Meet the John J. Harvey. She is a 1931-built fireboat with a serious set of lungs, capable of pumping 18,000 gallons of water per minute. She spent decades as the FDNY's heavy hitter, putting out fires like the Normandie in 1942 and the El Estero in 1943. She even stood by to watch the Andrea Doria make its first appearance in New York.
By 1994, the city decided she was done. She was sold at auction in 1999 to a private consortium of marine preservationists. They got her onto the National Register of Historic Places in 2000 and started taking people on free boat rides. It was all very peaceful until 2001.
When the World Trade Center was hit, the fire mains were trashed. The FDNY realized they were out of water and radioed the retired boat to see if her pumps still worked. She answered yes, dropped her tourists, and went back to work as Marine 2. She pumped water at Ground Zero for 80 hours until the mains were fixed.
Today, she sits at Pier 66 on the Hudson. She wears a red and white dazzle pattern from a 2018 art project, in commemoration of the camouflage used on World War I ships. She is moored alongside the Lightship Frying Pan, looking every bit the veteran who refuses to take a permanent day off.
Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons
Written by Kyle McLonely
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