Recharger has always asked himself the following: how can anyone with a pile of cash take a whole aircraft carrier--a floating city packed with an intriguing number of gay sailors and a terrifying array of futuristic weaponry designed to wipe out foreign populations--and make it boring?
Answer: not easily.
Since 1982 when it opened, the Intrepid Air and Space Museum has, with its football-field sized mess hall, its maze-like passageways leading to machine rooms and bunks, and its creepy death craft rusting on the top deck, teased jillions of hormone-crazed junior high schoolers and beer-bellied tourists with promises of a virtual wartime experiene. A visit to the ship, however, had all the excitement of a pre-K trip to the post office.
With any luck, this might change. On Sunday, October 1, “The Fighting I” (the Intrepid’s award-winning nickname) will go through a two-year overhaul. The $58 million project includes a hull repainting, interior decoration, and construction of a new pier. After the renovation, previously-shut portions of the ship--the dining rooms, the poop deck, and the sailors’ quarters (tee-hee)--will open to the public.
The carrier will be tugged from its Hudson River pier on November 6, then taken to dry dock at Bayonne, N.J. During the rehab, about 100 museum workers will be jobless, a small price, say officials, for profits the museum will eventually earn.
Since 1982, the museum has attracted about 750,000 people each year. At $16.50 a pop, maybe it can, under the plaque mentioning the ship’s service in Vietnam, include a couple of words about the 2 million Vietnamese who perished in the conflict?
-- Ilya Lyssanov