March 2009
Seawolf Park
Galveston, Texas
 
FEMA provides funding
to help restore
Historical Seawolf Park
Following Hurricane Ike.



Chelsea Klein
 
I'm Chelsea Klein. I'm a historic preservation specialist with FEMA. I am standing in the forward torpedo room of the U.S.S. Cavalla. We are at a city-run park, Seawolf Park on Galveston Island, home of the U.S.S. Stewart and the U.S.S. Cavalla. As a result of the storm damage associated with Hurricane Ike, damage to both the U.S.S. Stewart and the U.S.S. Cavalla was incurred.

John McMichael

My name is John McMichael and I'm the park manager here at Seawolf Park for the Galveston Park Board. I am a retired Master Chief, United States Navy, Submarines. I served on submarines for thirty-two years and we operated in this condition with red lights.

I am the curator of the submarine Cavalla and destroyer escort Stewart here at Seawolf Park for the Galveston Park Board. I'm also the Chief Operating Officer for the Cavalla Historical Foundation, which does the major portion of work on the ships here at Seawolf Park.

Chelsea Klein

Seawolf Park is on Pelican Island. Historically Pelican Island was more of a "spit" and there was an immigration intake station and a quarantine station. Out here at Seawolf Park was where the quarantine station was, as you can see here, this is from the 1930's. After they had tore down these buildings and this was taken over by the city of Galveston and turned into a park, there was a playground built here. As a result of the storm surge out there where the playground was, it scoured out all of the sand in the base of it and we were able to find the foundations for some of this building, or a part of the original pier that was a quarantine station before the "spit" actually went out that far. We were able to record it as a new archaeological site.

John McMichael

The ship that I'm standing next to, the U.S.S. Stewart, the destroyer escort was actually lifted out of her grading berth, just a big whole in the ground that she was sitting in. The Stewart floated about six feet higher than it is right now. When the surge came in a 32-foot aluminum workboat washed in with the surge and actually went underneath the ship, right about in the spot I'm standing, and then the ship came down and sat on top of it. The storm surge when it came through it moved the ship from side to side and actually broke the five big pilings that consisted of each one of these sets. So it broke them, but it stopped the movement of the Stewart so it basically sat down real close to where it was.

Chelsea Klein

We are standing on the bow of the U.S.S. Stewart. In order to prevent the type of damage that occurred during Hurricane Ike from happening again, FEMA is going to write an HMP plan that will allow us to add a mono-pile anchoring system to the U.S.S. Stewart.
The mono-pile anchoring system will consist of 6 mono-piles, 24 inch in diameter to be driven to an estimated depth of 90 feet. They will rise 30 feet above grade and will be attached to the ship using gusseted steel float rings. As the gusseted steel float rings will be welded to the ship at points to be determined later by a structural engineer in order not to compromise the integrity of the hull.
FEMA was able to fund this project at a hundred percent under category G, permanent work. Even though the U.S.S. Stewart is a museum, it is still owned by the city of Galveston and therefore was able to go in under the city for permanent funding as opposed to going to SBA for a loan.

For more information, go to
www.fema.gov