Moored in the Willamette beside OMSI floats the longest-serving fast-attack submarine of her class — and a movie star. The USS Blueback (SS-581), the U.S. Navy’s last diesel-electric combat submarine, appeared in “The Hunt for Red October” before retiring to Portland as a hands-on museum.
Guided tours squeeze you through her hatches into a world of torpedo tubes, periscopes, bunks stacked three high and a control room dense with dials. Guides — some of them submariners — share what life was like for 85 sailors spending months beneath the waves.
It’s cramped, fascinating and utterly unique: the only submarine museum in the Pacific Northwest you can tour daily. Tech tours and overnight camp-ins let true fans go even deeper.
