USS Gearing (DD-710) was the name ship of the Gearing-class destroyers, the definitive late-war evolution of the Fletcher/Allen M. Sumner hull, stretched by 14 feet amidships to carry extra fuel bunkerage for the long-range Pacific carrier task forces of 1945. Dragon's 1/350 Gearing kit reproduces this lengthened hull form with slide-moulded twin 5-inch gun houses, quad 40mm Bofors mounts and the distinctive lattice mast/radar fit typical of a 1945 fast carrier screen unit, giving builders an accurate silhouette of America's last WWII destroyer design. Injection-moulded parts are joined by photo-etched railing, ladder and gun-tub detail plus a decal sheet for hull numbers and national markings, allowing construction as a full hull or waterline model. An essential subject for collectors building a 1945 fast carrier task force, this kit represents the destroyer type that went on to serve, in modernised FRAM form, well into the Cold War.
