I biked over to the Mass­port Marine Ter­mi­nal this after­noon to catch a first glimpse of the USS John F. Kennedy air­craft car­rier, which pulled along­side the North Jetty this morn­ing. Holy crap!!! This thing is huge! And some­how beau­ti­ful too.

The state went out of their way to help with secu­rity. There are state police offi­cers stand­ing around (doing noth­ing) at every inter­sec­tion within a 1/4 mile radius. A pair of National Guards­men with fatigues and rifles are man­ning the gate to the pier. Off to their side, some­what to my amuse­ment, is a white party tent from a rental com­pany, sand­bagged up to waist height to pro­tect a very bored-looking machine gun­ner stand­ing inside.

Any­way, the ship is unbe­liev­able. At the adja­cent pier, a sim­i­larly mas­sive ves­sel which arrived yes­ter­day is also buzzing with activ­ity: the USNS Com­fort hos­pi­tal ship. Too bad the Com­fort isn’t giv­ing tours—in some ways it is per­haps more interesting.

Check it out!