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USS Texas Under Way


Eric
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11 hours ago, Huaco Kid said:

Why don't they drydock these ships for preservation / display?

Ships are designed to be in the water.

Stress is nicely  applied over the portions of the hull that get wet.

A dry dock supports a ship at a few points or in same cases, lets the ship rest on its keel.

Leave it that way too long and you have a broken ship.

That will need a dry dock.

 

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12 hours ago, Batesmotel said:

Because there is an emotional attachment to having them in the water.

The British have dry docked or land locked a few historic ships and a lot of people were very upset because emotionally they feel while it might preserve the body of the ship, it is killing the spirit of the ship to take it out of the water. 

The British have taken HMS Victory - Nelson’s  flagship - out of the water. Victory… “is raised sufficiently in her permanent dry dock to bring her normal waterline parallel with the top of the dock, so that the whole sweep of her three gun decks and her silhouette are seen in a proper perspective, at a distance or from nearby.”

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1 hour ago, railfancwb said:

The British have taken HMS Victory - Nelson’s  flagship - out of the water. Victory… “is raised sufficiently in her permanent dry dock to bring her normal waterline parallel with the top of the dock, so that the whole sweep of her three gun decks and her silhouette are seen in a proper perspective, at a distance or from nearby.”

Cutty Sark as well. 

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I rode on the SS France, from England to here, in the early 70's.  Took a week(?).

Lots of fun memories,  since I was very little, being escorted around (the parental units seemed fine with letting sailors take me all day), I saw a lot of cool insides.

I won a swimming race and won a 3' long ultra-detailed model (in a display case) that Dad put on the mantel for decades.  I don't know what happened to it.  Might've sank.

During one huge storm,  me and my friend,  went outside at night on the railing at the stern, and were amazed that the water was going from 300' down, and then up to almost the deck, and back...

We marveled at the pool (olympic sized), because first you could see the bottom of that end,  then the bottom of this end,  back and forth...  I think we threw lounge chairs in it.

Then a bunch of guys,  daisy-chained at the waist,  stretched out and snatched us up.

Some people were furiously angry,  and others just thought we were extremely cool little buggers.

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I was crossing the Atlantic around time of the Beirut revolution in 59/60.  We were suppose to be far away from other 6th fleet ships heading to Beirut that we couldn't see them.

Somebody screwed up because at just before sunset I looked at the horizon and saw the biggest ship I had ever seen silhouetted just at the horizon against the sky.  It was literally awesome.  I had seen the USS Ranger (IIRC) on the way to Beirut to the 6th fleet in Beirut harbor. 

We met some of the Sailors from the Ranger later in Beirut and they said that the sea was so rough that they actually felt the Carrier move.  They thought this was scary, while telling it to us that were on a 180 foot long wooden ship in the same storm.

My little Minesweeper took considerable time to get there.  It was an imposing sight to see the majority of the 6th Fleet anchored in the harbor.  We couldn't anchor reliably in the harbor, so we tied up to the 6th Fleet communications ship.  I got some notoriety involving the communications ship also.

I have posted previously how I typically messed up with the fleet communications,   resulting in the Fleet changing their standing orders to accommodate me!......................

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Since England didn't have GI Joes, and I didn't know any better,  I had Action Man.  He was like a lame male barbie.  It's all we had.

In the ships cabin, I made pulleys and slings (from that flat-plastic string from scout camp) (yes, I was an english boy scout),  so Man could get up to the top bunk (they were triple-deckers).

Then I engineered,  tying the string to the ceiling fan, and Man at the end,  and eventually the string would twist so much that it would lift man up to the top!  Saves all the manual labor.

Then, once, I don't know,  he missed his mark and wound up into the motor, with the string wrapped deeply into the bearings,  and Man getting melted with the heat,  and it caught fire.

No smoke alarms back then.

So I ran away.

You can try to lie your way out of that one,  but the evidence was damning.

Some people were furiously angry,  and others just thought I was just an extremely cool little bugger.

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We ate at the Captain's Table once.

Likely because of my notoriety of winning a race,  setting the cabin on fire, and requiring a level-10 rescue.

Mom and Dad probably had lobster,  and got hammered on the best stuff.  I think I only ate hot-dogs the whole time.

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Oh.  And I won the last-night Bingo.  The last game, on the last day.  The cover-the-whole-card game.

I don't remember how much it was (British Pounds),  but it was the big one.

Mom and Dad doled it out. I got whatever I wanted for a year.  I do know that the last thing I got was a Flexible Flyer.

I'm also pretty sure that Mom and Dad got a house full of new furniture.

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Some advertisers once came to our "Overseas" school in London.  The english had invented the Spirograph toy, which was a success,  and they wanted an American kid voice for the American commercials.

Me and a girl got picked.

Did the commercials, just my voice,  to the english kid's commercial.

The TV guys gave my teacher the checks,  and they were presented in a big deal.

I think Mom and Dad got that money too.

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Hyde Park had the Serpentine Lake.

It was a long-long time custom for people to sail their model ships on it.

I got a 3' one for my birthday!

There's a skill to sailing these craft (some were uber-skilled.  Mine was beginner.)

I set my sails,  with the little man in the boat,  and you just let 'er rip!  woo hoo!

Mine listed, on it's maiden voyage,  and went down, way way out in the middle.

Like, later,  they drained the lake for repairs,  and found 10,000 boats at the bottom.

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There were some concerns that she was so structurally damaged, she'd collapse on herself during dry-dock. Fortunately that didn't happen. They had lots of pumps running to keep her afloat during the move. She's not very water-tight.

They've raised somewhere around $30,000,000.00, but it's estimated that there's $100,000,000.00 in work that needs to be done. 

Also, the dry-dock she's in was destroyed, and then salvaged. It was broken in half, then repaired, and is now being used for USS Texas.

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I had the pleasure of driving a former Navy sailor to treatment last week.  He was a throttle man on a Destroyer.  He talked about his ship escorting an aircraft carrier though the waters of Vietnam during the war.  He said the engine room was hot as blazes, they had fans but they just blew hot air around.  

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It was an amazing day. I sailed with a Dreadnought! 

 

The day also went of without a hitch.  At various points along the 35 miles trip, we could hear the saluting cannons that folks were setting off. 

 

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Just now, Rabbi said:

It was an amazing day. I sailed with a Dreadnought! 

 

The day also went of without a hitch.  At various points along the 35 miles trip, we could hear the saluting cannons that folks were setting off. 

 

That must have been quite a day. I'm glad to got a chance to participate in that historic voyage. :599c64bfb50b0_wavey1:

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On 9/3/2022 at 12:48 PM, M&P15T said:

There were some concerns that she was so structurally damaged, she'd collapse on herself during dry-dock. Fortunately that didn't happen. They had lots of pumps running to keep her afloat during the move. She's not very water-tight.

They've raised somewhere around $30,000,000.00, but it's estimated that there's $100,000,000.00 in work that needs to be done. 

Also, the dry-dock she's in was destroyed, and then salvaged. It was broken in half, then repaired, and is now being used for USS Texas.

 

As for the structual damage, no, that was not a concern for this trip. 

 

A number of years ago, the State of Texas gave the money to move the Texas to a drydock.  The engineering report stated that she was about to fall apart.  All that money went to make her structurally sound.  Fast forward a number of years and the State of Texas gave 35 million more to do this (get her to drydock)

 

The Coast Guard, Port of Houston and all the stakeholders would have NEVER let her into the Houston Ship Channel if she was not "beyond a doubt" capable of the journey.   The Coast Guard did close the Ship Channel to ALL traffic while she was removed from her slip and then established a 1000 foot exclusion zone.  The Coast Guard led, had birds in the air and the Port Police and DPS also helped enforce the exclusion zone.  

In drydock, she will pretty much only have hull work done. She will then return to a new home (that is still a secret)   The State of Texas gave this last round of funding with the catch "We aint giving anymore, and to prove it, we are turning over the ship to the Battleship Texas Foundation...it is not the States problem anymore"  Which means she MUST go to a better location in order to attract more visitors. 

 

As for the actual journey itself.  Her pumps run at around 2000 gpm in her slip.  There was no significant change in the pump rate during the transit. She did have impressive additional pumps installed for the transit.  She came out of her slip without a problem and was ahead of schedule.  I was behind tug #3.  (of 4, but 2 were changed out mid transit)   Her rudder is stuck about 13 degrees to starboard.  This does make the rear tugs work a bit harder, but is far from a difficult task. 

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On 9/6/2022 at 2:45 AM, Rabbi said:

 

As for the structual damage, no, that was not a concern for this trip. 

 

A number of years ago, the State of Texas gave the money to move the Texas to a drydock.  The engineering report stated that she was about to fall apart.  All that money went to make her structurally sound.  Fast forward a number of years and the State of Texas gave 35 million more to do this (get her to drydock)

 

The Coast Guard, Port of Houston and all the stakeholders would have NEVER let her into the Houston Ship Channel if she was not "beyond a doubt" capable of the journey.   The Coast Guard did close the Ship Channel to ALL traffic while she was removed from her slip and then established a 1000 foot exclusion zone.  The Coast Guard led, had birds in the air and the Port Police and DPS also helped enforce the exclusion zone.  

In drydock, she will pretty much only have hull work done. She will then return to a new home (that is still a secret)   The State of Texas gave this last round of funding with the catch "We aint giving anymore, and to prove it, we are turning over the ship to the Battleship Texas Foundation...it is not the States problem anymore"  Which means she MUST go to a better location in order to attract more visitors. 

 

As for the actual journey itself.  Her pumps run at around 2000 gpm in her slip.  There was no significant change in the pump rate during the transit. She did have impressive additional pumps installed for the transit.  She came out of her slip without a problem and was ahead of schedule.  I was behind tug #3.  (of 4, but 2 were changed out mid transit)   Her rudder is stuck about 13 degrees to starboard.  This does make the rear tugs work a bit harder, but is far from a difficult task. 

Sad she's only having hull work done. I've been looking for information as to what work is scheduled to be done, so if you have any links please post them.

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On 9/7/2022 at 9:17 AM, M&P15T said:

Sad she's only having hull work done. I've been looking for information as to what work is scheduled to be done, so if you have any links please post them.

 

This is the best place to keep up with her. (the foundation has started anothe page, but for now, this is it)

 

https://www.facebook.com/groups/450347275643485

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