This World War II Battleship Fights Its Greatest Enemy Yet
The USS Iowa has faithfully served the U.S. in its darkest hours. Now, she faces a new set of challenges: combatting the brutal passage of time.
The United States Navy’s Iowa-class battleships were the largest and most powerful warships ever built in the United States.
All four warships participated in operations during the Second World War and were later returned to service more than once. While the warships will outlive the “Greatest Generation” sailors who served on them during the conflict, great effort is needed to preserve the vessels.
That was undoubtedly true of the USS New Jersey, which underwent a major $10 million restoration a year ago. The warship has been heading to a dry dock for the first time since 1991. While at the Philadelphia shipyard, it received significant repairs to its hull and sections of a new deck.
The lead vessel of the class, USS Iowa, has also battled time and the elements, which have taken their toll on the battle wagon’s deck. Though the USS Iowa has been spared the harsh Camden, New Jersey winters of her sister ship, she has been moored at the Port of Los Angeles for over a dozen years.
A trip to the drydock isn’t needed, at least not yet.
Still, a significant effort is underway to replace the deck of the Battleship of Presidents, nicknamed because she carried President Franklin Roosevelt across the Atlantic Ocean in 1943.
Hawkeye State Stepping Up for the Ole Battleship
Replacing all the decking on a warship the size of USS Iowa is no small task, and according to Jonathan Williams, president and CEO of the Battleship Iowa Museum, around 45,000 square feet need to be addressed. He told KTLA that the project could take five to six years and have a final price tag as high as $10 million.
Even as the City of Los Angeles remains the home of the retired battleship, Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds announced $750,000 in funding from the state to help repair the decking and replace a previous stopgap patch job that included plywood sections.
Time Was Not Kind to the Storied Battleship
The original deck was made of teak, the crew that polished the USS Iowa’s service.
However, as the Battleship Iowa website explained, “Sun and weather have taken their toll. Decaying wood allows water to become trapped against bulkheads and to pool underneath deck boards. That moisture is eroding the steel and allowing water to seep into the vessel’s interior.”
Other options are now being explored instead of replacing the decking with teak. The primary reason is cost, but it is also based on the slow growth of teak and its availability. Previous restorations employed Douglas fir, but it hasn’t proven nearly as durable, resulting in more frequent replacements.
“For long-term sustainability (and to better steward our resources), we are exploring wood-look synthetics that have begun to see use and acceptance in the cruise ship and yachting industries,” the museum added.
Deep Dive into the Battleship USS Iowa
Laid down on June 6, 1940, USS Iowa was completed on February 22, 1943, and just two days later was put to sea for a shakedown in the Chesapeake Bay and later along the Atlantic coast. By the summer of that year, the battleship was deployed to patrol the waters off the coast of Newfoundland after it was reported that the German battleship Tirpitz was operating in Norwegian waters.
In November 1943, the USS Iowa carried President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Secretary of State Cordell Hull, Chief of Staff Admiral William D. Leahy, Chief of Staff of the Army General George C. Marshall, Chief of Naval Operations Ernest King, Commanding General of the U.S. Army Air Forces Henry “Hap” Arnold, Harry Hopkins, and other military leaders to Mers El Kébir, Algeria.
It was the first leg of the journey for the leaders heading to the Tehran Conference, and the warship then conducted a similar presidential escort on the return journey in December.
For that special mission, the battleship was outfitted with a bathtub for President Roosevelt, who could not use the warship’s shower facilities. As a result, the USS Iowa was the only U.S. warship of her class to be equipped with such a feature.
The tub is still present today!
Beginning in early 1944, USS Iowa spent the rest of the Second World War in the Pacific, where she participated in the Marshall and Mariana Islands Campaigns and the Okinawa Campaign and, in the summer of 1945, even took part in strikes on the Japanese home islands.
The USS Iowa joined her sister ship, the USS Missouri, during the September 2, 1945, surrender ceremony in Tokyo Bay and remained in the bay as part of the occupying force.
Decommissioned in 1949, she returned to service just two years later and took part in the Korean War, serving as the flagship of the Seventh Fleet from April to October 1952. USS Iowa shelled enemy positions multiple times, including sorties north of the 38th parallel. She was decommissioned a second time in 1958.
That could have been the end of her story.
However, in the 1980s, when President Ronald Reagan called for a 600-ship U.S. Navy, the USS Iowa and her three sister battleships were reactivated and upgraded with new combat systems that replaced many of the ships’ smaller five-inch guns with launchers for Harpoon anti-ship missiles, thirty-two Tomahawk cruise missiles and four Phalanx close-in weapon systems (CIWS).
Initially equipped with 40mm anti-aircraft guns, they were replaced during the Cold War with missiles, electronic warfare suites, and Phalanx anti-missile Gatling gun systems.
The warship was also used as the test bed for the Navy’s RQ-2 Pioneer Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) in the 1980s, the first of its kind to use a drone as an aerial spotter for a battleship’s guns.
On July 4, 1986, President Reagan and First Lady Nancy Reagan boarded the USS Iowa for the International Naval Review in New York’s Hudson River.
While the USS Iowa didn’t take part in combat operations following her reactivation, on April 19, 1989, a fire in her second sixteen-inch gun turret killed forty-seven crew members. The turret was repaired, but the USS Iowa was still decommissioned and finally decommissioned in October 1990.
Though there have been calls for the vessel to be returned to operation, she fulfills a far more critical mission: she serves as a memorial to the sailors of the United States Navy.
The Battleship USS Iowa has been repeatedly ranked among the top five museums in Southern California. It preserves the long-retired warship, which has served as the centerpiece of the Pacific Battleship Center in Los Angeles since 2012.
About the Author: Peter Suciu
Peter Suciu is a Michigan-based writer. He has contributed to more than four dozen magazines, newspapers, and websites, with over 3,200 published pieces and over a twenty-year career in journalism. He regularly writes about military hardware, firearms history, cybersecurity, politics, and international affairs. Peter is also a Contributing Writer for Forbes and Clearance Jobs. You can follow him on Twitter: @PeterSuciu. You can email the author at [email protected].
Image: Shutterstock/ Darryl Brooks.