The Midway in San Diego

 We are in San Diego for a few days. We spent much of Monday at San Diego Port & the Naval Pier touring The Midway, the longest serving aircraft of the 20th century, 1945-1992.

a view of the launching section of the deck from

one of the control rooms in the Island

An aircraft carrier’s island is the command center for flight deck operations, as well as the ship as a whole. The island is located on the flight deck and rises above all the aircraft aboard ship.

a modern nuclear aircraft carrier across the harbor

helicopter wings folded allowing more units on the ship

The ship held 100 planes in its early years, but as the size of the planes increased, The Midway housed 80 aircraft.

famous statue seen from The Midway

Unconditional Surrender is a sculpture by Seward Johnson resembling two photographs taken separately by professional photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt (V–J day in Times Square) and U.S. Navy photo journalist Victor Jorgensen (Kissing the War Goodbye). It portrays a U.S. Navy sailor grabbing and kissing a stranger—a woman in a white dress—on Victory over Japan Day ("V-J Day") in New York City's Times Square on August 14, 1945.

the landing trap on the flight deck (yellow line) 

was much longer than the launching deck

The flight deck is 971' long; or just over three football field. Today the flight deck is home to a variety fighters, bombers, and helicopters. (The Midway's length is listed at 1001 feet long.)

the Mess Deck

one of five serving areas for the 4500 crew members

13,000 meals daily

500 pies for dessert

1000 loaves of bread daily

the hallway of one of the 18 decks

the chapel

books in the Chaplin's Quarters

Officers dining room

interesting map of the sources of the ships food

(remember to click on the photo to get a larger view)

USN Supply ships can carry up to 250 tons of dry goods and 250 tons of refrigerated goods.

reading material in the women's bathroom

43,000 pounds of laundry weekly

80,000 haircuts annually

1500 telephones on board

30,000 light fixtures

we were able to go below to the engines and turbines

this is the main control room for the ship

Main Control personnel coordinate all the valve settings, pump activations, and switch positions necessary to smoothly operate the entire plant.

USS Langley (CV-1) became the U.S. Navy's first aircraft carrier when commissioned in March 1922.

leaving the Hangar Deck

In 1945 The Midway was commissioned as the largest ship in the world. The ship needed refueling every 4 days using 300 gallons of fuel a mile.

one of three elevators needed to get the planes from the 

Hangar Deck to the Flight Deck

We walked to the pier next door, Tuna Harbor, to view Unconditional Surrender up close and to see the Bob Hope exhibit. 

entertaining the troops

statue of Bob Hope

another statue familiar to military families

Then we headed north along the Embarcadero to the Maritime Museum of San Diego.

We were looking at the figureheads (carved decoration at the bow of a vessel) on some of the masted ships. This is the Muse of Lyric Poetry. She carries a flute but it is only visible on the starboard side.

The Star of India is one of the oldest ships in the world still capable of sailing. She was launched as Euterpe on the Isle of Man in November 1863. She made 21 circumnavigations of the world before finishing her working life in the Alaskan salmon trade. Her name was changed to Star of India in 1906.

The Midway was Hubby's bucket list item on this trip. This was not a geocaching focused excursion, but we certainly made use of our time along that part of the harbor today, completing an Adventure Lab, several virtual caches, and earth cache, and some traditional geocaches. Tomorrow is my bucket list item.