USS Iowa

[jamieooh]

The Iowa, last U.S. battleship, leaving Bay Area

Vivian Ho

Saturday, May 19, 2012
http://johnfenzel.typepad.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/uss_iowa_6.jpg

http://johnfenzel.typepad.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/uss_iowa_broadside.jpg

After seeing service in three wars and hosting more American presidents than any other battleship, the Iowa will take its final journey Sunday down the California coast to Los Angeles, where it will live out its days as a floating interactive museum.

When the Iowa leaves the Bay Area - its home for the past decade - it will mark the last time a World War II-era battleship passes under the Golden Gate Bridge, said Bob Rogers, Northern California spokesman for the nonprofit Pacific Battleship Center. The Iowa is the last of its kind.

"She was built to go to sea and to simply engage enemy ships and slug it out until one sank," said Rogers, whose group will run the museum. "She and her sisters - the Missouri, the New Jersey and the Wisconsin - they were the mightiest and the most powerful battleships the United States ever made."

The Iowa first saw service in 1943 and transported President Franklin D. Roosevelt to Iran late that year for the Tehran Conference, at which the Allies agreed to open up a second front against Germany.
http://www.qoop.com/photobooks/image_generator/ldraw.php?file=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.qoop.com%2Fphotobo oks%2Fimage_generator%2Ffpt.php%3Ffile%3DE92pIr4P1 2foGCf7W2aLAwlEcA9DCGi_LHvi5RLxDhf5FqH4g7uQlPLdSvH Dx9cRSeRHLtcmZEI_C2QvCl81_1pLQN5Ea04DrCMbT6U.3rw%3 D%26sig%3D956c5a8d984f6f4ee3c7a3678698554eabcccd94&signature=6afde9e409f0b59593ed055322c4804ca959c2c8&t_height=294&t_width=445&crop=1
The battleship served as Adm. William Halsey Jr.'s flagship during the surrender of Japan and broadcast the surrender ceremony from its sister ship the Missouri to the world

The ship also served "with distinction" in the Korean War, Rogers said, before being put into the reserve fleet. In 1984 it was reactivated and saw service during the first Gulf War, when it patrolled the Persian Gulf, before being put back in retirement in 1990.

The Iowa was also the scene of one of the Navy's worst peacetime disasters, when one of its turrets exploded during gunnery practice off Puerto Rico in 1989. Forty-seven sailors were killed.

The ship had been docked in the Suisun Bay mothball fleet since 2001, and some naval enthusiasts hoped to transform it into a museum on San Francisco's waterfront. The city's Board of Supervisors voted against the idea in 2005, however, with opponents saying such a museum amounted to an endorsement of sorts for the Iraq war and for the ban that existed at the time on gays and lesbians in the military.

In recent months, the Iowa has been at the Port of Richmond, being prepared for its last journey and final task.

The ship will be flanked Sunday by the Coast Guard cutter Tern, the SS Jeremiah O'Brien and Roosevelt's onetime yacht, the Potomac, as it leaves the bay. It is expected to pass through the Golden Gate at about 3:30 p.m.

The battleship's departure marks the end of an era in the Bay Area, where naval installations once ringed the shoreline. But Rogers said the Pacific Battleship Center is excited about its new mission.

"Everyone is thrilled," Rogers said.
Battleship's departure

The Iowa will leave the Bay Area for the last time Sunday. Here's a tentative schedule of events:

Noon: The Iowa leaves the Port of Richmond.

1 to 2 p.m.: Ship travels from Richmond Inner Harbor to the Richmond Long Wharf.

2 to 3 p.m.: Parade of ships joins the Iowa as it sails past Angel Island.

3:30 to 4 p.m.: Iowa passes under the Golden Gate Bridge. The span's pedestrian walkways will be closed.

The ship can be tracked on its journey to Los Angeles at pacificbattleship.com.

Vivian Ho is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Twitter: @VivianHo. vho@sfchronicle.com

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/05/18/BAQN1OK8EI.DTL#ixzz1vRYm5RIo

http://youtu.be/vHSn1pjynng

[serpa6]

Nice picture and infro bro
It is funny they never metion this ship here in which they the Iowa and New Jersey where reffited they got alot of parts from this ship where i use to live in mass the ship is the Battleship Massuchettes
http://i116.photobucket.com/albums/o5/charlie2-2/battleship.jpg

[serpa6]

Nice picture and info bro
It is funny they never metion this ship here in which they the Iowa and New Jersey where reffited they got alot of parts from this ship where i use to live in mass the ship is the Battleship Masscuhettes
http://i116.photobucket.com/albums/o5/charlie2-2/battleship.jpg

USS MASSACHUSETTS BB59
Battleship Massachusetts was built in Quincy, Massachusetts at the Fore River Shipyard of the Bethlehem Steel Corporation. The ship was launched on September 23, 1941, the heaviest ship ever launched in Quincy. "Big Mamie", as her crew knew her, was delivered to the Boston Navy Yard in April 1942 and commissioned the following month.

Battleship Massachusetts went into action on November 8, 1942 as part of Operation Torch, the invasion of North Africa. While cruising off the city of Casablanca, Morocco, the Battleship engaged in a gun duel with the unfinished French battleship Jean Bart, moored at a Casablanca pier. In this battle, Massachusetts fired the first American 16" projectile in anger of World War II. Five hits from Big Mamie silenced the enemy battleship, and other 16" shells from Battleship Massachusetts helped sink two destroyers, two merchant ships, a floating dry-dock, and heavily damaged buildings and docks in Casablanca. The ship’s battle flag, holed by a shell from the Jean Bart, is on display in the Battleship.

After a refit in Boston, the ship went through the Panama Canal in February 1943 to join the action in the Pacific, where she would remain for the remainder of her 3 1/2 years of active service. The Battleship saw action in the New Guinea-Solomons area and participated in the invasion of the Gilbert Islands in November 1943, the invasion of the Marshall Islands in January 1944, the powerful carrier strikes against Truk in February 1944, and a series of raids against Japanese bases in the Western Pacific and Asia.

Following modernization and a refit in Bremerton, Washington, she returned to action in September 1944 for the invasion of the Palau Islands and acted as an escort for the fast carrier task forces using her extensive armament to defend the carriers against enemy aircraft.

Big Mamie's 16" guns pounded Iwo Jima and Okinawa before their invasion in 1945, and by July of that year she was off Japan with the Third Fleet. The Battleship bombarded the Imperial Iron and Steel Works at Kamaishi, and then sailed south to bombard a factory at Hamamatsu. Returning to Kamaishi, Battleship Massachusetts fired the last American 16" projectile of the war. With peace achieved, "Big Mamie" returned to the United States and operated with the Pacific Fleet until mid-1946, when she was ordered deactivated. The Battleship remained in the Reserve Fleet in Norfolk, Virginia until she was stricken from the Navy Register in 1962 and ordered sold for scrap.

However, her wartime crew had held annual reunions since 1945 and lobbied to save their ship as a memorial. With the assistance of Massachusetts school children, they raised enough money to bring Big Mamie to Fall River in June 1965. She was opened to the public two months later. Now the centerpiece of the collection at Battleship Cove and one of the five National Historic Landmark ships here, "Big Mamie" stands ready to welcome visitors from around the nation and across the world as she has for nearly a half century.

What the history does not mention that she was taken out of Fall River ma in 1999 and brought to Boston for a complete refit of her hull from the water line down her props taken off 2 stand like statues on the site of the museum Standing in front of the props they are about as tall as a 3 story building the ship had 4 of these When they moved the ship It was kinda funny when i was a kid we all watched as the tugboats brought her in and they turned it around and brought it to Mellville fuel docks which is where the navy use to dock there huge ships to take down the radar disk on top The ship was to tall to fit under the bridge and when they took her back out they forgot there history she sat in the channel for 2 days till they had a Navy floating crane take the disk off again lol

[jamieooh]

Serpa,
I found this after I made this post. They mention that the Navy had to get parts from the Battleship museums . I believe it's in part 12.
http://youtu.be/f4A-0WBEI-Q

[serpa6]

Thanks Jamie I wish they would have mentioned the BS Mass she has got a history let me post it in the above pick i use to live in the city she was berth at thanks for that link

[Clodius]

Here a personal project I did of the USS NC a few years ago, if I had the chance I'd probably re shoot some of the shots (but that's for another time)...Watch at full screen/720P if you have the bandwidth.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJSvR-rSp9g