Old Ironsides is heading back out on the water this week, and if you’ve never seen her underway, this is one of those quintessentially Boston experiences worth rearranging your Thursday for.
The USS Constitution is scheduled to depart the Charlestown Navy Yard on Thursday, May 28, at 10:00 a.m. for her second underway of the 2026 season. The 228-year-old warship will make her way through Boston Harbor, offering spectators along the waterfront a rare chance to see the world’s oldest commissioned warship afloat doing what she was built to do.
The highlight of the morning comes at approximately 11:30 a.m., when Constitution fires a 21-gun salute off Fort Independence on Castle Island. She’ll follow that up with a 17-gun salute as she passes U.S. Coast Guard Sector Boston, the site where Edmund Hartt’s Shipyard once stood. That’s no coincidence in the route planning. It’s the exact spot where the ship was built and launched on October 21, 1797.
