The USS Missoula was a Haskell-class attack transport laid down on June 20, 1944, and launched on September 6, the same year. It was commissioned on October 27, 1944, under Comdr. Alexander C. Kopper’s command, with the hull number APA-211 and it served in the US Navy for 2 years until it was decommissioned on September 13, 1946. During its activity, the ship carried a complement of 536 people on board and had its main missions in California, Okinawa, San Francisco, Eniwetok, Saipan, Iwo Jima, Hawaii, Tokyo and Leyte. After the decommissioning, the ship was struck from the Navy List on October 1, 1958. For the services brought to the country during World War II, the USS Missoula received 2 battle stars.
Exposure to asbestos could have occurred either by being a part of the crew serving in the Navy, but also by being implicated in some way in the process of building or dismantling ships and vessels, both processes involved the release of asbestos fibers into the air. Usually, the symptoms of asbestos exposure do not appear until about 15 to 40 years after the first exposure to asbestos.
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