She was born in a war and survived number of major US Military naval engagements where she arrived in Tokyo Harbor ending World War Two. She is the USS Missouri BB-63 and she is called Mighty Mo. Her motto “Strength for Freedom” was a resounding call heard across the Pacific where she earned in total 11 battle stars beginning in WW2 at battles of Iwo Jima and Okinawa, advancing later into the Korean War where she fought valiantly from 1950 to 1953.
Her 16 inch guns fired into the islands of the Empire of Japan and later during Operation Desert Storm.
Biggest Guns I Have Ever Seen!
The Iowa class battleship USS Missouri sported 9 16 inch guns. That means the size of these behemoths were 406mm in size. The USS Missouri had nine of them and could hurl a projectile weighing in at 2700lbs at a speed of 2690 feet per second a distance of 24 miles. Take a Volkswagon bug, jam it down the barrel of a gun and fire it a distance of 126,720 feet downrange.
So after that heavyweight of a gun fires that 16 inch shell it arrives on target in about 47.10 seconds.
Mighty By Design: Four facts about the USS Missouri
Last But Not Least
The last of the Iowa-class battleships she set to sea on January 29, 1944. A total of 6 Iowa-class battleships had been ordered to the tune of 100 million dollars warship per by the United States Navy in 1939 with all but 2 completed during the escalation of World War Two. The Mighty Mo, the Big Stick USS Iowa, the Big Wisky USS Wisconsin and the Black Dragon or also called Big J with the nickname going to the USS New Jersey were completed in time for the Cold War. With the needs of the US Navy changing US Navy submarines and aircraft carriers became the priority while battleships were no longer needed.
On the Wide
The Mighty Mo has a width of 108.2 feet and as facts would have it could narrowly slip through the Panama Canal with a width of 100 feet. Close enough to have a mouse scrape the paint off the sides when this dreadnought punched its way through this waterway.
Teak Deck
Battleships sporting teak decks. The days of masted sailing ships has returned? Not exactly but nice try. So what do these gorgeous battleships have for decking material?
Tectona grandis (teak) is a tropical hardwood in the Lamiaceae family of trees. That’s what! Why pick wood? The USS Constitution is made of wood and the hulls of ocean going minesweepers but battleships too?
Keeping the leaks out and better than scotch guard water repellent its lumber is valued for its water resistance and durability, which is an ideal building material for boats and furniture. Hello North Carolina! So in the interests of transporting heavy and massively explosive gunpowder and their receptacles across the decks of the Iowa-class battleships they cautioned on the safety side with wooden decks that would not set a spark like a steel deck possibly could. Gunpowder, steel cases scraping metal and we go boom! Boom is very bad.
Gun Show
The Mighty Mo boasts 9 gun turrets which can fire at the same time. That’s a salvo of 9 rounds of “pain and suffering” a distance of 24 miles. Kept all turned to one side when firing and she fires the ship does not move sideward. At a max speed of 1800 miles per hour and creating a crater 50 feet wide and 20 feet deep.
Why Not A USS Missouri Coin
The USS Missouri with its famous history had to be made into a challenge coin and so the veteran artists at Navycrow.Com did just that. As part of a magnificent collectible series of coins called the Warships of World War 2 75th Anniversary Coin series she was forever remembered in coin form. The USS Missouri Warships of World War 2 75th Anniversary Coin is a masterful design and perfect for your US Navy coin collection.
