HONOLULU (AP) - The planned reopening of the USS Arizona Memorial in Pearl Harbor that had been set for the end of March has been delayed.
The National Park Service suspended access to one of Hawaii’s most popular sites in early May after damage was found on the floating dock where visitors disembark.
Jacqueline Ashwell, the superintendent of the national park, says officials have taken an “aggressive approach” to implement a repair plan, but the memorial won’t reopen next month.
She said a contract for repairs is expected be awarded in March.
“I am frustrated, as all of us are,” Ashwell said, in the statement. “I can promise you that every person working on this project is working as hard as they can, and are dedicated to reopening the memorial to the public as soon as we can.”
The dock was damaged by a failure in the system that anchors it in place, the Park Service said.
In the meantime, visitors may see the memorial by boarding boats that go near it. The memorial sits above the sunken hull of the USS Arizona battleship that sank in the 1941 Japanese bombing.
Some 4,000 to 5,000 visitors head out to Pearl Harbor every day to visit the memorial and the battleship.
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