[rgreen4]

To add insult to injury, when I arrived at NAS Cubi Point in 1969, one of the HU-16's had a gray prop on the starboard engine and a black prop on the port engine. The prop on the starboard engine had incurred a problem and in order to get the aircraft back up, they borrowed one from the Coast Guard station at NS Sangley Point, which also flew HU-16's. Theirs were used for SAR of course and ours were use as back-up, but primarily for local transport and station aircraft. To fit in with their lighter paint scheme the USCG had gray props.

There were comments about the "shallow water prop", but the truth is that the Coasties flew over deeper water than we did. We rarely flew over water that was not in either Subic or Manila Bays. They made water landings all the time, and I only got to do it once. Hopefully, with the various services combining on a consistent basis, these jibes have gone into the dustbin of history.

[mjd420nova]

Gosh guys, I guess I missed out on part of the maritime action somewhere. The only hassles we ever had was with the KIWI's that visited the white hat club in Pearl Harbor. Seems they would steal anything that wasn't lock down, including large lei's hung on the bows of other ships returning from the western Pacific. I spent many a shore patrol duty dealing with them and always came away with a bad taste in my mouth. I guess they thought the rules didn't apply to them. They destroyed ten pin setters at the bowling alley one night when they started throwing bowling balls over hand at the pins. When we visited Auckland we found them to be the nicest port we'd ever visited. Very friendly and gracious. Hong Kong was pretty pleasant and cheap. We were allowed to go to Kowloon but no further. Took a whole roll of pictures from the top of Victoria Peak.

[coastie65]

We we deperted New York for our WesPac deployment, our evap broke down somewhere around Cuba. We transited the Canal and layed over at Balboa in the CZ. We went to the club as we couldn't leave the base at that time due to some unrest of some sort. Anyway, there was a French Navy vessel in at the time and a bunch of those guys were in the club. They had just started issueing the "Flat Hats" anfd theu were optional and most wore the Dixie Cups as we didn't like the "Donald Duck" hats. When we saw those French sailors with their White flat hats with the Red Pom Pom on top, those flat hats suddenly didn't look so bad. I ran into some Aussie tropps in either Cat Lo or Vung Tau, I don't remember which. Anyway I tried like crazy to snag one of those "Bush Hats" they wore. I think the best time I had was with a group of Canadian Sailors in Halifax Nova Scotia. We were at the Seaman's Club, and like the UK at the time, at Precisely 11:30 PM they called time and that was it. Those guys had few things up their sleeves. They said to come on and we did. We got into a cab and went to a cab stand where we bought some rum. We then went to an all night movie a kicked back and continued to party. All of this was illegal, but their way of doing an end around on the system. The UK has since dropped the 11:30 closing time, and I can only assume Canada has as well. Incidently, I do have a hat from the Royal Thai Navy. Hong Kong was nice but as I said, Macau and Kowloon were out of bounds. I did go up to the top of Victoria peak which was a heck of a view both in day light and night time. As far as Hong Kong goes, the first thing that comes to mind is "Paradise Alley". :D . I wasn't expecting all the Neon, but then again it was prevalent all over the Far East.

[rgreen4]

mjd420nova's post about the Bermuda Triangle remined me of an Aviation Sea Story. What doesn't?

While I was in the Navy, the Patrol Squadrons were flying two aircraft, the P3 (still in service almost 40 years later) and the P2. The later variants of the P2 were unique aircraft, the only I know of that had two large reciprocating propeller engines and two small turbo jet engines. The reason for the latter, was that the aircraft was so heavy that it could not fly on one prop engine, so the jets were added so they could be fired up to get the aircraft home.

Most twin engine aircraft while under Air Traffic Control, have to notify ATC of a decrease in true airspeed (TAS) when they lost an engine. P2's would call up and INCREASE their TAS because with one prop and two jets, the aircraft was faster.

This involves a P2 out of Jacksonville, in the Bermuda Triange one night on a routine patrol. They spied a boat, most likely in the 20-30' class or so out in the middle of no where, with no running lights, but not moving. It was a favorite location for partying, so they decided to play games. Since they were fairly high and in cruise mode, they weren't making much noise. They turned around, got a two mile run on them, dropped down to about 50', increased to full power on both recips and fired off the jets (two turning, two burning was the phrase they used), and about a quarter of a mile out fired off the 100 million candlepower searchlight (used to illuminate subs) and "lit off" the boat. After passing over the boat, they shut down the searchlight and jets, climbed up to several thousand feet and turned around.

The cruiser had all the lights on and was moving at full throttle. They didn't know where they were going, they were just getting the heck out of there! We always wondered at the story of what the people aboard said, and if they included what they were doing at the time in their story.

[coastie65]

Okay Guys, we're going to take a walk down memory lane once again. For those who have been to the Philippines, this should be a familiar sight.

!http://forums.pcworld.com/legacyimages/
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[rgreen4]

Actually the bottles they had when I was there had painted labels, not paper ones. Some guys would take the bottle, score it just below the top curve and then break off the top. They would then sand the cut edge down and voile - San Miguel glasses. That bottle is probaby from the U.S. imported variety which has a lower alcholic content.

San Miguel was not only the location of the main brewery, but also the Naval Communications center. Our Scout Camp was located on that facility, and the access in and out of camp was through the antenna field. They had electronic gates and lights, so that no one could go the field while the main transmitter was operating.

[coastie65]

Hey rg, If you look close at the background behind "San Miguel" & "Pale Pilsner" you will notice that it is just the brown glass bottle and that is the Painted on label. The "Export" San Miguel was a consistant alcohol content as prescribed by the US standard. The other stuff, you could get one bottle at 3.2 % and the next would 7.5 % or higher. I believe the export was marked San Miguel Phillipines and the "Other" was San Miguel Manilla if I remember correctly. I know we used to check the labeling. :D coastie

[rgreen4]

I stand corrected. When I first looked at it, I was on my laptop and the image is not as good as my 24" monitor.

Yes, I remember the guy's checking the labels. I didn't prowl O' Town, and we didn't have too much trouble with the clubs on base. They knew to check before they accepted the shipment.

[Adama]

Wow, you guys - RGreen, Coastie and MJD - really have quite a good memory of your times in the service.


I really enjoy coming over to this thread once in a while and checking out the latest news, whether old or not, it's always interesting.

@ RGreen, what's a P3?

[rgreen4]

The P3 Orion is a 4 engine Turbo-Prop Patrol aircraft. (the P is for Patrol). It is used for a number of activities including Anti-Submarine and weather recons. It is actually built off the basic design of a '60's civilian airliner, the Lockheed Electra II.
Many nations fly the aircraft, not just the U.S. Here are a couple of photos, including one with both U.S. Navy and Japanese Maritime Defense Force P-3's.

!http://forums.pcworld.com/legacyimages/
1!

!http://forums.pcworld.com/legacyimages/
1!

[coastie65]

I thought everybody patroled Olongapo. Then again, I don't recall too many, if any, Officers partaking of the local color. The must have had a good O club on the base. :D After a run in with a Jitney driver on our way back home, I spent my time on base at the club. I ended up late getting back because of it and the Marine at the gate took my Liberty card. My XO called me up to the ships office the next day and asked me about it and then gave me my card back. We didn't hang around Subic all that long so I stayed on base after that.

[rgreen4]

Remember, you were visiting and lived on the ship. I lived on the base. Some of the base personnel lived in town, few really "patrolled" Olongopo. For those who were married and had family with them, it would not have been good. For those who were single or unaccompanied, it still got old after a while.

In my case, I was flying almost every day. As the rule went, "No smoking within 50 feet of the aircraft and no drinking within 24 hours of a flight". My self imposed rule was even when permissable, no more than two. I had already established from personal experience that 4 or more brews resulted in an undesirable experience - I got sick and lost everything. Over, and over and over. After making several long distance telephone calls to Ralph O'Rourke via the ceramic telephone, I decided that was no fun.

I was not about to trust an Olongopo bartender with a mixed drink.

We had several enlisted who married into local families and lived in town. Of course they didn't patrol either. We had one officer who married a Filipino, but not there. He met her while she was going to school in Washington state. It killed his career. Marrying a foreign national revokes all security clearances. (Canada and UK used to be exceptions). It is difficult to function as an officer without one. It is impossible to fly, although he had already had his wings pulled for lack of performance. It's also hard to function when the crew doesn't want to fly with you.

[mjd420nova]

Olongopo has a lot of memories and you didn't really need to go into town to enjoy yourself. Myself, we had nothing but bad luck there. The gunners dropped a weapon on deck and it seemed to be forever raining. I did enjoy weekends out at Grande Island scuba diving. I was standing Shore Patrol on Christmas Eve the night Marcos decided there would be no midnight curfew and had to stay on patrol until 4AM Christmas Day. There were the normal 12 on patrol but after 2AM there was only two clubs left open, The Wave and the Sierra Club. The Sierra Club was a second floor club and the drunks usually fell down the stairs. I knew the owner as she was married to a friend I went to "A" school with at Treasure Island. He was killed in a car wreck on his way ti Idaho for Nuc Prototype school. She took the insurance and went home and bought the club. We made two emergency visits, one to replenish our CO2 extinguishers after we gave all we had to another destroyer when they had a boilerroom fire and we towed her back to Subic. The other was when we were doing shore bomb with our five inch, fifty four caliber cannon on what they called Point Alice. It was the northern most gunfire position on the northern boundary of the DMZ. We were doing spotter calls when a Russian made T-88 tank came over the sand dune and blew our air search radar dish off the superstructure. We turned tail and keep on going, all the way to Subic.. Funny thing was they had a spare. Not an easy feat for a brand new SPS-40D air search.

[coastie65]

Flying does have it's restrictions for sure. Four "Sam Magoos" was just a start for us. I never ordered a mix drink in the Far East as I was always a little leary of that. I was going back tothe base one night on our return home and was cutting things a bit thin as far as time goes. All was well and the Jitney driver pulled into that area to left before you get to the bridge where there were some shops. I was giving him a peso and he decided to grab the whole bunch of pesos out of my hand. I didn't let go and he started arguing and I was raising hell as well. I finally had had enough and pulled out my trusty switch blade you go get for almost nothing on the street. That kinda cooled his jets and he let go of my money. I bailed and took off for the gate. I was late and the Marine told me to get in the line, where they were writing up everybody. I tried to explain the situation, but they were having no part of it and took my liberty card. I went back to ship and the next morning was called to the ship's office. The XO asked me why I was late and I told him what happened and That I had been cutting it a bit close. He said he should restrict me to the ship until we got home and then chuckled and gave me my liberty card back. I never went back into Olongapo and we sailed for home two days later. We stopped at the Coast Guard Base on Sand Island in Honolulu and again at the Balboa Navy Base in the Canal Zone. It seemed like everytime we were on deck loading stores it would start pouring rain. Mjd, Yeah you guys had the 5" 54's. A longer barrel and range than the 5" 38 we had. We were good for about 5 Mi. or so. I remember one Gunfire support mission where we eased in close to shore just before daybreak. We went to GQ and started pounding with that thing. It went on in to the afternoon and ended just before evening chow. I remember hearing that the spotter pilot was so impressed that he wanted to work with us again. I don't know how many rounds we expended, but it required an unrep of ammunition a day or two later to replenish it. I also remember them talking about quite a few huge secondary explosions during that particular mission. We were told that it was a particularly large bunker complex plus a lot of what appeared to be a large number of support structures above ground. The Army had called it in as they had no available artillary in the area, and wanted to do an assault. We were more than happy to oblige. They said later that we didn't leave much for them. It seems as I heard about a ship getting it's dish blown off. I think it may have been at my VFW post, but am not sure. We were Trailing that huge long pennent when we arrived home as we had been away for two weeks shy of 10 months. coastie

[Adama]

So, did you fly the P3 also, RGreen?

The two planes on the top picture, are they US planes?

[mjd420nova]

Coastie: Yeah, the gun had a range of twelve miles and took sixty seconds for the rounds to go that far. We spent a lot of time doing H&I for the spotters, only night time missions. Fired six hundred rounds from 10PM to 6AM and then met up with the Katmai or Vesuvius to re-arm before breakfast and then sleep during the day. Usually stayed around a mile and a half from the beach. Had a Texas Instrument first generation infra-red long range camera mounted on the fire control director for one cruise. Gunsighted with the radar so we could take things under fire without using the radar. Got a PUC for destroying a hundred tanks in one night as they tried to cross the Qua Viet River into South Viet Nam. Also was in the task force that went into Haiphong Harbor to provide backup during a POW rescue in Hanoi. We were a mile and half from the beach with the Newport News and her fourteen inch guns at three miles and the New Jersey at five miles with sixteen inch guns. They were shooting over our heads and was scary as hell. We could hear their rounds screaming as they passed. My first time in Subic was only a half day as I arrived on a C-130 from Pearl via Midway and Guam. Rode back seat on an F-4 out to the Enterprise. Got dropped off in the delta in early January '69, ten days before they had their big explosion and fire. SIx months in the jungle convinced me that I really needed to get a shipboard job code and get away from the flying bullets. Got a radar jammer job code and never went on another shore assignment.

[coastie65]

Yeah, been there with that 16" stuff flying overhead. We cruised up North some where ( I never knew where the heck we were at most of the time). We moved in to about 1/2 mile of the beach and commenced firing. Well somehow, when they made some changes to the billet, I found myself with no GQ station as it was left blank. I went up on deck to observe the action. I was on the fantail as far as I could get from the "Pea Shooter" and that wasn't far enough as the concussion from that thing was bad back there. We weren't firing at a fast rate at that time and there was a pretty good pause between rounds. In between, I kept hearing something overhead but couldn't figure out what it was. I went below, because I had had enough up there and went to the mess deck and got a cup of coffee. The EO saw me and by the time I sat down here he came and wanted to know why I wasn't at my station. I told him I didn't have one. He went and checked the billet and sure enough it was blank. He came back and said that he'd be sure that found a place for me and went back to the engineering office. By that time the tempo of the firing had really picked up. I didn't think that thing would fire that fast. Anyway, I found out that what it was hearing was 16" rounds overhead from the New Jersey. We were pulled off station and sailed well North in a hurry, or as much of a hurry as the Halfmoon could do. We spent two days doing a lot of shelling then returned to station. We unreped for ammunition on the way back and got fuel ( and mail) shortly after getting back on station. Oh yeah, my new billet was the forward Damage Control Station.

[mjd420nova]

Coastie: Ours could fire at a pretty good rate, 80 rounds a minute. My gunfire station was non-existant as I sometimes had deck watch or had to be ready to repair a crypto-radio, a KY-8 that was a pain for the operator. They'd get excited and start talking before the syncro beeps finished and the spotter would tell them they were cutting out. I could stand up on the flying bridge while they were shooting and visually time the sounds of the loader to the actual firing. Once I could syncronize the sounds I could close my eyes and wait for just the right point and open them to see the shell leaving the barrel. That was a thrill. The night in Haiphong was real scary while on deck. No one was showing any lights and you couldn't see a hand in front of your face. The sky would turn bright orange and then black again when the Jersey fired. We could hear the whistling as the round passed overhead and I would say a little prayer that none would fall short.

[coastie65]

Hmmm, never gave any thought about one coming up short. We were firing in daylight so we couldn't see the N.J. Everybody ran dark over there, no smoking on deck either, We had black out curtains on the doors leading to the outside. I remember a shipmate and I were on deck one night and we were about a half mile off shore. We were looking towards the beach and he commented about all the lightning in the distance. I had seen it but it didn't look like any lightning I had ever seen. I realized that it was a bombing run and they were carpet bombing in the distance and the flashes were from the bombs going off. That was a lot of ordinance being dropped. It was out of our reach so we didn't participate. We used to mix up the rounds as well as we fired. We would use HE ( High Explosive) rounds and ACC ( the anti personnel stuff ). We used the Willie Peters, WP, ( White Phospherous) sparingly as they were hard to come by for some reason due to their popularity. The only thing I remember being fired at night were the star shells ( Illumination Rounds ). During the Gunfire Support Missions, we usually used a spotter plane, but sometimes it was someone on the ground. We did get a Navy Unit Commendation award as well as the RVN Medal of Valor w/ Palm Leaf ( Unit Citation).

[mjd420nova]

Coastie: We used to use the illumination flares for target practice with the infra-red unit. I remember one time we were doing it off of Kahoowlawae, one of the small Hawaiian Islands about ten Miles off Maui. They had to use a reduced charge for the flare so it wouldn't get fired too far away. They loaded the flare first and then five regular rounds behind it. One time the reduced charge didn't go off and the mis-fired charge cartridge was ejected out on deck. Without thinking, the gunner did what they always did with misfires, he tossed it over the side. Normally, full charges sink to the bottom but the reduced charge had an air pocket in it and it floated. There it was, a live cartridge bobbing around in the waves. Afraid some other boat might hit it and set it off, we held an impromptue small arms practice session. Do you know how hard it is to hit a bobbing object in the water from another bobbing platform? After using an M-16, a BAR and a Thompson submachine gun, they tried the 50 caliber guns mounted on the deck. Thirty minutes later the captain decided we'd have to retrieve it by hand. The boatswains mates put the whaleboat in the water and used a cargo net to snag it. After they brought it aboard, they found it had been hit a few times so figured it was safe to store with the spent shells. The state of Hawaii wants the Navy to return that island back to the state, but after using it for sixty years for target practice they decided that it would cost ten billion dollars to clean up only ten percent of the surface and they turned them down. They still use it and the Air Force even uses it to dump weapons when they have to return armed planes back to Hickam in emergencies. No one lives there but a few goats.