USS SARATOGA AT BREAKWATER

USS SARATOGA AIRCRAFT CARRIER

AT

DELAWARE BREAKWATER

1968 HISTORY

Lewes resident, Delaware Bay & River pilot, J. Wright Rowland,

had no problem as the pilot of the Saratoga , going up river from the

Delaware Breakwater Monday, January 7 1968.

There was a 25 knot or higher wind from the northwest as Rowland

stood on the navigation bridge with about 40 Navy officers and seamen

for the trip from the Delaware Breakwater to Philadelphia Navy Yard

where she will be most of this year until December undergoing overhaul

costing forty million dollars. The waters were choppy, lots of ice , it was

cold at 6:30 am when he was able to board.

He spent the day until 3 pm on the bridge with the carriers captain and

10 Navy men talking with crew in the engine room, the steer engine room,

the bow, the stern and all along the sides. There he stayed until the docking

pilot , a Coast Guard officer, took over and spent two hours docking.

The Saratoga is 1039 feet long with a 130 foot beam at her keel and

weighs about 68,000 tons.

For Rowland is was part of a days work as the night before he took a ship

through the Chesapeake & Delaware Canal to Philadelphia up the

Delaware River.

Abstract: Wilmington News Journal , Tuesday, January 9, 1968