Navy To Offer Free Warship Tours in OC

Here's a phrase you won't hear next weekend: You sunk my battleship.

In celebration of Seal Beach Founder’s Day and the 237th birthday of the
U.S. Navy, civilians can visit a famous, state-of-the-art warship and meet its crew at the Seal Beach Naval Weapons Station on Oct. 13-14, according to a station spokesman.

The guided missile destroyer USS Sampson (DDG 102) will be open for Saturday tours from 10 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., and Sunday tours from 10 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.

Hands-on displays of other Navy and Marine Corps equipment will also be available.

The USS Sampson was commissioned in 2007, and was one of the ships featured in the summer blockbuster movie Battleship, according to Gregg Smith, Naval station public affairs officer.

The vessel recently returned from a six-month deployment to the Western Pacific and Indian Ocean. 

The tour is free and no reservations are required. Cameras are permitted, and the Navy highly recommends walking shoes.

No backpacks or handbags will be allowed aboard the ship. The vessel is not accessible to the disabled.

Marine Corps personnel from the Toys for Tots program will also be on hand collecting unwrapped, unopened, store-bought toys or donations for the area’s underprivileged children this holiday season.

Public entry will only be available via the station’s Wharf Gate, located on Seal Beach Boulevard, 200 yards south of the Pacific Coast Highway intersection.

No access will be available from the station's Main Gate.

Additional information and live updates can be found on the Naval Weapons
Station Seal Beach Facebook page.

According to Smith, the station began operations in 1944 as a U.S. Naval Ammunition and Net Depot, and is "the Pacific Fleet’s premier ordnance loading and storage installation."

The base provides munitions for a majority of the fleet's surface ships, and services about 50 U. S. Navy vessels annually.