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Research / survey
Operated by United States Navy
Photo: Service Depicted: Navy · Public domain · file
Largest in this registry
#61,814
of 84,014 with a recorded tonnage
Largest research / survey
#290
of 483 of this type with a recorded tonnage
Largest in its fleet
#159
of 177 in this fleet with a recorded tonnage
In brief
USNS Vindicator (T-AGOS-3) was a United States Navy Stalwart-class modified tactical auxiliary general ocean surveillance ship that was in service from 1984 to 1993. Vindicator then served in the United States Coast Guard from 1994 to 2001 as the medium endurance cutter USCGC Vindicator (WMEC-3). From 2004 to 2020, she was in commission in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) fleet as the oceanographic research ship NOAAS Hiʻialakai (R 334).
Vessel particulars
Every value is as recorded in the source. Blanks are values the source does not hold — none is estimated from a sister ship or a class average.
Identification
Construction
Measurements
In context
Every figure in this section is a count, a rank or a percentile over vessels actually held in this registry — not over the world fleet, which is larger. Nothing here is estimated.
At 1,486 gross tons, USNS Vindicator is the 61,814th largest of the 84,014 vessels in this registry that report a tonnage. The median across that set is 5,994 GT, so this hull is about 4.0 times smaller than the typical vessel on record here. The largest measures 499,167 GT.
Among the 612 research / surveys held here, it ranks 290th by tonnage — larger than 40% of that group. Their median tonnage is 2,180 GT, and the largest tenth begin at 9,452 GT. The flag most often flown by this group is United States (90 ships). The yard that appears most often against it is Wärtsilä, with 36 hulls on record.
United States is the country of registry for 2,278 vessels in this directory, of which USNS Vindicator is the 807th largest by tonnage. The most common class under that flag is vessels this registry holds no type classification for (977 ships), and the median vessel measures 1,706 GT. Browse every ship flagged United States.
Narrowing to both dimensions at once, this registry holds 90 research / surveys flying the United States flag, of which 43 are larger by tonnage.
USNS Vindicator was built in 1984, making it 42 years old. It is one of 1,492 hulls in this registry delivered that year, a cohort whose median tonnage is 4,366 GT; within it this ship is the 1,037th largest. Across the whole of the 1980s the registry holds 13,213 vessels, median 3,004 GT. The median build year across the entire registry is 1995.
The registry attributes 17 vessels to Tacoma Boatbuilding Company, with a median tonnage of 1,751 GT, delivered between 1946 and 1991. See the rest of that yard’s output.
At 76.0 m overall, USNS Vindicator is 5.0 m longer than the 71.0 m median for research / surveys on record, with a beam of 43.0 m and a draft of 16.0 m.
IMO numbers are issued in broadly chronological blocks. Within 500 either side of 8835619 this registry holds 49 other vessels, whose median build year is 1982 and which range from 1927 to 1990. That places this hull’s registration in the same part of the series, consistent with its recorded build year of 1984.
Its IMO number, 8835619, carries its own check digit. The first six digits are weighted seven down to two and summed — 8×7 + 8×6 + 3×5 + 5×4 + 6×3 + 1×2 = 159 — and the last digit of that total, 9, must equal the seventh digit, 9. It does, so this number is well formed.
Nearest by tonnage among research / surveys
| Ship | Built | Gross tonnage |
|---|---|---|
| NOAAS Miller Freeman | 1967 | 1,515 |
| NRP Don Carlos I | 1989 | 1,493 |
| NRP Almirante Gago Coutinho | 1985 | 1,492 |
| USNS Vindicator (this ship) | 1984 | 1,486 |
| Keifu Maru | 2000 | 1,483 |
| Komet | 1998 | 1,482 |
Record
Events recorded against this vessel in the source, with the dates the source gives. An event with no date is listed last rather than assigned one.
Same yard, same years
No ship class is recorded for this vessel, so these are not asserted to be sister ships — they are contemporaries from the same builder, shown because that is what the data supports.
Same fleet
Provenance
Vessel recordWikidata, released under CC0, keyed on this ship’s IMO number.
Written summaryQuoted from USNS Vindicator on English Wikipedia, reused under CC BY-SA 4.0.
PhotographBy Service Depicted: Navy, reused under Public domain.
| Dr. Fridtjof Nansen |
| 1993 |
| 1,444 |