Europa turns a ship into the Valona seaplane base

Building a permanent seaplane station at Valona was difficult, so the Navy converted a ship that could arrive with hangars, stores, maintenance facilities, and eight aircraft. The base supported Italy's effort to secure the Otranto Barrage and contain Austro-Hungarian naval forces in the Adriatic. More seaplanes could fly out to join Europa because crews knew that fuel, maintenance, and supplies would be waiting on arrival. The ship was therefore less a carrier in the modern sense than an airfield whose support infrastructure could relocate under its own power. Water supplied the runway, removing one of the hardest construction requirements of a conventional forward air station.