USS Ajax
The USS Ajax was a Vulcan class repair ship, one of the earliest examples of this class of naval vessel. The keel for the Ajax was laid in May of 1941 and was built by the Los Angeles Shipping and Drydock Company of San Pedro, California.(Now known as Bethlehem Steel Terminal Island) The vessel was launched in August of 1942 and was commissioned by the United States Navy in October of 1943. The vessel departed California and arrived in Pearl Harbor, HI in December and began initiating installations of radar and related infrastructure on smaller craft for use in the Marshall Islands campaign.
The ship served as a mobile repair station in the Pacific theatre for the majority of its service during World War II. Certainly the ability above the U.S. Navy to have such mobile repair stations provided an immense advantage over their enemies in the region, whose repair capacities were predominantly blocked by allied forces. Following a particularly laborious period in late August 1945, a bout of dysentery broke out aboard Ajax that reached epidemic proportions. The vessel was eventually quarantined and released to again resume its repair operations in the region. The vessel's work then continued uninterrupted up until the end of the war in late 1945. The Ajax sailed from station to station throughout the second half of the twentieth century before finally being decommissioned in 1986.
Those who worked aboard the USS Ajax were at a particular danger that was no so much of the combat variety, but more in the substances they encountered while conducting repairs on naval vessels. Among the more prominent materials used in vessel constructions of this period was asbestos. Asbestos was used primarily in an insulation capacity, a use for which utilization aboard ships was extensive. Asbestos could be found in nearly all insulation materials, particularly those around piping, electrical, or other construction fixtures. Those who encountered asbestos in a repair capacity are in a high risk pool of asbestos exposure. Any shipyard worker or crew member who feels they may have been exposed to these materials in a repair or other capacity should closely monitor their respiratory health, as asbestos has been conclusively linked with respiratory illness and mesothelioma cancer.
Last modified: December 28, 2010.
