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March 21st, 2024 marked a historic day along the banks of the Delaware River, as the Battleship New Jersey left her dock for the first time since 2000. Throughout the last 24 years of serving as a museum ship on the Camden Waterfront, it became apparent that the New Jersey was in need of maintenance to her hull. Plans were made to move the battleship from her dock to the Philadelphia Naval Yards where she was assembled, and the occasion brought thousands to the windy banks of the Delaware River to watch “Big J” sail downstream to Paulsboro, New Jersey for ballasting before finally returning to Dry Dock 3, the same dry dock in which she was built.
Touted as the most decorated battleship in American history, the USS New Jersey is an Iowa Class battleship built in the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard between 1940 and 1942 at the height of World War II. Part of a fleet of four Iowa Class battleships, these battleships were the largest, longest, and fastest built in naval history, and the New Jersey in particular served longer than all three of her sisters, serving until 1991 before finally being mothballed for good. Later in 1999, she was towed to her new home in Camden, welcoming a new era of preservation of an Icon of American naval history.
This video features scenes from the Dry Dock Celebration ceremony, as well as the first moves down the Delaware in 24 years before arriving in Paulsboro, NJ. Now, please enjoy this exciting moment in American naval history brought to you by Blue Comet Productions!
This video was filmed on March 21st, 2024.