MV Mississippi
On left, with barge used to reduce bow wave.
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| History | |
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| Name: | MV Mississippi |
| Owner: | United States Army Corps of Engineers |
| Port of registry: | Memphis, Tennessee |
| Builder: | VT Halter Marine, Inc., Moss Point, MS |
| Laid down: | 1992-03-31 |
| Completed: | 1993 |
| Status: | In Service |
| General characteristics | |
| Tonnage: | 2600 tons |
| Displacement: | 2135 tons |
| Length: | 241 ft |
| Beam: | 58 ft |
| Height: | 52 ft 1½ in |
| Draft: | 8 ft |
| Depth: | 12 ft |
| Installed power: | 3 Caterpillar 3408 diesels at 350 K.W. |
| Propulsion: | 3 Caterpillar 3606 diesels (6276 hp. total) turning 3 5-blade 93-inch-diameter (2,400 mm) propellers |
| Speed: | 15 mph; 8 mph with tow |
| Crew: | 36 |
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MISSISSIPPI III
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| Location | Final location was Neville Island, Pennsylvania |
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| Coordinates | 40°30′43.56″N 80°7′12.36″W / 40.5121000°N 80.1201000°WCoordinates: 40°30′43.56″N 80°7′12.36″W / 40.5121000°N 80.1201000°W |
| Area | less than one acre |
| Built | 1926 |
| Architect | U.S.Army Corps of Engineers |
| Architectural style | Texas-deck sternwheeler |
| NRHP Reference # | 83002066 |
| Added to NRHP | September 21, 1983 |
The M/V Mississippi is a United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) towboat operating on the Mississippi River. It is the largest diesel towboat on the river.
The M/V Mississippi is a working towboat for the USACE Memphis District of the Mississippi Valley Division. Ninety percent of the time it is moving barges, equipment and supplies in support of mat sinking operations. It also serves as an inspection boat for the Mississippi River Commission (MRC) during a high- and low-water inspection trip each year. Commissioners hold meetings at river towns in the boat's hearing room, which can seat 115 people. Its dining room has a capacity of 85 people. The boat has 22 staterooms and can handle 150 passengers. The Corps also uses it as a "giant floating ambassador".
During the Hurricane Katrina crisis, the Mississippi was moved to Vicksburg, Mississippi and used as a floating command center.
There have been five USACE vessels of this name.
Steamer Mississippi was built in St. Louis in 1882. It was used by the MRC for its spring and fall inspection trips from St. Louis to New Orleans, Louisiana. In 1919 it was renamed the Piomingo after being transferred to what is now the Memphis District, where it served as a towboat for many more years.
Steamer Leota was built in 1899 as a dredge tender. Selected in 1920 as the new MRC inspection vessel, two years later it was rebuilt and re-designated Mississippi.
Steamer Mississippi was a sternwheel, steam driven boat that was based upon the Mississippi II. After Mississippi II's hull and machinery were determined to no longer be serviceable in 1926, a new hull, boilers, and engines were built at Jeffersonville, Indiana. In 1927, the cabin from its predecessor was moved atop the new hull at Paducah, Kentucky. Used for inspecting and surveying along rivers, the boat continued in service until April 1961, when the USACE decommissioned it at Memphis, Tennessee. Converted to a museum and restaurant, it was in Saint Louis, Missouri until 1975. While in Missouri, it was renamed Becky Thatcher, after a character in Mark Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. It was then moved to Marietta, Ohio, where it was the Showboat Becky Thatcher restaurant and theater in 1975. The boat was purchased by a group of interested citizens who planned to bring her to Marietta as part of the Bicentennial project. Those citizens formed a not-for-profit corporation, the Ohio Showboat Drama Inc., and in the summer of 1976, the musical Showboat was performed as part of the town's U.S Bicentennial celebration, by the Mid-Ohio Valley Players on the decks and an adjacent barge with 3,000 people watching from the shore. The boat was permanently moored on the Muskingum River, near where the mouth meets the Ohio River. The Becky Thatcher was entered into the National Register of Historic Places by the National Park Service in September 1983.
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Wikipedia