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"Sally" with uncrumpled port wing (with life preserver) |
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The funniest
event, in the way that seeing somebody slip on a banana peel is funny, aboard the Salinan was something that
happened when we were chasing a barge that had gotten loose in a
hurricane and was drifting around in the Gulf of Mexico. We were
assigned to go out, find it, capture it and tow it back to port. The
only problem was the hurricane wasn't entirely over yet and the sea
was still pretty rough with very large swells. Large waves tend to
bounce and throw the ship around, whereas swells cause it to roll
queasily back and forth.
We proceeded out
of Key West, heading into the Gulf looking for this wayward barge.
Eventually, with the help of radar and sharp-eyed lookouts up in the
crow's nest (not really in the crow's nest, only figuratively—crow's
nests went out with tall sailing ships), we found the old rust bucket
helplessly bobbing around and rolling in the swells of the
hurricane's aftermath. Needless to say, we, too, were rock and
rolling enough to make American Bandstand dancers look completely
arrhythmic. (American Bandstand was a popular rock 'n roll TV dance
program in the 1950s.)
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ooops! |
I was on the
wheel, as usual in tight circumstances, as we approached this
rusty behemoth barge that was at least twice as big as the Sally. Our
dipstick ROTC Ensign “had the con” (he was in charge of the
operation) as we pulled in alongside the barge. The idea was to get a
tow cable over and secure the barge so that it could be towed back to
port. I looked out the wheelhouse portholes (windows to landlubbers)
and could see this humongous derelict rolling dangerously close when
I heard some shouting from the deck below that we were getting to
close and should pull back before we collided. The Ensign, confused,
didn't know what to do so, too late, the captain took over the con.
By then, precious seconds had been wasted and the gap between us and
the barge had narrowed too much. We were bobbing up and down and
rolling left and right and so was the barge. Then the bobs and rolls
lined up just right. Up came the barge and down we rolled onto it
with our port (left) side bridge wing which caught and was
pried up like the lid on a freshly opened tin can. Fortunately,
everyone on the bridge wing scrambled quickly enough and no one was
injured—except the Sally with her broken wing.
Our Ensign, red
faced, quietly slunk away. Being an officer, he would not be
reprimanded publicly by the captain in front of enlisted men like me.
But I would have loved to be a fly on the wall in the officers'
quarters later on. The captain was not happy.
After the
collision the deck crew managed to get a line over to the barge and
board it. The towing cable was attached and we headed back to port
with what must have looked like a very funny profile from behind with
one crumpled bridge wing sticking up in the air. And I could only
imagine one very unhappy and
humiliated Ensign confined in the wardroom to his bunk with an ice pack on his head.
To be continued...
2 comments:
am really enjoying your stories, Joe…with the accompanying pictures and drawings (how DO you do that?). It is amazing how your recall things, such a long time ago, with such detail.
-R
I'm glad you're enjoying them. I certainly have a lot of fun writing them. I DO the drawings with a graphics program called CorelDraw; I've been using it for years. As to the memory for details, actually writing seems to jog the memory and you start to remember things you thought you had forgotten...of course I do take "artistic license" to fill in the gaps or to embellish a story line.
BTW, sorry to hear about your knee problem. Hang in!
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