User:The ed17/Saratoga

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I’m not sure of the answer to your question. There is a lot of information available on Operation Crossroads. The atomic tests at Bikini Atoll were filmed, and you can find film of the actual explosion. [1][ [2][3] I have never heard that the vessel was lifted out of the water; that seems very improbable, and the films do not show vessels being lifted up.[4] The explosion did create a half-mile wide column of water.

Saratoga did take hours to sink.[5] She rests on the bottom, and is easily accessible to SCUBA divers.[6][7] Many ships survived Able (an air blast) very well, but the underwater test of Baker sank many of them due to underwater damage. I read somewhere that is what sank the Arkansas (or was it Nevada?), and that her hull was smashed, but I don't remember where I saw that. Kablammo 00:45, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I remembered where I saw the reference to Arkansas. Here's some more information on Crossroads, from Ireland, Bernard (1996). Jane's Battleships of the 20th Century. New York: HarperCollins, 186-87. ISBN 0 0047 0997 7. :

• US capital ships present included Arkansas, New York, and Nevada in addition to Saratoga
• The Able test (an air blast) did little damage to the armored citadel of Nevada only three ship lengths from ground zero
• Baker involved a similar weapon detonated 90 feet below the surface (lagoon was only 31 fathoms deep max)
• As explosion was underwater, the shock was transmitted directly to the hulls, without attenuation
• column of water 1/2 mile wide (this is from another source) went 2500' into the air
• A wave 94' high was measured 1000' away (you can see ships heeling from the wave in the videos)
• Arkansas, 250 yards from center, was "crushed as if by a tremendous hammer blow from below"

There is also a book by Richard Rhodes entitled Dark Sun which contains information on these tests, but I don't believe Saratoga was specifically mentioned. (I no longer have the book.) Nothing I have seen mentions warships being thrown in the air, but the vaporization of much of the water in the atoll near ground zero, a 90'+ high wave, and most importantly the underwater shock wave, caused catastophic damage. I hope this helps. Kablammo 00:24, 8 September 2007 (UTC)