Tuesday, May 26, 2020

LAST SURVIVING LIBERTY SHIP SAVED FROM FIRE

by Bob Walsh

The S.S. Jeremiah O'Brien is the last surviving functional Liberty Ship, a relic of WW II wartime production. It is on permanent floating display at Pier 45 in the People's Republic of San Francisco.

There was one hell of a fire on Pier 45 over the weekend. A large still in use fish warehouse at the end of the pier was completely destroyed.

The fire was apparently actually licking at the sides of the ship but the S F Fire Dept. fire boat and fire department units on the pier managed to prevent the vessel from suffering any serious damage.

The fire started about 0400 on Saturday. There were workers in the building at the time, but there is some concern that there may have been homeless people camping out in the building.

There were about 2,700 of the 10,000 ton ships built. They were built from prefabricated subassemblies. One of them was cranked out in the Richmond, CA ship yard in 4 days 15 hours from laying of the keel to launch.

EDITOR'S NOTE: In 1947, I came back to America from Korea on a Liberty Ship.

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