PORT TOWNSEND – For the first time this year, a nuclear-powered submarine equipped to carry non-nuclear weapons docked at Naval Magazine Indian Island’s munitions pier about two miles from the city’s downtown.
The USS Ohio was escorted through Port Townsend Bay and docked about noon Thursday – reviving fears to some residents about the possibility of danger.
“They have all the cards in their hands, and we have to guess as to what’s over there,” said Doug Milholland, a Port Townsend Peace Movement member, on Thursday.
The Ohio was apparently the second sub to dock at the munitions storage and transfer depot since the Navy announced plans in September 2005 to convert the Naval Magazine’s ammunition wharf into a maintenance site for nuclear-powered submarines.
A $1.5 million upgrade of the Naval Magazine Indian Island wharf’s power systems was completed last year.
The last time a submarine docked at Indian Island was when the USS Florida arrived in April 2006, said Lt. Kyle Raines, Navy spokesman for Submarine Group 9, on Thursday.
Raines would not say if the 560-foot-long Ohio, which is capable of carrying 154 conventional Tomahawk missiles, was to transfer weapons while at the Navy’s only munitions storage and transfer depot on the West Coast.
“The Ohio is returning from sea, on her way back to Bangor, and is conducting proficiency training,” he said.
While Raines confirmed that the vessel is intended to carry conventional weapons – including missiles and torpedoes – as part of its mission, he stopped short of saying whether weapons would be handled during the sub’s stop at Indian Island.
“Obviously Indian Island has its expertise,” he said of the Naval Magazine.
The vessel, which is 42 feet wide, was guided in and secured at the pier by two tugboats after it had been escorted into Port Townsend Bay by a Coast Guard vessel.
Based in Bangor, about 40 miles southeast of Indian Island on Hood Canal in Kitsap County, the Ohio most recently has been conducting sea trials after it was returned to service in February 2006, Raines said.
“It’s a continuation of subs coming into the [Indian Island] pier,” Navy spokesman Chris Haley said Thursday.
“We’re doing what we do.”
Haley represents Naval Magazine Indian Island and is based at Navy Region Northwest offices in Silverdale.
