USS Missouri BB-63 1944

USS Missouri (BB-63) is an Iowa-class battleship and was the third ship of the United States Navy to be named after the U.S. state of Missouri. Missouri was the last battleship commissioned by the United States Navy in 1944 and is best remembered as the site of the surrender of the Empire of Japan on September 2, 1945, which ended World War II.

Missouri was ordered in 1940 and commissioned in June 1944. In the Pacific Theater of World War II, she fought in the battles of Iwo Jima and Okinawa and shelled the Japanese home islands, and she later fought in the Korean War from 1950 to 1953. She was decommissioned in 1955 into the United States Navy reserve fleets (the "Mothball Fleet"), but reactivated and modernized in 1984 as part of the 600-ship Navy plan, and provided fire support during Operation Desert Storm in 1991.

Missouri received a total of 11 battle stars for service in World War II, Korea, and the Persian Gulf, and was finally decommissioned in 1992 after serving a total of 17 years of active service, but remained on the Naval Vessel Register until her name was struck in 1995. In 1998, she has donated to the USS Missouri Memorial Association and became a museum ship at Pearl Harbor Hawaii.



Namesake: State of Missouri
Ordered: 12 June 1940
Builder: Brooklyn Navy Yard
Laid down: 6 January 1941
Launched: 29 January 1944
Sponsored by: Margaret Truman
Commissioned: 11 June 1944
Decommissioned: 26 February 1955
Recommissioned: 10 May 1986
Decommissioned: 31 March 1992
Stricken: 12 January 1995
Status: Museum ship in Pearl Harbor Hawaii

Class and type: Iowa-class battleship

Displacement:
Standard: 48,110 long tons (48,880 t)
Full load: 57,540 long tons (58,460 t)

Length: 887 feet 3 inches (270.4 m) loa
Beam: 108 ft 2 in (33 m)
Draft: 36 ft 2.25 in (11 m)

Installed power:
8 × Babcock & Wilcox boilers
212,000 shaft horsepower (158,000 kW)

Propulsion:
4 × steam turbines
4 × screw propellers

Speed: 32.5 knots (37.4 mph; 60.2 km/h)
Range: 15,000 nmi (28,000 km) at 15 knots (28 km/h; 17 mph)

Complement:
117 officers
1,804 enlisted men

Armament:
9 × 16 in (406 mm)/50 cal Mark 7 guns
20 × 5 in (127 mm)/38 cal Mark 12 guns
80 × 40 mm (1.6 in) anti-aircraft guns
49 × 20 mm (0.79 in) anti-aircraft guns

Armor:
Belt: 12.1 in (310 mm)
Barbettes: 11.6 in (290 mm)
Turrets: 19.7 in (500 mm)
Decks: 6 in (152 mm)