New Guinea campaign

After shakedown off San Diego, California, Orca sailed for Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, escorting the escort aircraft carrier USS Fanshaw Bay (CVE-70). Reporting to Commander, Naval Air Force, United States Seventh Fleet, she was ordered on to Hollandia, Dutch New Guinea, where she commenced operations with her first seaplane squadron on 26 May 1944.

Orca's squadrons carried out "Black Cat" night bombing and reconnaissance missions during the ensuing five months. These missions, in which black-painted Martin PBM Mariner flying boats conducted night bombing strikes against Japanese shipping, proved to be tremendously destructive to the Japanese. For them, the squadrons were awarded the Presidential Unit Citation and Commander Fleming, Orca's captain and commanding officer of the task unit that included the ship and her squadrons, was awarded the Legion of Merit. Orca's squadrons also carried out air-sea rescue missions in support of the United States Army's 13th Air Force.

Philippines campaign

In early November 1944, Orca moved into the Leyte Gulf area in the Philippines, as that campaign was reaching the critical stage. She sent her planes into Ormoc Bay right under the noses of the Japanese on 3 December 1944, and they taxied around the bay for nearly an hour picking up survivors of destroyer USS Cooper (DD-695), sunk the previous night. After the Japanese finally realized what was taking place, they threw up quite a fusillade. The pilots bore down on the throttles and headed for the open sea. Heavily loaded, the old Martin PBM Mariners finally heaved themselves into the air, after about a three-nautical-mile (5.6 km) run. Making additional trips, they were able to rescue 167 Cooper survivors.

Orca was attacked by a lone plane on 27 August 1944, but her guns drove it off. That next night, the Japanese radio propagandist Tokyo Rose announced that "The volume of ack-ack which met the previous night's raid indicated that a battleship of the Wisconsin class had been sighted at Middleburg Island."^[5]

Orca came under similar attack twice on 26 November 1944, and was credited with an assist on a plane which narrowly missed motor torpedo boat tender USS Oyster Bay (AGP-6).

On 6 January 1945, kamikaze suicide planes attacked Orca's convoy formation. In the attack, a minesweeper was destroyed and Orca was slightly damaged as a plane crashed close alongside, showering her with wreckage and bomb fragments and wounding six of her gun crew. Tokyo Rose overstated the attack's results by announcing that the kamikaze "special attack group" had sunk one battleship and one heavy cruiser and seriously damaged three other cruisers in a large convoy moving north along the coast of Mindoro.

Orca continued to service air squadrons and carry out rescue missions until the end of World War II on 15 August 1945.

Honors and awards

Orca earned three battle stars for service in World War II. She also was commended, along with her squadrons, by United States Army General Walter Krueger, U. S. Sixth Army commander, for landing scouts behind Japanese lines, carrying supplies to Philippine guerrilla forces, and evacuating wounded personnel during the Philippines campaign.