Monday, November 2, 2009 | Last updated: Tuesday November 3, 2009, 10:51 AM
BY GIOVANNA FABIANO
The Record
STAFF WRITER
The USS New York created in part with steel salvaged from the World Trade Center has come home. And Scott Koen couldnt be prouder.
The Rutherford volunteer firefighter came up with the idea to use the steel from the rubble in the 9/11 terror attacks and create the Navy battleship as a symbol that the U.S. would persevere.
I feel like this is my daughter, Koen said, as he sailed his own buoy tender down the Hudson after sunrise Monday to get a close up of his finalized vision.
This is very emotional for me to see this beautiful ship coming through the New York harbor all these years after I woke up at 3 in the morning with this idea in my head.
The $1 billion ship, built in Louisiana, contains about 7.5 tons of trade center steel that once towered over Lower Manhattan. The crews morning began at 4 a.m. with a reveille, followed by a recording of Frank Sinatras New York, New York. It made its way up the Hudson River, pausing at ground zero around 8 a.m. with a 21-gun salute, before heading to Pier 88 for a ceremony. It will be officially commissioned on Saturday.
Koen, who helped the 9/11 rescue effort, is the former director of operations at the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum.
In the wake of the attacks, he wrestled with different ways to use the steel to commemorate the victims, even considering creating a large steel bald eagle that would stand at Ground Zero. But in early 2002, he awoke in the middle of the night with a idea what if the steel was melted down and used to make a Navy battleship?
At first, people thought I was crazy, but what better way is there to commemorate the victims than with a moving, floating memorial? Koen said.
He approached Bill White, president of the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in New York City, and the pair got the ball rolling.
On Monday, the 684-foot amphibious transport dock ship blended with the gray skies, making it difficult to view until it got closer to Koens buoy. But he spotted her from miles away, her steel bow clearing the Verrazzano bridge.
Shes the color haze gray for a reason… so her enemies wont be able to see her from a distance, Koen said.
I can spot her because I feel like shes mine, in a way.
Koens boat, the buoy tender Lt. Michael P. Murphy named after a Navy seal who was killed in Afghanistan – rocked back and forth on the choppy waters of the Hudson as ferryboats sped past on both sides. His wife, Eileen, and his stepdaughter Jessica Viani, came equipped with coffee, donuts and video cameras for the occasion.
Scotts been involved with this for years, so I cant believe its actually here… its incredible, Eileen Koen said.
Hes that guy who always has a million ideas and is in the right place at the right time, she said. Of course, he cant ever remember where he put his keys, but hell come up with an idea like this with no problem.
Koen was on his boat the night a US Airways flight taking off from La Guardia Airport slammed into a flock of birds and lost power in both engines, landing in the frigid Hudson River. He headed straight for the plane in the water, and was the only private boat involved in the rescue mission. He jumped onto a ferryboat and helped usher shaking passengers onto dingies. Miraculously, all 155 people onboard that day were pulled to safety. He keeps the seat of the Flight 1549 plane and other debris he found floating in the water that night.
It was the right thing to do, just like the USS New York is the right thing, he said.
For Koen, the USS New Yorks return provides a sense of closure.
Finally, a little bit of what was lost that day returns, Koen said.
Its like a beautiful ambassador going around the world, saying no matter what you do to us, we will take what was knocked down and make something else out of it.
E-mail: fabiano@northjersey.com
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