Puget Sound Naval Shipyard Bremerton WA Patch

Puget Sound Naval Shipyard is the only facility in the United States certified to recycle nuclear-powered ships, and it has taken apart more than 125 submarines. The yard sits on Sinclair Inlet at Bremerton, Washington, across Puget Sound from Seattle, and the Navy has used it without a break since 1891. Sailors call it PSNS, and plenty of old hands still say the Bremerton Navy Yard. With about 15,000 people assigned, it is the largest public shipyard in the country by personnel and the largest naval shore facility in the Pacific Northwest. If your ship came to Bremerton, it came to be repaired, overhauled or retired.

The Navy established a naval station here in 1891 and designated it Navy Yard Puget Sound in 1901. During World War I the yard built 25 subchasers, seven submarines, two minesweepers, seven seagoing tugs and about 1,700 small boats. In World War II its main work was repairing battle damage to American and allied ships, and after the war it took the name Puget Sound Naval Shipyard. USS Sculpin (SSN-590) became the first nuclear submarine maintained at the yard in 1965, and in 1990 the Navy authorized the Ship-Submarine Recycling Program there. On May 15, 2003, the shipyard and the Intermediate Maintenance Facility were consolidated as PSNS and IMF, and the conventional carrier USS Kitty Hawk (CV-63) waited there in reserve until she left for scrapping in 2022.

The patch is 4 inches round on light blue twill, ringed in a gold twisted rope and finished with a cut edge. PUGET SOUND NAVAL SHIPYARD arches across the top in dark blue block letters, and BREMERTON, WA. runs along the bottom, with a gold star at each side. At the center a gold atom sits at the hub of crossing gold lines, three electron orbits looped around its nucleus. Around it are three white silhouettes, an aircraft carrier with its island on the left and a submarine above and below. The atom is the nuclear work, and the carrier and the boats are the ships that bring it to Bremerton. It has an iron-on backing and can also be sewn on.

Shipyard time is its own kind of duty. Crews who brought a carrier or a boat into Bremerton lived through months of drydock, fire watches, hot work and the long count to undocking day. The welders, pipefitters, riggers and nuclear workers of PSNS have done that work for generations of the Pacific Fleet. About a quarter of the yard's workload today is inactivation, reactor compartment disposal and recycling, careful work that closes out a ship's service. The shipyard was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1992, with 22 contributing buildings and 42 contributing structures in its historic district.

Put it in a shadow box beside your ship's patch and the dates of your yard period, or sew it onto the jacket you wore through a wet Bremerton winter. It makes a good gift for a shipmate who rode out an overhaul with you, or for a retired shipyard worker who still knows every drydock by number. An atom, a carrier and two boats.