Navy Memories #17: Helo Down - Commence Search and Rescue

Previous installments:

1. Boot Camp Memories
2. About Those Navy Memories
3. First Orders
4. Anchor's Aweigh
5. Man Overboard!
6. Reflections of a Black Shoe
7. Destroyer Life and Ports of Call
8. Warships vs. Big Waves
9. The Accident, and More Ports of Call
10. The Black Sea - Operation Silver Fox
11. 1975, A Year of Change 
12. North to the Future
13. Adak Outdoors
14. Adak Life
15. Adak Work, Winter, and More
16. Rounding the Edges and Filling In The Blanks

Approx. location of operations described below.

SITREP: 
6 November 1974. Task Group 60.1 enroute from Golfo di Palmas, Sardinia, to Palma de Mallorca, Spain.

USS Independence (CV-62)
USS William V. Pratt (DLG-13)
USS Sampson (DDG-10)
USS Vreeland (DE-1068)
USS Richard L. Page (DEG-5)
USS Manley (DD-940)
USS William M. Wood (DD-715)
USS Dalgren (DLG-12)
USS Detroit (AOE-4)

22:10 hours, approx. position 39° 40' N by 13°0' E. The destroyers maintain a loose circle at 10,000 to 14,000 yards from the carrier, steaming at various courses and speeds, while maintaining radar and sonar watches for non-U.S. aircraft and submarines. LTjg D.E. Myers is OOD.*  Cdr. John B. Castano, commanding, directed the rescue operation while LTjg Myers remained on the bridge.

Independence reports a helo** down to the west, and sights two white lights in the water. Wood's position is about 7 miles ahead to the west-southwest of the Independence, and sets Search and Rescue Detail. 

Wood's deck crew was ready with a rope ladder, enough hands to pull the airmen up, blankets and hot coffee. Doc was standing by, in case of injuries.

LT. R.P. Fiske, a qualified diver, was in the water with a line, attempting to tow the men back to the Wood. He was unsuccessful, being blown off course. 

Wood was close by the aircrew when the rescue helo arrived. We kept them in the spotlight until they were out of the water. LT. Fiske was pulled aboard a whaleboat lowered from Dalgren and taken aboard that ship, and later returned to Wood.

22:50 hrs - SAR is cancelled. Ships return to station and normal operations. Course and speed resumed.

Actual ship's log from that night

And now, the rest of the story ...

Two air crewmen down in the Mediterranean, surrounded by the ubiquitous green dye. Why use dye in the dark? Because we were searching with spotlights, and the searchers could more easily see the color change if/when the lights crossed that patch of water. Wood was close enough to keep a spotlight on them, at the end.

Their white helmets with reflective tape helped, too.

My emergency and/or special evolution duty station, as always, was as the Captain's phone talker. When the Search and Rescue Detail was announced, I reported to the bridge. The Captain told me to stand by in his ready room, adjoining the bridge. Two of the on-call Operations Specialists (radar operators) were waiting there, too. They were OS1 Art Spurr and OS3 Russ Haxton.

While we waited, I retrieved my guitar from Ship's Office, and played to keep us entertained.

Me and the guitar

Art had a brand new reel-to-reel tape deck***, and he recorded parts of the session. (I used to have a cassette copy of that, but it long since self-destructed.)

When the aircrew was sighted, Wood steamed to within 30 yards, and kept them spotlighted until the rescue chopper had them out of the water. Called back to the bridge, I was on the port bridge wing with the skipper to watch the rescue. Unforgettable.

Once the SAR detail was secured at 22:50, the ship resumed course and speed. And me? I did what any good sailor would do, and hit the sack.




* OOD: Officer of the deck, e.g., the officer assigned to "drive" the ship when the captain is not on the bridge. In other other words, he had the con.

** Helo: Navy shorthand for helicopter.

*** It was 1974, after all.