Lowe (DER 325) - Naval Cruise Book

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I V 1 1 s l N 1 l i T I l I i i 1 v r 2 i 3 1 5 1 5 I 3 n ,I I V i Y 9 Y I 1 w Q X i 1 I i 1 . I , q J ' 3 k , 5 1 5 1

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Oct Oct Oct Nov Nov Nov Dec Dec Dec Dec Jan Feb Feb Feb Mar Mar Mar Mar Mar Mar Mar Apr 2, 6 10 6 14 26 2 12 21 31 26 2 17 26 4 9 14 18 22 27 30 3, 967 - Oct - Nov - Nov - Nov - Nov - Dec - Dec - Dec - Jan - Jan --Feb - Feb - Mar - Mar - Mar - Mar - Mar - Mar - Mar - Apr 1968 7 1 13 21 28 11 18 28 USS LOWE QDER 3251 '61-'sa wEsT PAC DEPLOYMENT 23 31 14 23 3 8 13 17 21 26 29 2 Departed Guam Subic Bay Market Time Area Two Kaohsiung, Taiwan Taiwan Patrol Keelung, Taiwan Market Time Area Two Market Time Area One Subic Bay ' Market Time Area Two Kaohsiung, Taiwan' Market Time Area One Hong Kong Kaohsiung, Taiwan Taiwan Patrol , Keelung, Taiwan Taiwan Patrol Keelung, Taiwan Taiwan Patrol Kaohsiung, Taiwan Enroute Guam Arrived Guam, M.I.

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SHIP'S HISTORY The USS LOWE was built by the Consolidated Ship Builders of Orange Texas and launched on July 28 1943. Named after a Gunner's Nlate 3rd Class, Harry J. Lowe Jr. of Paducah Kentucky. She has served in many roles and many distant places in her career. --Bermuda, the lvlediteranean, Nova Scotia, Seatle, Japan, San Francisco, Alaska, Hawaii, and, of course, Guam are some of the places that have passed by her beam. Originally a Coast Guard ship operating as a convoy escort in the Atlantic in late WW Q sl?-e has at least one sub, the U-866 to her credit, which was sunk off the coast of Nova co ia. . I -After the end of hostilities she became a training ship for Naval Officers in Norfolk, Virginia until her first decommissioning in 1946. She was not to remain idle for long as she was put in the harness once more in 1951 as a weather station ship in the Atlantic. She saw the warm waters of the Pacific for the first time in lVlay of 1952, where until 1954, she continued her role as a weather ship. The LOWE was not to rest long before the Navy found a new use for her. After much re-fitting she put to sea as a Radar Picket Ship in August of 1955. For the next 10 years she plied the waters off the West Coast of the U.S. as part of the Norad Air Defense System. Some of the highlights of that period were participation in the Bellingham Wash- ington Blossom Time Festival, a good-will tour in 1960 to Acapulco and lvlarjenillo in lVlexico as part of the President's People to People program, and many E's for excellence in her picket duties. ln lVlay of 1965 the Picket Ships were declared to be of no further use to Norad and the LOWE and her sister ships were to be decommissioned. But, once again the Navy found another use for those versatile DER's. This timethe LOWE would be an Anti-infiltra- tion Patrol Ship off Vietnam. So she sailed the breadth of the Pacific to Guam, which was to be home for her and her crew in her latest role. lt is long and arduous work with much at sea time, 72'7s at sea being reached on her last Patrol, but the LOWE is used to chal- lenges having met and overcome them from Naples to Da Nang. From Alaska to Acapulco. What new challenges lie ahead for this twenty-five year old veteran? The LOWE has Just been scheduled for decommissioning, under CNO project 673.