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A Word From The NJ Submarine Commissioning Committee

Our committee continues to be busy supporting the submarine and her crew. We've conducted numerous 'namesake' visits bringing crew members to NJ to learn about our state, to conduct community service projects, to tour companies, to visit the BB-62 (Battleship New Jersey) in Camden, and to conduct youth outreach activities.

If you haven't been to our site lately I recommend you do so you can see examples of the wide variety of activities we've already conducted. https://njcommissioning.org/events This will give you a taste of what we intend to continue doing later this month, next month, and next year leading up to the commissioning which we anticipate in late 2023. The exact date and location still remain to be announced but we'll let you know as soon as we know, as well as how to apply for tickets to attend.

Here's a photo of our recent attendance at the Atlantic City Airshow, where several crew members joined us for an amazing day before visiting the 177th Fighter Wing the next day.

We are still confident the event will take place in NJ and a couple of specific locations will be analyzed shortly by the Navy. We had really hoped the event could take place just down river from the BB-62, but bringing a nuclear powered submarine up river and docking so close to Philadelphia was a non-starter unfortunately. From the very start we've been mindful of the history associated with the battleship and very much wanted to create a symbolic 'passing of the torch' from one USS New Jersey to the next. We will continue to bring sailors to the ship though on every visit if we can, and so far so good!

USS New Jersey SSN-796 crew members visit the BB-62 and fire one of the 'smaller' guns.

One thing our committee has been doing in addition to bringing crew members up to New Jersey is to make presentations about the committee, about our mission, and about the submarine. During these presentations we talk about milestones the submarine had gone through and are upcoming. We talk about the construction, the mission types, the crew composition and how this is the first US submarine ever designed and built from the very start to support a fully integrated male/female crew - something we're proud of!

We also talk about the visits where we are bring the crew up and give some examples, but we also talk about our need for support from the public in NJ - both in volunteers but also in financial support. Each of the namesake visits cost money, the week of the commissioning will be particularly busy for us, but we also really want to have money at the end to support the creation of a scholarship fund for children of the crew.

If you know of a corporation of any size, or a group of some sort that might be interested in hearing our message and potentially helping us financially please reach out! We need your help!

Please consider forwarding this to anyone you think might be interested in supporting a new fast attack submarine named after our great state of New Jersey!

Stephen Hutton
Chairman