Post by scansy on Feb 22, 2009 7:47:02 GMT -5
Jason's Cub Scout Pack spent the night Friday on the Battleship NJ. It's an Iowa class battleship, built during WWII and it's highly decorated. It was used in WWII, Korea, Vietnam, the Persian Gulf and many other conflicts and humanitarian missions until it was decommissioned in the mid 90's. They said it's no longer effective because it was built to be big and powerful and ships used in battle these days need to be fast and nimble. Things have changed with the computer operated systems these days.
The battleship is now berthed at Cameden, NJ and is essentially a museum. They take Cub Scouts/Boy Scouts/Brownies/Girl Scouts on weekend nights. They also give tours during the afternoons on Saturday/Sunday. It was a neat experience for the boys.
I thought maybe we had someone around here who served in the Battleship NJ or one of the other four Iowa class ships?
Check out these bulkhead doors - you had to crunch up to get through them. Jason's only in second grade so you get an idea of the size of them. You can also see the typical bunks on the left - three high.
This is the original "computer" from WWII era used to fire the big guns.
These next four pictures are from in the Captains quarters. This room is where he would entertain dignitaries.
This is the Captain's bunk.
This is inside the command center that was retrofit into the ship. This is where newer weapons that were installed later were controlled. Tomahawk missles, computer guided gattling guns and other "modern" weapons were controlled here.
Here's Jason in front of the rescue helicopter that was on board.
This is on the pier - the monument on the right is a marker for one of the missions the ship completed. There are about 25 or so of these markers along the pier. The bridge in the background is the Ben Franklin. NJ is on the right, PA (Philly) is on the left.
This is from the ships bridge, looking out over the big gun turrets. Each gun used (6) powder kegs to fire one round. Each keg held 110 lbs of powder.
This is one of the gattling guns. It fired 300 rounds per minute. It was used primarily as defense against missles. A computer tracked the missle and the rounds being fired and it automatically adjusted after each round until it hit the missle
This is where the rounds went into the gattling gun.
This is another defense againste missles - it was a diversionary tactic. These cannons fired a metallic cloud into the air to "fool" the missles.
The battleship is now berthed at Cameden, NJ and is essentially a museum. They take Cub Scouts/Boy Scouts/Brownies/Girl Scouts on weekend nights. They also give tours during the afternoons on Saturday/Sunday. It was a neat experience for the boys.
I thought maybe we had someone around here who served in the Battleship NJ or one of the other four Iowa class ships?
Check out these bulkhead doors - you had to crunch up to get through them. Jason's only in second grade so you get an idea of the size of them. You can also see the typical bunks on the left - three high.
This is the original "computer" from WWII era used to fire the big guns.
These next four pictures are from in the Captains quarters. This room is where he would entertain dignitaries.
This is the Captain's bunk.
This is inside the command center that was retrofit into the ship. This is where newer weapons that were installed later were controlled. Tomahawk missles, computer guided gattling guns and other "modern" weapons were controlled here.
Here's Jason in front of the rescue helicopter that was on board.
This is on the pier - the monument on the right is a marker for one of the missions the ship completed. There are about 25 or so of these markers along the pier. The bridge in the background is the Ben Franklin. NJ is on the right, PA (Philly) is on the left.
This is from the ships bridge, looking out over the big gun turrets. Each gun used (6) powder kegs to fire one round. Each keg held 110 lbs of powder.
This is one of the gattling guns. It fired 300 rounds per minute. It was used primarily as defense against missles. A computer tracked the missle and the rounds being fired and it automatically adjusted after each round until it hit the missle
This is where the rounds went into the gattling gun.
This is another defense againste missles - it was a diversionary tactic. These cannons fired a metallic cloud into the air to "fool" the missles.