USS Solar (DE-221)

USS Solar (DE-221) in New York harbor with a barge and harbor tug alongside. Photographed 22 July 1944, from a 300-foot altitude by a Naval Air Station New York aircraft.
History
Name:	Solar
Namesake:	BM1 Adolfo Solar
Ordered:	1942
Laid down:	22 February 1943
Launched:	29 May 1943
Commissioned:	15 February 1944
Decommissioned:	21 May 1946
Struck:	5 June 1946
Fate:	Scuttled following ammunition explosion, 9 June 1946
General characteristics
Class and type:	Buckley-class destroyer escort
Displacement:	1,400 long tons (1,422 t) standard 1,740 long tons (1,768 t) full load
Length:	306 ft (93 m)
Beam:	37 ft (11 m)
Draft:	9 ft 6 in (2.90 m) standard 11 ft 3 in (3.43 m) full load
Propulsion:	2 × boilers General Electric turbo-electric drive 12,000 shp (8.9 MW) 2 × solid manganese-bronze 3,600 lb (1,600 kg) 3-bladed propellers, 8 ft 6 in (2.59 m) diameter, 7 ft 7 in (2.31 m) pitch 2 × rudders 359 tons fuel oil
Speed:	23 knots (43 km/h; 26 mph)
Range:	3,700 nmi (6,900 km) at 15 kn (28 km/h; 17 mph) 6,000 nmi (11,000 km) at 12 kn (22 km/h; 14 mph)
Complement:	15 officers, 198 men
Armament:	3 × 3"/50 caliber guns 1 × quad 1.1"/75 caliber gun 8 × single 20 mm guns 1 × triple 21 in (533 mm) torpedo tubes 1 × Hedgehog anti-submarine mortar 8 × K-gun depth charge projectors 2 × depth charge tracks

USS Solar (DE-221) (pronounced sō-lär), a Buckley-class destroyer escort of the United States Navy, was named in honor of Boatswain's Mate First Class Adolfo Solar (1900–1941), who was killed in action during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941.

Solar was laid down on 22 February 1943, by the Philadelphia Navy Yard; launched on 29 May 1943, sponsored by Mrs. Regina Solar; and commissioned at Philadelphia on 15 February 1944, Lieutenant Commander Hadlai A. Hull, United States Naval Reserve, in command.

Solar completed post-commissioning trials in the Delaware River and shakedown training in the Bermuda area; then returned to Philadelphia at the beginning of April 1944. After post-shakedown availability, she headed for Casco Bay, Maine, for more training.

On 25 April, Solar put to sea from New York City with Task Group 27.1 in the screen of a Casablanca-bound convoy. The convoy made Casablanca on 4 May; and, three days later Solar headed back toward the United States. She arrived in New York on 16 May. Solar was next assigned to Task Force 64, and spent the next six months escorting three convoys from the United States to the Mediterranean and back.

On 16 December 1944, the destroyer escort was assigned to the Commander, Operational Training Command, Atlantic Fleet (COTCLANT), to help train destroyer and destroyer-escort crews. On 2 February 1945, she resumed Atlantic convoy escort duty as an element of TG 60.9. On her first voyage of this new assignment, Solar encountered her first combat, though she herself was unable to engage the enemy submarines. Her convoy, UGS-72, lost two tankers at the entrance to the Strait of Gibraltar. Solar fueled and provisioned at Oran, Algeria; then escorted convoy GUS-74 to the United States. After yard work at New York, she got underway in the screen of another Gibraltar-bound convoy.