Even so, Navy officials say security for the maritime celebration is unprecedented, with airport-type restrictions on visitors' bags and other items, and a commercial blimp, contracted by the Navy, patrolling above the Hudson River and beaming live television images to two ground security stations.

Twenty ships -- 18 American, one Canadian and one from Denmark -- with 6,000 sailors aboard will participate in Fleet Week, which started in 1987. The event runs May 22 through May 28.

American warships have remained on heightened alert since the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, which triggered U.S. military retaliation against terrorist groups in Afghanistan.

While a few selected visitors have been aboard U.S. ships since then, Fleet Week marks the first invitation to the general public, spokesman Navy Capt. William Armstrong said.

"This is an opportunity for the people of New York to recognize the work done by the fleet sailors and Marines in responding to the Taliban and al-Qaeda," Armstrong said. "That's why the Navy has made an exception to the policy -- for the people of New York City."

He said the Navy considers New York's pier areas better protected than those in other cities where the ban on visitors remains in effect.

Ships in the May 22 arrival parade will "render honors" -- a salute by sailors manning the rails -- as they move up the Hudson past the trade center site, where more than 2,800 people died.

The Navy plans special ship tours for firefighters, police officers and others who helped in rescue, recovery and cleanup at the trade center.

Absent this year will be the aircraft carrier USS John F. Kennedy, a perennial Fleet Week visitor. With the flattop and its crew of 5,000 on combat duty in the Arabian Sea, the amphibious assault carrier USS Iwo Jima heads the lineup.

Armstrong said Iwo Jima's crew includes a New Yorker who quit his job as a delivery truck driver and re-enlisted in the Navy after a friend was killed in the trade center attacks.

This year's mix of cruisers, destroyers and frigates includes seven ships recently returned from duty in Operation Enduring Freedom, the war in Afghanistan. The 1991 Fleet Week featured several ships that participated in that year's Persian Gulf war against Iraq.

(CNN) -- Military teams responded Wednesday to a fire on a Navy research submarine off the coast of California.

The blaze aboard the USS Dolphin broke out Tuesday night. All 43 crew members on board the submarine were rescued -- 41 by a Navy ship, and two by helicopter from the water, Pentagon officials said Wednesday.

Officials said it was unclear whether the fire was still burning as a towing vessel and other equipment arrived at the scene, about 100 miles from San Diego, California.

The fire broke out around 11:30 p.m. Tuesday. The submarine was on the surface when the fire started, and it partially flooded as water entered through the open hatches.

The Dolphin is one of the Navy's only operational diesel-electric, deep-diving, research and development submarines. It carries scientific and technical payloads of up to 12 tons, and has extensive onboard laboratories.

According to the Navy, the Dolphin holds the world-depth record of 3,000 feet for operational submarines.

The Dolphin has been outfitted to test advanced Navy sonar equipment and conducts civilian research.

The fire on the Dolphin comes 34 years to the day after the nuclear-powered submarine USS Scorpion was lost at sea in an accident that took the lives of all 97 crew members. The sub was only five days short of its return to port at Norfolk, Virginia.

Many details of that disaster remain classified, and the Navy has said it does not know the cause of the sinking. The wreckage was found in the Atlantic at a depth of 10,000 feet, about 400 miles southwest of the Azores.

Reports have cited a mid-1980s study that showed no radiation leaking from the Scorpion's nuclear reactor or its two nuclear-tipped torpedoes.

With thousands of projects large and small awaiting approval and funding by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, users of the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway have been informed that the Corps will reevaluate all projects for this year and has been denied any money in the 2003 Federal Budget for the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway (AIW).

In Miami, Florida it’s the long awaited clean-up of the Miami River. In St. Lucy County Florida they are worried about a seven-year-old plan to dredge the port. In Myrtle Beach, South Carolina it’s the Intracoastal Waterway that keeps getting clogged as workers struggle with tons of sand and spoil. In Biscayne Bay it’s a channel down the middle that is so shallow, barges drag the bottom damaging the sea grass beds with silt every week when they bring diesel fuel to the local nuclear reactor. On the Cape Fear River just downstream from Snows Cut it’s the Sunny Point Military Ocean Terminal that demands regular dredging by the Corps. There are as many examples as there are eroding shorelines and shoaling channels.
Article Courtesy of The Boating News