USS Inaugural
Marker: recorded wreck position (Date not recorded).
Key facts
| Name | USS Inaugural | Wikidata label |
|---|---|---|
| Ship type | minesweeper | Wikidata P31 instance of |
| Cause of loss | Grounding or wreck on rocks | Keyword match in English Wikipedia lead sentence |
| Nationality / flag | United States | Wikidata P8047 country of registry |
| Operator | United States Navy | Wikidata P137 operator |
| Conflict | World War II | Wikidata P607 conflict |
| Nearest coast | United States | Natural Earth (public domain) |
| Position | 38.6115, -90.1881 | Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0) |
About the wreck
USS Inaugural (AM-242) was an Admirable-class fleet minesweeper. The Admirable class was the largest and one of the most successful classes of U.S. minesweepers ordered during World War II. Inaugural was launched on 1 October 1944 and commissioned less than three months later. After seeing combat in the Pacific Theater, she was decommissioned in 1946 and spent two decades in mothballs.
In 1968, she was set up as a museum ship in St. Louis, Missouri. In the Great Flood of 1993, Inaugural was ripped from her mooring, ran aground, and rolled on her side a mile downstream. As of December 2017, the hulk was still sitting on the Missouri side of the river. In the autumn of 2021, a historic low level of the Mississippi River allowed the hulk to become visible.
Diving & visiting
In 1968, Inaugural was towed to St. Louis and established as a floating museum. The vessel was designated as a National Historic Landmark on 14 January 1986, as one of two surviving Admirable-class minesweepers used in the Pacific during World War II, the other being the USS Hazard.
On 1 August 1993, during flooding of the Mississippi River, Inaugural broke loose from her moorings at the Gateway Arch. The ship suffered a breach in her hull, took on water, and rolled on her port side. She sank on the Missouri side of the river, half a mile south of the Poplar Street Bridge. She has since remained in that position, partially submerged.
Location
- Recorded position: 38.6115, -90.1881 (Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0); may be approximate)
- Nearest coast: United States
Wreck positions on this site are for interest only and are not for navigation. Many wrecks are war graves or legally protected: never disturb human remains or remove artefacts, and check local law before diving.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article USS Inaugural (revision 1378218282), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section and section(s) “Museum ship”; condensed by selecting paragraphs; citations and formatting removed. No text added. This excerpt is available under the same licence.
Wreck facts from Wikidata (CC0).
Other wrecks of the World War II
- HMS Thetis 1918
- Admiral Graf Spee 1939
- HMS Blanche 1939
- HMS Duchess 1939
- HMS Rawalpindi 1939
- HMS Seahorse 1939
- SS Binnendijk 1939
- SS Fanad Head 1939
- Stanbrook 1939
- U-12 1939
All 599 wrecks of the World War II →
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