On April 14, 1988, USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG-58) struck an Iranian mine in the Persian Gulf. The explosion tore a hole in her hull, broke her keel, and killed no one — a near-miracle given the severity of the damage and a testament to the damage control efforts of her crew, who kept the ship afloat through hours of controlled flooding and emergency repairs. Ten sailors were wounded. The ship herself was saved by the collective effort of 200 men who refused to let her sink. Four days later, Operation Praying Mantis — the largest American surface naval engagement since World War II — destroyed two Iranian oil platforms and sank or severely damaged several Iranian naval vessels in retaliation. Roberts had nearly been lost to a mine; the Navy's response was to fight back with everything it had.
The Ship
USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG-58) is an Oliver Hazard Perry-class guided missile frigate, commissioned on December 12, 1986, and named for Petty Officer Third Class Samuel Booker Roberts Jr., a Navy Boat Coxswain who died in a heroic action at Guadalcanal in September 1942. The name is a continuation of a tradition — there had been a previous USS Samuel B. Roberts, a destroyer escort that was sunk at the Battle of Leyte Gulf in October 1944, whose crew's resistance against vastly superior Japanese forces has become one of the defining stories of destroyer warfare. The frigate that carried the name in 1988 lived up to both of her predecessors.
Operation Earnest Will
Samuel B. Roberts was operating in the Persian Gulf as part of Operation Earnest Will — the escort mission for reflagged Kuwaiti tankers that the United States Navy was conducting in response to Iranian attacks on Gulf shipping. The threat environment included Iranian mines, small boat attacks, and occasional larger naval confrontations. The mine that struck Roberts was part of an Iranian minefield that had been laid in international shipping lanes — a violation of international law that the United States had been monitoring and that coalition naval forces had been working to counter.
The mine hit Roberts's hull below the waterline on the port side, flooding multiple compartments and causing structural damage that threatened to break the ship apart. The crew's damage control response was immediate and sustained: flooding was controlled, temporary repairs were made, and the ship was kept afloat long enough for salvage assistance to arrive. Roberts was eventually towed to Bahrain and then transported to the United States for repairs. She returned to service in 1989.
Operation Praying Mantis
The American response to the mining of Roberts came four days later, on April 18, 1988, in an operation specifically designed to demonstrate that attacks on American ships would be met with a decisive response. Operation Praying Mantis destroyed two Iranian oil platforms that had been used as bases for Iranian military operations against shipping. When Iranian naval forces sortied in response, they were engaged by American surface ships and aircraft. The frigate USS Sahand was sunk; USS Joshan was sunk; USS Sabalan was severely damaged. It was the largest surface naval engagement involving American forces since World War II, conducted in the same theater where Roberts had nearly been lost four days earlier.
The Crew
The crew of Samuel B. Roberts who kept her afloat on the night of April 14, 1988 did something that naval tradition calls "extraordinary damage control." What it actually looked like was men working in flooded, smoke-filled spaces, in darkness, fighting to stop flooding that threatened to sink their ship, continuing when they were exhausted and frightened because stopping was not a category of action available to them. The ship was named for a man who died in a heroic action; the crew in 1988 demonstrated that they understood what that name meant.
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Legacy
USS Samuel B. Roberts continues to serve, nearly four decades after her commissioning — a frigate that nearly sank and didn't, that was repaired and returned to duty, that carries a name with a specific meaning in naval history and has lived up to it. The 1988 Persian Gulf deployment is the most consequential of her career, and it is remembered not for what was lost — though ten sailors were wounded — but for what was saved: a ship whose crew refused to give her up.