wide flight deck. Built by Bethlehem Steel, it had three aircraft elevators and two catapults. This Wasp saw considerable combat in the Pacific and was damaged by an explosion in March 1945. After the War, the Wasp was refitted to accommodate jet aircraft. In the mid-'60s, its crews fished five pairs of U.S. astronauts out of the drink at the conclusion of various space missions. The carrier was decommissioned in 1972 and sold for scrap the next year.

Former USS Wasp crewman Ralph Mills, a member of Rhode Island's Quonset Air Museum (QAM; qam-ri.com), conceived the idea of building the model as a way to keep the memories alive for all former CV-18 crewmen. Ralph is what's known as a "plank owner"; that is, he served aboard the newly christened, 1943 Wasp. Funded by grant money from the USS Wasp Association, of which he is a director, Ralph recruited former Navy man Stanley Essex and Air Force vet Mike Jackson, who told RC Boat Modeler, "I took a lot of ribbing from the other guys; they kept reminding me that the bow was the pointy end of the ship!"

Mike added, "I was hired because I could read plans, but I found out that there was no plan-just a 20-inch Revel model of the Wasp, a calculator and a pair of calipers!" Stan and Mike created preliminary drawings, designing their model from the keel upward. They decided to make the structural rib stations 3 feet apart for the model's entire length, but they weren't sure which material to use for the flight deck, which would be exposed to the elements. Mike set to work building the hull under a tent on the museum grounds, and the keel was laid in April 2001.

Then Bob Miniati, chief hull technician and a ship's carpenter on the Wasp from 1959 to 1966, joined the project. After a few weeks, he had built the entire upper half of the ship. He solved the flight-deck dilemma by making it out of a weatherproof, polyresin composite. And when Mike had difficulty framing the fantail because of its many compound curves, carpenter Bob Kerkhoven of Chicago-another Wasp veteran-traveled to Rhode Island to help out. Award-winning builder Ron Eminger supplied the model aircraft for the Wasp's flight deck.

The 35-foot-long model is permanently bolted to a 40-foot trailer-a reclamation story in itself! It's the trailer that held a model of the ship back in the '70s. In 2000, the guys found it rotting at a U.S. Army-owned site in Worcester, MA: they convinced military officials to let them have it and then restored it so it could hold their Wasp.

Although several of these dedicated builders experienced serious illnesses while trying to finish the project, they succeeded nonetheless, and the model was christened on Veterans Day 2003. The model is stored and exhibited at QAM, and it's already beloved by the state's schoolchildren, who get a real kick out of seeing a huge model aircraft carrier up close. Once again, "The Mighty Stinger" rules!