Europa (AK-81)

Europa (AK-81) was never commissioned and thus never bore the USS designation.

The ship was laid down 2 March 1942 as MV William Lester, a Maritime Commission type (N3-M-A1) hull, under Maritime Commission contract (MC hull 464), at the Penn-Jersey Shipbuilding Company of Camden, New Jersey and launched 7 December 1942. Assigned to the Navy as Europa (AK-81), named for Europa, the smallest of the Galilean moons of planet Jupiter, scheduled to become an Enceladus-class cargo ship. She was delivered to the Navy uncompleted 24 November 1943; transferred the next day, 25 November 1943, to the United States Army; stricken from Navy lists 6 December 1943.

The ship, renamed Thomas F. Farrel Jr., after an Engineering officer killed in the war, began conversion in December, 1943 to an Engineer Port Repair ship manned by a military crew under the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The ship did not complete conversion until 30 April 1944 and did not sail for Europe until late summer. The ship was one of the port repair ships making it to Europe in time to assist in the restoration of ports.

Thomas F. Farrel Jr. was disposed of by Maritime Administration sale 11 March 1965 and was scrapped in 1967.