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HOUSTON: Battleship Texas

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The big guns did not look like a fun place to be when they were making boom

Look up the Battleship New Jersey YT channel.. That guy does a lot more explaining on how things like that work. Of course the NJ is a more modern ship, however most things apply. He talked not long ago about having someone on deck while firing the big guns. It's a big ship so you can have someone on the back while firing off the front but I don't think anyone was allowed to be under or near them when they go off. Imagine shooting the equivalent of a car 30 miles. I think too they preferred to shoot to the left and right, not over the front because of the effect. He talked about in that vidga 1 time the NJ shot over the front and the damage it did to rooms several layers deep into the ship. It peeled tile off some of the walls.
 
Alabama is same class as New Jersey , major differences between it and Texas , thats whats so unique about Texas , not another one close to it left .
 
major differences between it and Texas

yes but there are similarities.. Both are huge steel museum ships, still working out what is the best way to care for them. Look at the NJ video posted yesterday. They are doing so much better than the Texas. Heck, Texas didn't even announce it was coming out of dry dock. Word got out by a video short showing the water starting to come over the floor of the dry dock. Our Texas folks can do better. It's going to be us little dedicated Texan people paying the admission and buying the swag to keep it going the next 30 years.

 
charliez said:
major differences between it and Texas

yes but there are similarities.. Both are huge steel museum ships, still working out what is the best way to care for them. Look at the NJ video posted yesterday. They are doing so much better than the Texas. Heck, Texas didn't even announce it was coming out of dry dock. Word got out by a video short showing the water starting to come over the floor of the dry dock. Our Texas folks can do better. It's going to be us little dedicated Texan people paying the admission and buying the swag to keep it going the next 30 years.

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Yeah, I am not sure what the deal is with the Battleship Texas foundation. No real updates on anything. I am aware a lot of them are volunteer, but you would think someone would at least be able to post up the ship is coming out of drydock. The video I posted above with it being pushed out of dock and such was done by someone with a drone that had someone contact him the morning of the event saying it is being floated now.

At least somebody there had the presence to take a walk around the ship and record it just before it was lowered.


There are a few vids of the guy from New Jersey talking to the Texas people and he says how much they are/have learned about preservation from what has happened to the Texas.
Texas had a lot going against it from the get go. Nobody knew how to really make a war ship a museum. Minimal consideration was given for long term upkeep, and some of what was done was just plan bad (filling the ballast with salt water and oil mixture, letting the ship sit in mud for decades, pouring cement on the deck, etc).

I have to admit though, I did splurge a little bit just now.
I was on their website looking at stuff and made an impulse purchase, I bought one of the steel silhouette cutouts from the torpedo blisters (1945 full).
Just thought it would be cool to actual own a piece of the Texas.
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I can see them not having a place for people to come watch it and not wanting the waters filled with boats. Even if you say there's n place for lookers, they will show up anyway. They did finally start live streaming it. I had to search a little to find it. But theres so many more that would have loved to watch it that didn't because of the way it was handled.
 
The Texas has had very poor care since it was given to the state . It has deteriorated almost to the point of no return twice on my lifetime now , im just hoping they did a better job this time . Keeping a ship afloat is a never ending very expensive job and to expect for it to get by and what little it earns probably doesnt even pay the light bill . Specially when its over a hundred years old . Maybe if a few million of that money that is just being squandered on the other side of the world could be trimmed off and used for something good rather than just burning it the old BB35 could be around in another hundred years , if people could see just how brutal and sensless wars are they might think twice before wanting to start them
 
charliez said:
I can see them not having a place for people to come watch it and not wanting the waters filled with boats. Even if you say there's n place for lookers, they will show up anyway. They did finally start live streaming it. I had to search a little to find it. But theres so many more that would have loved to watch it that didn't because of the way it was handled.
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I get it to a point, but there is a lot of space at Pier 21 for people to watch.
I went by there today and took a pic of it from the pier.
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Cagiva 549 said:
The Texas has had very poor care since it was given to the state . It has deteriorated almost to the point of no return twice on my lifetime now , im just hoping they did a better job this time . Keeping a ship afloat is a never ending very expensive job and to expect for it to get by and what little it earns probably doesnt even pay the light bill . Specially when its over a hundred years old . Maybe if a few million of that money that is just being squandered on the other side of the world could be trimmed off and used for something good rather than just burning it the old BB35 could be around in another hundred years , if people could see just how brutal and sensless wars are they might think twice before wanting to start them
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This drydock vs the '89 drydock are different things.
The '89 seemed to be a lot more cosmetic, vs this time is a lot of structural repair. The foundation admits it made a lot of mistakes in '89, passing the buck on things that came back to bite them.
Getting the blisters torn off and being able to repair the actual hull will make a huge difference in the life of the ship. No more leaks, all the corroded metal is gone and/or treated.
I agree that there is more money wasted on stupid stuff that could/should be used for things like this, but what are you going to do.
 
It's an interesting argument. At one point, I bet the building of the Texas was considered wasting money that could have been spent elsewhere. And now here we are spending MORE money to restore that "Waste of money" as a museum. Kinda strange circle there.
 
Clearly their PR efforts are lacking. There were many places that would have afforded a view of the re-launching. And the more excitement the organization can generate, usually donations follow.

This is one thing that Battleship New Jersey gets right. Battleship Texas should have an active presence on social media.
 
Cagiva 549 said:
I vaguely remember climbing in the big gun turrets in the 50s or 60s when we went out there , also remember several small gun placements around the ship , 5 inch enclosed turrets and aa guns , all gone in the 80s . The big guns did not look like a fun place to be when they were making boom boom and the 5 inch wernt big enough for one person let alone the several it took to make it go boom boom . Kinda glad they didnt have guns when I was yachting .
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Battleship Texas lobbed almost 1,000 shells on Iwo Jima. What a catastrophe that was...

The Battle of Iwo Jima took place from February 19, 1945 to March 26, 1945. The battle was a major conflict between the United States and the Empire of Japan during World War II. The United States Marine Corps and United States Navy landed on the island and captured it from the Imperial Japanese Army.
The battle is considered one of the bloodiest battles of World War II in the Pacific. It's estimated that all but 200 of the 21,000 Japanese forces on the island were killed, along with almost 7,000 Marines. 27 Marines and sailors were awarded the Medal of Honor for their actions at Iwo Jima.
 
Very insightful comments. They seemed to regularly come out with videos in the beginning but all but later stopped.
 
The guy in charge of the Texas needs to start watching the social media of the guy from the new jersey and learn how its done and what can be gained from it. Sadly the Texas isn't getting the recognition and publicity it needs to sustain itself. There's so much more that can be done and so much left on the table. We were told in our dry dock tour that he might possibly be there and not to talk to or approach him because he doesn't like to be around people. Guess what, it's the people interested in the Texas that's paying his salary and without us, he's out of a job and the Texas get recycled into electric cars.
 
charliez said:
The guy in charge of the Texas needs to start watching the social media of the guy from the new jersey and learn how its done and what can be gained from it. Sadly the Texas isn't getting the recognition and publicity it needs to sustain itself. There's so much more that can be done and so much left on the table. We were told in our dry dock tour that he might possibly be there and not to talk to or approach him because he doesn't like to be around people. Guess what, it's the people interested in the Texas that's paying his salary and without us, he's out of a job and the Texas get recycled into electric cars.
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Sounds like it's managed more as a private club, then a public floating museum that needs to generate revenue
 
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Gotta say that’s a janky vid.
If I was paying for that I would be quite unhappy. Low quality, no image stabilization, vertical orientation, etc. Looks like it was filmed with something worse than my 9 year old smartphone.
This is rather poor if that is an “official” video.

If this is indicative of how the rest of the project is being managed, it will look like a colossal waste of money in 10 years or less. That’s really sad.
 
dukey33 said:
Gotta say that’s a janky vid.
If I was paying for that I would be quite unhappy. Low quality, no image stabilization, vertical orientation, etc. Looks like it was filmed with something worse than my 9 year old smartphone.
This is rather poor if that is an “official” video.

If this is indicative of how the rest of the project is being managed, it will look like a colossal waste of money in 10 years or less. That’s really sad.
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That's too bad. Seem like just released raw video? Old videos were interesting.
 
charliez said:
The guy in charge of the Texas needs to start watching the social media of the guy from the new jersey and learn how its done and what can be gained from it. Sadly the Texas isn't getting the recognition and publicity it needs to sustain itself. There's so much more that can be done and so much left on the table. We were told in our dry dock tour that he might possibly be there and not to talk to or approach him because he doesn't like to be around people. Guess what, it's the people interested in the Texas that's paying his salary and without us, he's out of a job and the Texas get recycled into electric cars.
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Sad thing is the guy from the New Jersey has been down to the Texas and done videos with the Texas guys, they are aware of each other.
I said before that the other museum ships have learned a lot about how to care for their ships because of the mistakes with Texas, and this apparently also includes publicity and getting/keeping the public interested.
The New Jersey channel puts out a video almost every day, and while not all of it deals directly with the New Jersey itself, they have visitors to their site that keep them relevant.
Texas goes months with nothing posted.

StromXTc said:
That's too bad. Seem like just released raw video? Old videos were interesting.
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Yeah, but that is part of the point, they knew this move was coming.
It is not like they got a call that morning saying "hey, were gonna move the ship in an hour".
There was time to get somebody out there to do a semi decent job to document it.
I think I heard him say there was somebody with a drone out there filming that they had contacted, but have not come across the vid yet (but have not been looking either).
 
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