The port’s manager of special projects
Drydock 1 was built for Navy use in 1942 and remained in military or commercial use until 1999, when it was declared unfit for service.
The San Francisco Port has tried to dispose of it over the years — especially after it broke loose in 2002 and floated to Yerba Buena Island, where it was stranded until it could be towed back to its home at Pier 50. Over the years, the dry dock has taken on water and threatened to sink in storms, port officials said.
The port tried to auction off the dry dock twice. The first time a bidder bought it for $76,000, but then was unable to move it. At the second auction, the bids were a negative value, meaning the port would have had to pay someone to take it away.
This year, the port negotiated a deal to ship the dry dock to China as scrap.
“It’s huge for us,” said Daley Dunham, the port’s manager of special projects. “It was a complicated problem that required a complicated solution.”
While port officials had hoped to celebrate the successful removal of the hulking eyesore, the day turned somber when a body floated loose from the dry dock as it was towed to the waiting ship. About 300 yards off Pier 50, a tugboat operator saw the decomposed body and shut down all engines.