'Old Ironsides' restoration salvages warship's storied history

The world's oldest commissioned warship still kept afloat will be spending a little time in dry dock undergoing repairs to keep it watertight.

Launched in 1797, the USS Constitution was among the first six frigates built for America's Navy after the Revolutionary War. To ensure the ship remains intact, the aging vessel was recently removed from the water to undergo major repairs at the Charlestown Navy Yard in Boston where visitors can still walk the deck.

"We are making history," said historian Margherita Desy of the Naval History and Heritage Command Detachment Boston, who serves as a principal expert on the USS Constitution. "I was here in the last restoration in the 1990s and to be part of another restoration with USS Constitution, to be working with the oldest commissioned warship afloat in the world, the only vessel left that helped to begin the United States Navy in the 1790s, is a thrill."