USS Runner (SS-476)
History of the USS Runner Submarine
The USS Runner (SS-476) was ordered for the U.S. Navy during World War II. Her keel was laid down at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in New Hampshire on July 10, 1944. She was launched on October 17, 1944 and commissioned on February 6, 1945 under the command of Commander R.H. Bass.
The USS Runner arrived at Pearl Harbor on May 21, 1945. Her first war patrol began on June 25 in the waters east of Honshu. On July 10, she sank the Japanese minesweeper W-27 with her torpedoes. She took aboard 16 downed aviators from the USS Gabilan and the USS Aspro. This patrol ended at Guam on July 24.
On August 4, the USS Runner got underway for her second and final war patrol off the east coast of Honshu. The war had ended by the time she reached her station, and she entered Tokyo Bay on August 31 to witness the formal surrender ceremony. She sailed for home on September 3, arriving home at New London, Connecticut on October 6.
The USS Runner shifted her base of operations to Balboa, Panama on February 14, 1946. She spent the next few years participating in fleet exercises in the Caribbean. Her homeport shifted again in June 1949, this time to Norfolk. The submarine remained there for the next seven years, participating in fleet exercises and NATO exercises.
In July 1958, the USS Runner had her homeport shifted to San Juan. She operated as a Regulus missile guidance submarine in the Caribbean for one year. The submarine then returned to Norfolk, Virginia, spending the next few years along the East Coast and in the Mediterranean. In the mid-1960s, she participated in antisubmarine warfare exercises and training Naval Reservists. The submarine provided training services for the Underwater Demolition Team in 1968. Later that year, she took patrol in NATO Exercise Dawn Patrol.
The USS Runner was decommissioned on January 25, 1969. She was redesignated as AGSS-476 and served as a Naval Reserve Training Ship at Great Lakes Naval Training Station in Illinois until she was struck from the Naval Vessel Register on December 15, 1971 and sold for scrap on June 19, 1973. The submarine received one battle star for her service in World War II.
The use of asbestos was common in shipbuilding components for much of the 20th Century because of its resistance to heat, fire, water and corrosion. Because of their asbestos exposure onboard ship and in the shipyards, seaman, shipyard workers and longshoreman are at risk for developing asbestos-related diseases like mesothelioma.
Sources include:
Asbestos and Ship-Building: Fatal Consequences, by John Hedley-Whyte and Debra R Milamed
