The public is invited to tour the Navy's newest oceanographic survey ship, USNS Bruce C. Heezen, in port at the Intrepid Berth in New York City on Aug. 4 and 5. The Navy's unique high-tech, noncombatant ship -- named for the pioneering Columbia University marine scientist -- will be docked near the Intrepid Sea-Air-Space Museum, at West 46th St. and 12th Ave. in Manhattan. Public tours will be offered on Friday Aug. 4 from noon until 3:00 p.m and on Saturday Aug. 5 from 11:00 a.m. until 2:00 p.m. Tours are free, and reservations are not required.

The Heezen is the latest in a new class of high-tech, state-of-the-art military ocean survey ships deployed around the world to collect oceanographic and hydrographic data. Launched in April 1999, the ship will carry on the work of a remarkable man: probing the secrets of the oceans and seas, attempting to understand them, collecting oceanographic data, and making them available both to the Navy and to the nation, so that other scientists can benefit from them.

The ship's namesake was known for his pioneering work in plate tectonics and the famous Heezen-Tharp physiographic maps of all the major oceans of the world. Heezen died of natural causes in 1977 while diving in the Navy's deep submsersible NR1.

In an unprecedented break with old naval tradition, in 1997 the Secretary of the Navy asked the schoolchildren of America to name the Navy's next oceanographic survey vessel. Nearly 2000 schoolchildren entered the nationwide contest to help the Secretary find a name for this new ship. The winners - announced in 1998 - were nine 5th graders from Mrs. Marilyn Remick's Oak Lawn Elementary School class in Cranston, Rhode Island, who chose to honor the pioneering oceanographer by naming the ship for him. The ship will depart for Rhode Island, following its New York stop.

Continuing the spirit of Heezen's exploration, the vessel joins a small worldwide fleet of survey ships covering the Earth's oceans. The ship's typical mission includes sampling and data collection in surface, midwater, and ocean floor areas, the launch and recovery of scientific packages including Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs), shipboard oceanographic data processing and analysis, and precise navigation and maneuvering. The Heezen carries the most advanced bottom-mapping sonar available, and the resulting bathymetric data enables ships to navigate underwater.