A Naval Inactive Ship Maintenance Facility (NISMF) is a facility owned by the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

as a holding facility for decommissioned naval vessels, pending determination of their final fate. All ships in these facilities are inactive, but some are still on the

Naval Vessel Register The ''Naval Vessel Register'' (NVR) is the official inventory of ships and service craft in custody of or titled by the United States Navy. It contains information on ships and service craft that make up the official inventory of the Navy from t ...

(NVR), while others have been struck from that Register. The ships that have been stricken from the NVR are disposed of by one of several means, including

foreign military sales The United States Department of Defense's Foreign Military Sales (FMS) program facilitates sales of U.S. arms, defense equipment, defense services, and military training to foreign governments. The purchaser does not deal directly with the defense ...

transfer, ship donation as a

museum A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical History (derived ) is the systematic study and th ...

or memorial, domestic dismantling and recycling,

artificial reef An artificial reef is a human-created underwater structure, typically built to promote marine life in areas with a generally featureless bottom, to control erosion, block ship passage, block the use of trawling nets, or improve surfing S ...

ing, or use as a target vessel. Others are retention assets for possible future reactivation, which have been laid up for long-term preservation and are maintained with minimal maintenance (humidity control, corrosion control, flood/fire watch) should they need to be recalled to active duty. The Navy has been reducing the number of inactive ships, which numbered as many as 195 in 1997, but was down to 49 by the end of 2014. The Naval Sea Systems Command's Inactive Ships Management Office (INACTSHIPOFF) is based in

Portsmouth, Virginia Portsmouth is an independent city in southeast Virginia and across the Elizabeth River from Norfolk. As of the 2020 census, the population was 97,915. It is part of the Hampton Roads metropolitan area. The Norfolk Naval Shipyard and Naval ...

. There are three NISMFs: *

Puget Sound Naval Shipyard Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, officially Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility (PSNS & IMF), is a United States Navy shipyard covering 179 acres (0.7 km2) on Puget Sound at Bremerton, Washington in uninterrupted u ...

–

Bremerton, Washington Bremerton is a city in Kitsap County, Washington. The population was 37,729 at the 2010 census and an estimated 41,405 in 2019, making it the largest city on the Kitsap Peninsula. Bremerton is home to Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and the Bremerto ...

Joint Base Pearl Harbor–Hickam Joint Base Pearl Harbor–Hickam (JBPHH) is a United States military base on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. It is an amalgamation of the United States Air Force's Hickam Air Force Base and the United States Navy's Naval Station Pearl Harbor, wh ...

–

Pearl Harbor, Hawaii Pearl Harbor is an American lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. It was often visited by the Naval fleet of the United States, before it was acquired from the Hawaiian Kingdom by the U.S. with the signing of the Re ...

Philadelphia Naval Shipyard The Philadelphia Naval Shipyard was an important naval shipyard of the United States for almost two centuries. Philadelphia's original navy yard, begun in 1776 on Front Street and Federal Street in what is now the Pennsport section of the ci ...

–

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...

In addition, parts of the

Norfolk Naval Shipyard The Norfolk Naval Shipyard, often called the Norfolk Navy Yard and abbreviated as NNSY, is a U.S. Navy facility in Portsmouth, Virginia, for building, remodeling and repairing the Navy's ships. It is the oldest and largest industrial facility tha ...

South Gate Annex Naval Inactive Ship Maintenance Facility USS ''Albany'' (CG-10) laid up at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard in 1983 Atlantic Reserve Fleet, Norfolk was a part of the United States Navy reserve fleets, also called a ''mothball fleet'', and was used to store the many surplus ships after Worl ...

and

are designated for the storage of inactive

nuclear power Nuclear power is the use of nuclear reactions to produce electricity. Nuclear power can be obtained from nuclear fission, nuclear decay and nuclear fusion reactions. Presently, the vast majority of electricity from nuclear power is produced ...

ed vessels. Inactive ship facilities in

Suisun Bay Suisun Bay ( ; Wintun for "where the west wind blows") is a shallow tidal estuary (a northeastern extension of the San Francisco Bay) in Northern California. It lies at the confluence of the Sacramento River and San Joaquin River, forming the ...

James River The James River is a river in the U.S. state of Virginia that begins in the Appalachian Mountains and flows U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map , accessed April 1, 2011 to Ches ...

and

Beaumont, Texas Beaumont is a coastal city in the U.S. state of Texas. It is the seat of government of Jefferson County, within the Beaumont– Port Arthur metropolitan statistical area, located in Southeast Texas on the Neches River about east of Houston ( ...

are owned and operated by the Maritime Administration under the

U.S. Department of Transportation The United States Department of Transportation (USDOT or DOT) is one of the executive departments of the U.S. federal government. It is headed by the secretary of transportation, who reports directly to the President of the United States an ...

Vessels moored at NISMFs

Following is a list of vessels currently being stored at the facilities as per the NAVSEA Inactive Ship Inventory dated September 26, 2017 (with exceptions as referenced separately):

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Bremerton, Washington

Pearl Harbor, Hawaii

Past Facilities

United States Naval Station Orange United States Naval Station Orange, later Texas Group, Atlantic Reserve Fleet and US Naval Reserve Orange was major United States Navy shipyard in Orange, Texas on the Sabine River. The shipyard opened on August 24, 1940, to manage the construct ...

, Orange, Texas (1966-1975) *

Naval Inactive Ship Maintenance Facility Bayonne Military Ocean Terminal at Bayonne (MOTBY) was a U.S. military ocean terminal located in the Port of New York and New Jersey which operated from 1967 to 1999. From 1942 to 1967 the site was the Bayonne Naval Drydock. The site is on Upper New York ...

, Bayonne, New Jersey *NISMF at

Naval Base San Diego Naval Base San Diego, also known as 32nd Street Naval Station, is the second largest surface ship base of the United States Navy and is located in San Diego, California. Naval Base San Diego is the principal homeport of the Pacific Fleet, con ...

San Diego, California San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the List of United States cities by population, eigh ...

NISMF San Diego, California
/ref>

References

{{Reflist, 2

External links

U.S. Navy Inactive Ships Program Office

Official List of Inactive U.S. Navy Ships

Official List of Stricken U.S. Navy Ships

NavSource Online
United States Navy installations Ships of the United States Navy