Iowa was launched on August 27, 1942 and entered service on March 22 the following year. Trials were held in the Chesapeake Bay, after which it was moved to the Pacific in 1944 to join the Pacific Fleet. The USS Iowa participated in the Marshall Islands battle, the Battle of the Mariana Islands, and the naval Battle of Leyte Gulf. It was also involved in the Korean War in the 1950s, and then post-war it was used as a training ship, soon to enter the reserve. It was re-enabled in the 1980s and in April 1989 there was a turret explosion that killed 47 sailors. In 1990 Iowa received a decommissioning notice and was removed from the list of active-duty warships on March 17, 2006 and transferred to a Texas Bay National Defense Reserve fleet. There is a plan for the USS Iowa to become a floating museum in the near future.
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