Why is the USS Iowa being turned into a museum that will be berthed in Los Angeles?

[taterguy]

Wouldn't Des Moines be more appropriate?

[Archae]

1. Umm...kind of difficult to put it in Des Moines...

We wouldn't mind the other Iowa-class battleship USS Wisconsin to be in Lake Michigan, berthed in Milwaukee or Green Bay, but it just won't fit through the St Lawrence seaway docks.

[taterguy]

2. Difficult? This is America

Just make the St Lawrence seaway wide enough to accommodate the USS Iowa.

What's the problem?

[petronius]

3. Why go to all that trouble? Why not just get a LOT of helicopters

to carry it? Or even some giant blimps? :shrug:

[taterguy]

4. If you have a LOT of helicopters, one of them might have an engine failure

Now that would make a helluva mess.

[petronius]

6. Sure, but that's why you use twice as many choppers as the ship alone would call for

If a couple of them fail, they can just fall down and dangle below the whole ensemble. Naturally, the ship itself is wrapped in a thick cocoon of rubber, so that it is undamaged by any falling helicopters (and, if it all does tumble, the ship can bounce safely to rest)...

[JVS]

16. Helicopters would cut each others' wires.

[Kaleva]

5. They have several left-over Saturn V rockets in storage.

Strap them on to the USS Iowa and shoot the ship to Des Moines.

[bluedigger]

7. Just put it on greased logs and pull it there with ropes.

It's not like we don't have the manpower available.

[taterguy]

8. What about the Rockies?

I'm not talking about Sylvester Stallone movies.

I'm talking about the biggest fucking mountains on the continent.

Lewis & Clark barely made it over them in canoes?

You think you can 'pull' something that weighs 45,000 tons over them?

Get real.

[bluedigger]

9. Nice "can't do" attitude, mister.

If it were up to naysayers like you, we'd still be walking on all fours.

Besides, who says you have to cross the friggin' Rockies? Ever hear of the Mississippi River drainage? It's pretty damn flat (in a relative way) from the Gulf Coast to Iowa.

Now concentrate on the important things - like what viscosity of grease would work best.

[taterguy]

10. That would only work if the USS Iowa was close to the Gulf Coast

It's currently in San Francisco Bay.

It's too big to fit through the Panama Canal and it doesn't have the fuel capacity to get around South America.

People who don't know what the hell they're talking about really annoy me.

[bluedigger]

11. You must be full of self loathing then.

Everybody knows the USS Iowa can go through the Panama Canal. It's a tight fit, but if you close all the doors and windows and run the all the exhaust vents in the galley it slims right down.

And you could tow it all the way with a gas sipping Boston Whaler. Once you get it moving, it's all inertia.

[taterguy]

12. Battleships don't have windows. They have portholes

:eyes:

[SkatmanRoth]

13. Oops, Iowa has already gone through the Panama Canal

[taterguy]

14. Of course, it's been through the Panama Canal. That's a design requirement of US warships

Don't you know anything about naval ships?

[era veteran]

60. This picture about a mile from my birthplace.

They use a canal stretcher for big ships.

[oneshooter]

22. Try closer to 67,000 tons. The USS Texas(BB35) was launched in 1914

And she weighed nearly 57,000 tons when fully loaded.

http://www.usstexasbb35.com/

[Old Troop]

44. I thought the Navy had a no alcohol policy. If she was fully loaded

she'd be in violation.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

31. More pullers, bigger ropes

louder drums.

We can do this.

[rrneck]

25. Tell the teabaggers

rush said so. It'll be there in an hour. They schlep his fat ass around enough.

[Deep13]

15. It's a ship, not a freight train. nt

[taterguy]

17. What's your point?

[Deep13]

36. Ships don't do so well overland. nt

[Fire Walk With Me]

18. Because they already tried to berth the sister ship to the Nazi Bismark in LA

but it sank into primordial goop. No sir, the LaBrea Tirpitz was a bad idea all the way around.

[taterguy]

19. The port of Los Angeles is not filled with primordial goop

I don't know where you're getting your information.

[Fire Walk With Me]

20. Haha, you mock my joke with feigned misunderstanding.

[krispos42]

21. *groan*

Ow, that hurt my liver. *winces*

[Fire Walk With Me]

23. I'm sorry, isn't it awful? I apologize again.

And it's so obscure the majority would have to Google to get it. Which means I'm Reaching. Oh well..

[krispos42]

24. Because midwestern battleship museums tend to suck

This is the memorial to the USS South Dakota, BB-57. As you can see, it's a concrete full-scale outline of the battleship with a single 16" gun barrel, a screw, and a few pieces of deck equipment located in a park in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. And a memorial marker

Yay.

USS South Dakota (BB-57) was a battleship in the United States Navy from 1942 until 1947. The lead ship of her class, South Dakota was the third ship of the US Navy to be named in honor of the 40th state. During World War II, she first served in a fifteen-month tour in the Pacific theater, where she saw combat before returning to New York for an overhaul. Back on operational duties in May 1943, she joined British Home Fleet patrols in Scapa Flow before sailing to the Pacific in August 1943 for a second tour. There, she participated in combat operations preparatory to the invasion of Japan until her return to the United States in October 1945.

<more>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_South_Dakota_%28BB-57%29

She fought in the Battle of Santa Cruz, the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, patrolled off the Norwegian coast to counterbalance the German battleship Tirpitz, provided naval gunfire support for the invasion of Tarawa, bombarded the Japanese-held Island of Nauru, provided more naval gunfire support for the invasions of the Marshall Islands and Truk, defended the carrier and amphibious fleets during the invasion of the Mariana Islands, fought at the Battle of the Philippines Sea, shelled Okinawa, and was part of the first task force (3 battleships, 2 heavy cruisers, and 9 destroyers) that bombarded mainland Japan, the force launching a total of well over 2,400 shells at a major steel facility that shut down production for over 4 weeks of one of the largest steel production facilities in Japan. She shelled mainland Japan three more times before the war's end.


And she gets... a ring of concrete, a mini superstructure, and a single gun barrel in a public park.

:sigh:

I'd prefer San Fransisco, as it has a long history with the US Navy and World War Two, but LA is good.

[JVS]

26. That's all the more reason to try to do what Taterguy is suggesting.

Bringing the actual ship there would make a world of difference.

[krispos42]

27. Oh, I'd LOVE to have the "Iowa" in Iowa.

I just don't see how you're going to get it TO Iowa. The Corps of Engineers maintains a 9-foot deep channel up the Mississippi for barge traffic, but the Iowa draws 37 feet. So that's out.

She displaces 45,000 tons. The maximum payload of a Sikorsky CH-53 Super Stallion is 16 tons. You would need 3,000 of them to lift the ship, and to date Sikorsky has made about 115 of them.

:shrug:

And I think we can eliminate moving her up I-45 or I-35 on a flatbed.

[taterguy]

28. Can-Do Spirit: Just convert the USS Iowa to a hydrofoil

Do I have to do all of the thinking around here?

[krispos42]

33. Too much work, IMO

I was going to fill it up with water and run some DC current through it to covert it into hydrogen. It might not float away, but it should reduce the draft of the ship to maybe 8 feet.

[bluedigger]

65. OK then, how about this?

We freeze dry the sucker, box it up, and UPS it to Des Moines (2nd Day). Then we throw the box in the Racoon, and POOF, instant USS Iowa!:thumbsup:



I've spent a lot of time at work, thinking about this.

[JVS]

34. What we need to do is build some big dams in northern Canada.

This way we can reconstuct the glacial lake Agassiz but also with navigation dams to Hudson Bay and the southern outflows.



Keep dams to control outflows closed for all outlets other than S. After we have our huge lake, increase flow through S, which will fill in the Minnesota river valley to it's full potential (the river that runs through the valley now is much smaller than that left behind by the drainage of Agassiz, refer here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glacial_River_Warren ) we can also refill the deep river valleys of the upper Mississippi http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driftless_Area This should be enough to get the Iowa to one of the Quad Cities, and the Dakotas should be able to get their ships either from the shore of Agassiz or the start of the Minnesota river.

Also, we're going to have fresh water resources of incredible magnitude after this.

[krispos42]

39. I like the scale of your thinking!

Wow! A place to put all the runoff from global warming...

[taterguy]

40. Do you know how many people you'd displace if you did that?

Perhaps as many as 12.

:shrug:

[dixiegrrrrl]

55. If we drew MORE feet on the Iowa, maybe it could walk there??????

:shrug:

[taterguy]

62. A typical foot can support about 200 pounds of weight

Where the hell are you gonna get 450,000 feet?

[dixiegrrrrl]

63. Occupy Iowa! of course.

:evilgrin:

It would only take 225.000 people ( assuming they are able....footed...)
or
4,500 millipedes.

Sheesh...think it thru, man!

[taterguy]

74. That would only be feasible in Europe

Americans don't walk anywhere these days.

[Kali]

50. OMG!

that is really sad

[krispos42]

72. Don't get me wrong...

...it's nice that they did it.

BUT...


The monument in Sioux Falls shouldn't be the only one. The ship probably should have become a museum ship, with the Sioux Falls monument sort of a satellite of it.


You have to actually BE on one of these suckers to appreciate it. I've been on her sister ship, the USS Massachusetts, several times.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

29. balloons.

really big balloons.

[hobbit709]

30. Because they didn't want to put it in NC.

[taterguy]

41. The USS NC is in Wilmington and the USS New Jersey is in Norfolk which might as well be NC

Hell, you can tour the Monitor if you get the right diving permits.

So there's really no need to put another WWII battleship in NC.

[Angleae]

42. Actually Wisconson in in Norfolk, New Jersey in in Camden, NJ

Also, as an answer to the OP, congress mandated it to be on the west coast.

[taterguy]

43. Congress has nothing better to do than mandate the location of old battleships?

I did not know that.

I still think a boat built in Iowa should be allowed to retire there.

[oneshooter]

47. Not built there. Named after the state. All BB's are named after states.

[Angleae]

49. All except USS Kearsarge

[taterguy]

51. They should name ships for where they're built

It would have really confused the enemy if there had been a bunch of World War II ships named the USS Brooklyn.

[Angleae]

52. Why not? We have to Roosevelts right now.

USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71) and USS Roosevelt (DDG-80)

[LeftinOH]

32. Directions: Head south to the Panama Canal; go thru canal towards the mouth of the Mississippi;

head north to Dubuque or thereabouts; now for the fun part -build some rails to Des Moines, then plop the ship in the Des Moines River. Easy Peasy.

[taterguy]

35. See Post 27: Depth of Mississippi is 9 feet, USS Iowa draws 37 feet

Or something like that.

And another thing: Standard rail is 7 feet wide. The Iowa is over 100 feet wide.

[Ptah]

37. The USS Iowa has a feature called instant dredging.

[trof]

38. I believe a HUGE dirigible is called for.

That's the ticket!
:-)

[Old Troop]

45. Ok, you unscientific knuckleheads need help. You close the doors and

windows; fill it with helium (not hydrogen -- we don't want another Hindenburg event)and have troops of boy scouts work in relays to pull it to Des Moines.

[taterguy]

46. Doors and windows? You mean hatches and portholes.

And there's no way to make one of those ships airtight.

What are you gonna do about the turrets?

And another thing: Do you have any idea how far it is from San Fran to Des Moines?

I don't and I don't feel like Googling it.

ps: Lifting something that weighs 45,000 pounds would totally deplete the world's helium reserves. Just use hydrogen. It's not like there's flammable stuff onboard.

[oneshooter]

48. 57,000 + TONS

[Old Troop]

54. Hey, I actually transited the Panama Canal on the New Jersey

in the early 80's. As an Army guy I called them doors, windows, floors, stairs and ceilings. After the beating I got from the crew, I resolved to continue in that mode. So there!

[mysuzuki2]

53. you guys are missing the obvious solution here.

take it apart and reassemble it in Iowa. It comes apart into only 200 or so parts. I know this because I built a model of a battleship when I was 9.

[ellisonz]

57. That's my idea too.

What can't be disassembled can be cut apart and glued back together.

[taterguy]

58. I'm sure the guns will work fine after being taken apart and glued back together

That ship will only be a museum temporarily.

As soon as it's needed again, it'll be recommissioned and go out and kick some ass.

All of its parts need to remain fully functional.

[Xithras]

56. WTF? I thought it was going to Mare Island?!?

Last I heard, the Navy had awarded it to Vallejo and everything was finished. When did Los Angeles get its grubbies on the ship?!?!

I still think the SF board of supes are a bunch of fucktards for passing the ship over. No matter what their opinion of the Iraq War was, these ships were a piece of Bay Area history, and one should be preserved in the Bay. I was thrilled when Vallejo was awarded the ship, because she was going to stay in the Bay.

[Angleae]

59. The bid from Vallejo fell through

A problem with financing if I remember right.

[taterguy]

61. Too much seal and sea lion shit in San Fran Bay

Those large aquatic mammals are cute, but they make a helluva mess.

[bluedigger]

64. We were going to GIVE an oil company a battleship?

Shit is seriously fucked up.:crazy:

[oneshooter]

66. They were the only ones who could afford to keep her fueled!!

#3 bunker oil ain't cheap!

[dixiegrrrrl]

67. Why don't we just move Iowa closer to Cal. ???

Maybe put it where Nevada is.

There..problem solved.

[taterguy]

68. And put Vegas where Des Moines is?

Are you out of your mind?

[dixiegrrrrl]

70. You are missing the genius of the idea, obviously.

Jobs, man...jobs!!!!!!!

[taterguy]

73. You are missing the insanity of your idea: Making a corn field the Sin capital of the world

[kwassa]

69. The USS Iowa is berthed there to be better able to fire long range guns on Orange County.

Which certainly deserves it.

The Iowa can elevate its guns to fire over the Orange Curtain.

[taterguy]

71. They'd have to be very long range guns to reach the county where Chapel Hill, NC is located

Unless there's some other Orange County I don't know about.