Hundreds of people, including more than 180 former crew members, gathered aboard the USS Intrepid Museum on Wednesday to celebrate eight decades since the ship’s commissioning.

Two of the ship’s oldest crew members met for the first time on the 80th anniversary of the ship’s commissioning.

The crew members are Edward Hill, a 99-year-old New Jersey native, and Ed Coyne, a 97-year-old New York City native.

“Very few people I knew,” Hill said. “It was nice to meet another plank member.”

They are known as plank owners because they both served since the Intrepid was commissioned in 1943. Both men also ended their service on the ship in 1946.

“There’s only two of us here who put the ship in commission,” Coyne said. “It was great.”

Eighty years later the World War II veterans were back on the ship turned museum for a special ceremony to celebrate the anniversary.

“Having the heart and the soul of intrepid from all around the country on this hanger day and having the opportunity for all of us to personally interact with all of you is an honor,” said Intrepid President Susan Marenoff-Zausner. “It’s because of you, literally, that I and you have the privilege to be here today.”

Though their paths never crossed all those years ago, Hill and Coyne enjoyed reminiscing with one another about their time serving on the ship during Wednesday’s ceremony on the ship’s hanger deck.

“He was below deck and I was on the flight deck all during the war,” Coyne said.

That’s where Coyne manned the fuel pumps and phones. He was able to see everything that was happening and says the ship was hit by five kamikazes, including one with a bomb in it.

The ship was even torpedoed once, which caused them to lose crew members, but the ship never sank.

“I’m glad I came through it,” Hill said.

Intrepid was decommissioned in 1974 and was supposed to be sent to the scrapyard. But the ship was saved and opened as a museum in 1982.

The ship’s sick bay is undergoing a renovation that should be completed and opened to the public sometime next year.

Hill and Coyne were among about 180 other former crew members on board on this day who served during World War II, the Cold War and the Vietnam War, including Bill Carroll.

“Whenever you bring someone here, like my granddaughter or my son, my sons, the family, they’re always amazed at how much is going on with the history of the ship here,” he said.

U.S. Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro, a New York City native, agreed.

“It preserves the legacy, your legacy, of the men who served onboard intrepid,” he said, referring to men like Edward Hill and Ed Coyne.

“The respect they have for us, it’s fascinating,” Coyne said.

The ceremony’s attendees also included a dozen relatives of the Intrepid’s Air Group 18, who flew from the carrier during World War II.

Air Group 18 also sailed out of Pearl Harbor on the ship’s first birthday — exactly 79 years ago.

Family members of the group traveled from as far away as California to pay tribute.