NYC Fleet Week 2025: VR Exhibits, Wreath Laying, Marching Bands and More
The Fleet Week 2025 celebrations started with a ship parade up the Hudson. Public activities include ship tours of Navy vessels and on the Interpid, a free movie night, the Harlem Globetrotters, and an interactive dive into the ship’s engines. A wreath laying takes place at the Soldiers and Sailors Monument on Monday.
Fleet Week 2025 kicked off on May 21 with the parade of ships up the Hudson River followed by days of military-themed events open to the public as 1,300 sailors and US Marines hit the sites around the city.
As the active-duty military take to the city, the public can take to USS Intrepid and other vessels that arrived for a five day stay of activities and experiences.
If touring ships is your thing, then Fleet Week has you covered. Joining Intrepid at Pier 86 are five U.S. Naval Academy Yard Patrol ships and the U.S. Coast Guard cutter, Hauser. Docked at Pier 88 is the USS New York, the flagship of Fleet Week. Just north at Pier 90, the U.S. Coast Guard cutter Calhoun is also docked. All of these ships will be available for tours on Friday and Saturday, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Want a deeper, interactive tour? Check out the new exhibit from the Intrepid Museum which debuts on Saturday May 24, aiming to take visitors into unseen areas of the historic air craft carrier.
The VR experience, called “Boilers and Engines,” allows visitors to experience the inner workings of the ship, down in the engine, boiler, and fire rooms, spaces otherwise inaccessible or dangerous. Visitors can perform maintenance drills, interact with the machinery, and tour the depths of Intrepid. It is set to debut to the public May 24.
Those sailors worked in the ship’s bowels in hot, loud, and cramped environments, doing difficult tasks that were key to the maintenance and survival of the Intrepid. Stuart Gelband, from Brooklyn, was one of those sailors.
A former machinist’s mate third class, Gelband served on Intrepid from 1970 to 1972, working in the aft of the ship. On May 21 he got to try out the new VR experience for himself. “It was very good. Lots of memories,” he told Straus News. “That was my life for three years on this ship.”
“It was very realistic...you feel like you can walk through it.” The VR system even allowed Gelbrand to perform the “steam cycle” operation he would regularly do more than fifty years ago on Intrepid. And while the VR doesn’t replicate the ear-blistering noise or the oppressive heat, Gelbrand says the experience gets the job done.
“You get a sense of all the equipment that it took to run the ship, and all the men that had to man different areas of the ship to make it go... it wasn’t a one-man show.”
Designing, mapping, scanning, and developing the new exhibit was not a one-man show, either. Christopher Malanson, Assistant Vice President of Exhibitions and Experience Design and project lead, can attest to that. He and his team reviewed dozens of blueprints, construction documents, and historical photographs to ensure the designs were correct. Then, they scanned Intrepid in 3D. “We spent three years LiDAR scanning the entire ship.”
No detail was overlooked. The shadows, sounds, color, and even crew-drawn graffiti on the ship’s walls in the VR experience are the same as when Intrepid was decommissioned in 1974. “It’s another opportunity for storytelling,” Malanson said. “The sheer mechanical ingenuity that had to happen for a ship like this to function, giving visitors that experience.”
Also on Intrepid will be a free outdoor movie night on Friday (6:00 p.m.), a showcase from the Harlem Globetrotters on Saturday (11:00 a.m.), performances by the U.S. Army and U.S. Coast Guard Silent Drill Teams on Sunday(10:00 a.m.), along with athletic military competitions and contests, and a Broadway revue at noon. (12:00 p.m.)
The VR experience will be open to the public on weekdays. While it is not being called a permanent exhibit just yet, expect it to stay on board the Intrepid for some time.
On Monday, a Memorial Day Ceremony will be held 10:00 a.m. before a day’s worth activities, which include guided tours, the U.S. Army Silent Drill Team, and a Search and Rescue Demonstration (2:00 p.m.).
Also on Monday at 10 a.m. at the Soldiers and Sailors Monument at Riverside Drive and W. 89th St. there will be a Memorial Day Observance with music from the U.S. Marine Corps Band, a procession with Civil War re-enactors, Navy and Marine units from the fleet Naval cadets, and bagpipers. Keynote address by a Navy flag officer, remarks from other officials including City Council member Gale Brewer and presentation of the wreaths.