Dead Horse Bay

[4] This raised the land to 16 feet above the high tide mark and connected the islands to each other, and the mainland of Brooklyn, in order to create Floyd Bennett Field as New York City's first municipal airport.

[7][8] In August 2020, the National Park Service announced that Dead Horse Bay would be closed indefinitely because of the presence of radiological contamination.

[10] The contamination was identified as having come from two deck markers, a type of Radium-226 or Strontium-90[11] based radioluminescent device used by the US military, though the risk of radiological exposure was considered low.

[12] School groups are taken to Dead Horse Bay on a regular basis to walk the Millstone trail, seine for a variety of fishes, and learn about the natural and cultural history of the area.

[13] Its shores are also a popular sport fishing spot, and home to a marina operating in Deep Creek as a National Park Service concession.

Gerritsen Inlet and marina on left; Dead Horse Bay center; Rockaway Inlet , Marine Parkway–Gil Hodges Memorial Bridge , and Rockaway, Queens on right
Bottle Beach, the western shore of the bay
Glass Bottle Beach, facing the Marine Parkway–Gil Hodges Memorial Bridge
A view of Dead Horse Bay's Glass Bottle Beach from May 2020