for at least a year, the prcureent committee would have to incur interim docking charges in the meantime. To avoid this expense, the procurement committee decided to wait and take its chances on another submarine being made available after the waterway opened. In September 1970, the procurement committee inspected Batfish as a possible alternative to Piranha, both of which by then were in reserve at the Naval Inactive Ship Facility in Orange, Texas. Both submarines had suffered considerable neglect and Piranha had been almost completely cannibalized for parts, but Batfish was much cleaner and better outfitted. Batfishs better war record compared to Piranha′s impressed the committee. In 1971, the committee made a formal application to the Navy to acquire Batfish. The Navy made no objection to the last-minute swap, and the donation contract was drawn up on 24 June 1971. John H. Chafee, the United States Secretary of the Navy, approved the transaction and the United States Congress approved the transfer on 8 November 1971. Towing and permanent placement On 9 December 1971, the Navy transferred ownership of Batfish to the Oklahoma Maritime Advisory Board. The towing was divided into two phases. the first phase was a direct offshore tow from Orange to Avondale Shipyard in New Orleans. At the shipyard, Batfish was raised on steel lifting straps and cradled between two pairs of bare-decked barges so that the submarine's draft was shallow enough to make the second phase of the tow, upriver, possible. Because of Strike action at the Orange drydock, Batfish instead was towed to the Bethlehem Beaumont Shipyard drydock in Beaumont, Texas. After a general inspection and clearing of fuel and ballast tanks, Batfish was sealed up and was ready to tow to the Avondale Shipyard on 1 March 1972. At Avondale, it was found that the four barges were insufficient to reduce the submarine's draft, and a new plan was devised to use six barges, ballasted to the outside and linked together by steel cables. On 13 March, Batfish was partially secured to the barges by lifting straps, but no cables had been placed to bind them together when the British tanker Silverman passed through a nearby zone at that afternoon: the resulting wake sank one barge and seriously damaged several others, although Batfish herself escaped major harm. The flotilla of barges was re-assembled, and by two tugs slowly moved Batfish upriver at . On 3