Pier T Container Terminal/Long Beach Naval Shipyard (site) (Long Beach, California)

USA / California / Signal Hill / Long Beach, California
 draw only border, cargo terminal
The Long Beach Naval Shipyard, which closed in 1997, was located at Terminal Island between the city of Long Beach and the San Pedro district of Los Angeles and approximately 23 miles south of the Los Angeles International Airport.

The Long Beach NSY industrial area encompassed 119 acres (482,000 m²) of the total 214 acres (866,000 m²) owned. There were 120 permanent, 39 semi-permanent, and 6 temporary buildings, for a total of 165 buildings. There were 17 different shop work areas and 2,400,000 ft² (223,000 m²) of covered building space. The shipyard had three graving docks, and five industrial piers. There were 12,307 feet (3.8 km) of ship berthing space. Crane capacity ranged from 25 tons to 67 tons (portal) and from 25 tons to 112 tons (floating).

During World War II, the naval dry docks provided routine and battle damage repairs to a parade of tankers, cargo ships, troop transports, destroyers, and cruisers. Peak employment of 16,091 civilian employees was reached in August 1945.

On February 9, 1943, the Secretary of the Navy established the facilities as the US Naval Dry Docks, Roosevelt Base, California. The name of this facility was changed to Terminal Island Naval Shipyard on November 30, 1945. The name became Long Beach Naval Shipyard (NSY) in March 1948.

The Long Beach NSY was equipped with facilities and skills to perform all non-nuclear structural, sheet metal, boiler, rigging, electronics, electrical, insulating, lagging, ordnance, sandblasting, welding, machining, woodworking, painting, pipe fitting, and other work pertaining to the overhaul and repair of surface ships. The shipyard possessed complete design, engineering, combat systems, quality assurance, planning and public works capabilities to support its industrial work. Dry dock No. 1 was designated the West Coast nuclear powered aircraft carrier (CVN) emergency dry dock.

The Long Beach NSY was placed in an inactive status on June 1, 1950. The Korean War began less than one month later. Reactivation of the shipyard was directed on January 4, 1951.

The shipyard enjoyed an excellent reputation among its fleet customers. Past and current performance in terms of producing timely, economical and quality work coupled with a zeal in responsiveness contribute to this reputation.

Through the years the shipyard accomplished several special projects in addition to its primary mission. These included support or scientific projects in conjunction with programs like POLARIS, POSEIDON, and SEALAB.

The former shipyard was converted into a container terminal in 2003.

www.militarymuseum.org/NOBLongBeach.html
Historic American Buildings Survey photograph collection: memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/d?hh:20:./temp/~ammem_okwE...
A shot of the shipyard when it was active: www.fas.org/man/company/shipyard/long-beach-nsy-DNSC940...
www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/long_beach_nsy...
home.att.net/~drydock-1/index.html
home.compuall.net/~dianerush/navalbase.html
www.kpffspd.com/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=2...
Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Beach_Naval_Station
Nearby cities:
Coordinates:   33°45'23"N   118°14'6"W

Comments

  • The site of the former base was built on fill. The original shoreline ran adjacent to Seaside Ave.
  • A firsthand account of the Long Beach Naval Shipyard worth reading can be found here: http://astore.amazon.com/woraffboa0b-20/detail/1448648521
  • Thanks for the historic '50's aerials additions, desu. I can see my old Dispensary in one of 'em!
  • It's sad they had to demolish the really classic art deco buildings of the old Navy base.
This article was last modified 8 years ago