Historic
Left: Shafts of sunlight illuminate the USS Arizona as nearly 2.5 million visitors pay their respects each year
The drawings you see of Arizona
in many publications were obtained from the work in 1983 and 1984 by the NPS Submerged Cultural Resources Unit or SCRU, as (the SRC) was then known. Arranged into a five part presentation in 1985 by our chief illustrator Jerry Livingston, it won awards for historic display.
Ongoing Stewardship Frankly, at this point we intended to ride off into the sunset. But something happened that was telling for the future. We were asked to return to Pearl Harbor by the new superintendent (Bill Dickinson). In 1986, with help from the Navy Mobile Diving Salvage Unit One Reserves we added more detail for a model maker to make an eight -foot (2.5m) model of the ship as it is now. Paired with the existing pre- attack model of the ship, it made a wonderful interpretive device. We
46 Magazine
had enough Navy Reserve divers that we also mapped USS Utah—a story in itself. Impressed with how much we
learned about what was there, Dickinson wanted to know, “What’s happening to it?” He meant impacts from corrosion, oil creeping its lighter-than-water way up from shattered bunkers, etc. This began a process that has continued and formalized over the past 30 years. SRC helps managers care for the nation’s submerged treasures. Entrusted with this national icon they want to know everything happening to it in the biochemical soup called Pearl Harbor. SRC became their eyes underwater. Larry Murphy, my deputy, took steel and oil samples to university corrosion specialists to focus attention on the site and wring out all they could offer. Under succeeding SRC Chiefs
(Larry Murphy and Dave Conlin) and
determined that corrosion has slowed but needs to be closely monitored
Top: A National Park Service Honor Guard stands at
attention before
the names of the 1177 sailors and
marines killed on the USS Arizona.
Above: 50 caliber rounds
inventoried and labeled by NPS archaeologists
superintendents including Kathy Billings, this relationship continues. Superintendents use our focus on the material past (archaeology) along with our underwater savvy as tools. We are not trying to preserve Arizona but keep our leadersip apprised of what’s happening down there and document changes as they occur. The oil is the biggest issue––we
determined that corrosion has slowed but needs to be closely monitored. Removing the oil is a vexing problem because there are so many separate bunkers. You aren’t dealing with a big gas tank like in the family car but hundreds
Te oil is the biggest issue, we
Photo: NPS / Susanna Pershern
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