With apologies to my editor, at the request of a number of readers, here’s yet another “sea story.”
Note: There really is no end to them. Ask any sailor.
On this particular night, we were off the coast of Vietnam supporting a Marine unit that needed some help. The USS Newport News — a World War II-era heavy cruiser was nearby. I was the gunnery officer (“cannon-cocker” to you Army types out there) onboard a destroyer from the same period.
I was on watch in Main Battery Plot — from which we controlled the aiming and firing of our 5-inch guns. We were alternating between the two guns in one of our forward mounts to prevent overheating the barrels. Still, we’d fired enough rounds to get both barrels pretty hot.
There were two triggers that I was using that night. One activated an alarm in the gun mount and the other fired the gun. Each time we were ready to fire, I’d squeeze the alarm trigger twice to alert the gun crew, then I’d squeeze the firing trigger. “Buzz. Buzz. BOOM!” was the appropriate sequence.
After a while, however, “Murphy’s Law” kicked in and things went south.
“Buzz. Buzz. Click.”
The “click” meant that the powder charge had failed to go off. Now, there was a 55-pound, high explosive projectile sitting in a very hot metal tube with no particular place to go.
As in all things Navy, there were procedures for such a situation and I started running through them. After a few minutes, the officer of the deck (OOD) called down to ask about “the problem.”
I told him we were working it. He then “advised” me to train (point) the guns 90 degrees to port which, in general, was according to procedure. That night, though, I told him I thought the safest position for the guns was just where they were — pointed at the bad guys.
We went back and forth a few times until he reminded me of another Navy “procedure” in which ensigns (me) always took orders from lieutenants (he).
I gave it one more attempt and was told to “Get with the program.” So, assuming (a bad habit amongst ensigns) that he’d checked that our port side was clear, I cranked the guns over. All this time, the gun crew had been working the problem and everything came together just as I lost my argument with the OOD.
“Buzz. Buzz. BOOM!”
I later learned that the USS Newport News had, in fact, been somewhere off our port side, running “blacked out,” and that a very senior captain was inquiring in a decidedly non-collegial manner about the round that had just passed near them.
Again, there was a procedure to cover this situation. It’s referred to in the Navy as the “stuff flows downhill” phenomenon. Our captain got chewed. He chewed both the OOD and me. I’d had a lot of experience in being chewed out and did what all ensigns did in such situations — stood to attention, looked crestfallen, and inserted a lot of “Yes Sirs” and “No Sirs” in all of the appropriate places.
The thing that ended the chewing was the fact that the Marines still needed us to resume indicating to the bad guys that they were unwelcome. So, after everyone had sufficiently vented, we went back to shooting. “Buzz. Buzz. BOOM!” “Buzz. Buzz. BOOM!” “Buzz. Buzz. Click.”
”@*^%$#(*^![”]
That last was from me.
We went through the same drill but, this time, we left the guns pointed at the bad guys. Unfortunately, nothing worked. So, now, we had to turn the mission over to another ship, evacuate the gun mount, and put a fire hose down the barrel while someone used another hose on the outside of the barrel.
Since ensigns were expendable and I was the gunnery officer, I ended up on that second hose. While hosing, I noticed that the water was turning to steam as soon as it hit the barrel and I distinctly remember being “scared stuffless” (a nautical term) while wondering at what temperature the round would “cook off.”
About then, the ship took a roll and a very heavy, unsecured metal door very loudly slammed shut directly behind me.
“Depends” undergarments hadn’t been invented yet but, thankfully, the fire hose I was handling had gotten me so wet that no one noticed anything when the gun had been properly cooled and cleared.
Bad night at sea.
Really bad night.
Larry Simoneaux lives in Edmonds. Send comments to: larrysim@comcast.net
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