VAdm. K. R. Wheeler (T-AG-5001)
2007–
First U.S. Navy ship named in honor of Vice Admiral Kenneth Ray Wheeler, the 31st Chief of the Supply Corps, who was born in Huntsville, Ark. on 3 June 1918. A 1939 graduate of the University of California at Berkeley, he was commissioned an ensign in the U.S. Naval Reserve through the ROTC program.
Following service on board destroyer Hull (DD-350) and training at the Navy Finance and Supply Corps School in Philadelphia, Pa., Wheeler reported for duty as Assistant Supply Officer, Cavite Navy Yard, Philippine Islands, and was serving there at the time of the commencement of hostilities with Japan on 8 December 1941. Subsequently evacuated to Bataan after the destruction of Cavite, he served in the submarine tender Canopus (AS-9), and as Supply Officer of the Provisional Naval Infantry Battalion until being ordered to Corregidor in April 1942. Present during the fall of the island fortress, Wheeler became a prisoner of war (POW).
Following brutal captivity in such Philippine locales as Corregidor, Cabanatuan, and Davao, in December 1944, Wheeler was among a group of over 1,600 POWs headed for Japan on board the freighter Oryoku Maru, when the ship was attacked and sunk in Subic Bay by planes from U.S. carriers in Task Force 38 – the American aviators unaware that the vessel is not marked as transporting POWs. After assisting a seriously wounded Supply Corps shipmate to the beach, he repeatedly swam back to the ship to rescue others amidst heavy enemy gunfire and for his actions was awarded the Bronze Star. Wheeler was awarded a second Bronze Star in January of 1945 in the wake of an attack on another prisoner ship. When his group reached Fukuoka Prison Camp, he endured sub-freezing temperatures in unheated barracks. Wheeler, determined to care for the sick and wounded, contracted pneumonia, that almost resulted in his death. His selfless actions, however, contributed greatly to saving the lives of many of his fellow prisoners.
After his liberation in 1945, Wheeler went on to assignments at the Aviation Supply Office and Naval Air Station, Jacksonville, Fla. prior to serving in 1960 as Director of Supply Corps Personnel and three years later as Commanding Officer, Naval Ordnance Supply Office, Mechanicsburg, Pa.
Achieving Flag rank in June 1965, Wheeler served as Deputy Chief of Staff for Logistics and Management on the Staff of the Commander in Chief, U.S. Atlantic Fleet, before assuming command of the Navy Accounting and Finance Center Washington D.C. He was named Commander Naval Supply Systems Command and Chief of Supply Corps in June 1970. His service in these roles earned him a third star in January 1973, at which time he was designated Vice Chief of Naval Material and became the principal advisor to Admiral Isaac C. Kidd, Jr., as well as exercising authority over six deputy chiefs and six Systems Commanders. Wheeler retired in September 1974 after thirty-five years of service.
Vice Admiral Wheeler died on 29 April 2002 at the age of eighty-three, and was interred at Arlington (Va.) National Cemetery on 20 June 2002.
(T-AG-5001; displacement 6,491; length 349'; beam 70'; draft 26'; speed 15 knots; complement 26 civilian; class VAdm. K. R. Wheeler)
VAdm. K. R. Wheeler (T-AG-5001) was laid down at Cut Off, La. by Edison Chouest Offshore LLC in 2006; delivered under a 5 year contract at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla. on 20 September 2007 and purchased by the Military Sealift Command (MSC) on 20 August 2012. She entered non-commissioned U.S. Navy service under the control of the Military Sealift Command with a primarily civilian crew on 20 September 2007.
VAdm. K. R. Wheeler is an Offshore Petroleum Distribution System (OPDS) ship and is the U.S. Navy's only vessel capable of pumping diesel or aviation fuel to shore from up to eight miles off the coast. With flexible pipe stored on 35-foot-tall spools on its weather deck, she delivers vital fuel to U.S. forces ashore during contingency operations where port facilities may be damaged, destroyed or non-existent.
Along with Fast Tempo, her 145-foot support vessel, VAdm. K. R. Wheeler sailed from Singapore's Sembawang Wharves in early November 2012 after completing six weeks of repairs and upgrades.
The repairs and upgrades were the first to be conducted by MSC port engineers after the ships' purchase. Port engineers from Ship Support Unit Singapore, MSC headquarters' Prepositioning Program and MSC Norfolk, Va.-based Ship Inspection Division were part of the engineering team overseeing repairs. VAdm. K. R. Wheeler has both tunnel and down-swing azimuth thrusters, part of a sophisticated dynamic positioning system designed to keep the ship in place during pumping missions.
Detailed history pending.
Paul J. Marcello
5 February 2016
