The USS Intrepid Slides to Freedom

This time, just as the tugboat operators were starting to give up hope, the old ship yielded, sliding free of the muck and away from the pier that has been its home since 1982. Pat Kinnier, who planned the towing operation for McAllister Towing, yelled out, “We got it!” and hugged Bill White, the president of the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum.

The men who had spent months preparing the Intrepid for its first voyage in 24 years admitted that for several minutes they had feared that the 36,000-ton ship might never budge.