The Olympia Reserve Fleet (also known as the Mothball Fleet) was stationed in Budd Inlet from the 1940s to the 1970s. In a 1964 exercise that would doubtless horrify today’s environmental regulators, the fleet deliberately set fire to an oil barge near the Port of Olympia to practice their firefighting skills.
Daily Olympian photo, 1964, State Capital Museum collection, Washington State Historical Society, catalog C1986.43.64.10.8.2.1
Text © Deborah Ross and The Olympian 2019