There was a hell of a string going on about our days in the Fleet. Having achieved full Geezerhood, I had the time to react and reflect as some shipmates swapped sea-stories from our Fleet days.
Vince said: “Reminds me of my squadron days. I had a great mentor: the VA-56 Leading Chief Petty Officer, which is what we called them in those days. He was a grisly old bastard, and he did not hesitate to chew my ass, respectfully of course. BUT he did alert me to the mail buoy business early, and a few other attempts to make me look foolish. His Ensign was NOT going to be embarrassed. Only Ensign in the squadron, of course. Remember in those days, the liberty card issue… well, as an Ensign Duty Officer in-port Cubi in the P.I., I just handed them out. The Master Chief went nuts, since I forgot to read the list of men on restriction, and as the word spread they all got off the ship. Funny what we remember, you know?”
Julio smiled. “At VF-32 embarked in JFK (CV-67), the tradition with newly-reported nugget JO’s was to formally schedule them on the Plan of the Day and the Flight Schedule for a Maritime Air Superiority “Trainer” session (supposedly the latest Northrup-Grumman sophisticated F-14 Tomcat simulator!) located way down in the 7th Deck magazines. Got some hilarious results when some DC or MM Chiefs in the bowels of the ship played along and would give the Ensigns or LTJGs various follow-on confusing directions on the frame number and access hatch to find the trainer, somewhere among the bilges and piles of Mk-82 bombs! The red-faced JO would then be chewed out by the Ops-O or the XO in the ready room for not getting to his assigned Trainer session on time and missing it, while the rest of the squadron tried to suppress giggles…”
JoeMaz jumped on that one. “Vince, you remind me that when I arrived in July of 1970 with VF-84 embarked aboard FDR (CVA-42; the first of a couple Midway-Class CV tours) in Napes I was still an Ensign though I had promoted in June. Yeah I was smart enough to not pin on the JG bars myself. Anyway back then it was only a rear from O-1 to O-2 so I was the only Ensign in the Airwing. The Skipper told they couldn’t waste such a prize and he was going to delay authorizing my promotion for a week or so. My first fleet assignment was as Ready Room Static Display at set hours so the officers in VF-84 could bring their buddies by “to see the Jolly Roger’s official Ensign. They appreciated that I played along in good humor and I got to meet the rest of the airwing. All-in-all, a fun experience that actually help me fit in.”
I had to suppress a chuckle. My welcome aboard my first Fleet command was auspicious, but not the way I wanted it to be. We had spent about a year in the pipeline, from the marching on the Grinder in Pensacola through commissioning, and then orders to the Armed Forces Aviation Intelligence Training Center at Lowery AFB in Denver.
At AFAITC, we were taught the rudiments of our new trade: Imagery analysis, strike warfare, nuclear planning, and once our clearances were processed, an indoctrination into the mysteries of the classified world of sources and Methods.
Then we got our orders. I volunteered for a squadron assigned to the Overseas Family Residence Program, or OFRP, which referred to the USS Midway (CV-41) home parted in Yokosuka, Japan. The Squadron to which I would be assigned was VF-151, flying the venerable F-4 Phantom II Fighter.
The orders also carried a provision for thirty days leave, but I was eager to get on with the great adventure, and decided to take a couple weeks on arrival and see a little bit of the mysterious East before reporting to the ship.
If at this point you are thinking that Ensign Socotra did not quite have the lay of the land, you would be quite right. I cleared up my affairs, packed out my half of the apartment off Colfax Boulevard, and got a Port Call out of Travis Air Force Base in California for points west across the vast Pacific.
Last night of liberty in San Francisco was poignant. I was anxious and unsettled and didn’t even do that good a job of drinking my nerves away.
Eventually, I found myself at Yokota Air Base in the dead of the Kanto Plain night. World Famous Carrier Airwing FIVE had a duty office manned by a sleepy looking petty officer. There was a message directing me to immediately report to Atsugi Air Field for further transportation to the Midway and V-151. I showed my orders to the Petty Officer and explained they granted me leave, and I intended to take it.
He shrugged. Whatever Butterbars decided to do, it was their problem, not his.
At this distance, I cannot remember much more than spending that first day mostly at the patio bar of the Yokota Officer Club, marveling at the rich taste of Kirin Beer, and the delightful taste of the crisp pork and cabbage gyoza dumplings on the plate in front of me. From the patio I could see the chain-link perimeter fence, and beyond that, a Japanese alley.
I think it took me a day to get up the nerve to collect my bags and get a bus to Atsugi, where I decided to touch base with the shore detachment of the Wing before heading up to Tokyo to take a look-see at my new temporary homeland.
It was daylight, so there was a crusty Warrant Officer at the desk. He told me I was in deep shit, UA, and the squadron was pissed. “We don’t have any overhead times for the COD today, but you better have your ass here for the 1400 COD flight tomorrow. I swallowed hard, got a room at the Q for the night, and wondered exactly what sort of hell I had got myself into.
If you want to keep your wits about you, I don’t recommend the first flight in a C-2 Greyhound followed by an arrested landing as the way to do it. The ship was operating a couple hundred miles south of Honshu. If you have not traveled by Carrier Onboard Delivery aircraft, you should know that the seats face aft, for the perfectly good reason that the twin engine turbojet is flying right up the moment that the arresting gear snags the thick steel cross-deck pennant and brings you to an immediate and dramatic halt.
If the pilot catches the wire, that is. If he doesn’t, you have to hope he hasn’t cut the power and made a play for the desk and there are enough knots to go flying again rather than sinking into the waves below.
After an hour or so of straight and level flight, we swung into what seemed to be some sort of racetrack pattern, and then the wing dropped as we went into a bank. I caught a flash of something gray down below, and then the intercom crackled something about final, and moments later there was a great crash and we were pressed into our seats as the airplane decelerated abruptly.
This was an experience quite unlike anything I had ever experienced. The ramp began to come down as we taxied out of the landing zone and the wings began to fold up. There was the stink of jet fuel and men in colored jerseys- green and red and yellow and brown- were performing some clearly choreographed movements. Eventually, an individual in a white float coat abled “ATO” wearing mickey-mouse ears and holding a clip board waved at us to unstrap and follow him. We went down a ladder- there was water out there! The surface was blue and whitecapped- the short ladder was greasy below my highly polished low-quarter black shoes.
The ATO guy turned out to be a Lieutenant, and he handed me over to a Petty Officer in dungarees. “You ENS Socotra?” he asked without ceremony. I nodded, being too disoriented by the events of the arrival to do anything else.
“XO wants to see you and he is pissed. Follow me.” He headed rapidly down the passageway and I struggled to keep up as he stepped easily across hatch frames that threated to trip me and send me sprawling headfirst onto the deck. He stopped and opened a door painted black and featuring an emblem with an ominous flaming skull clenching a dagger it its teeth.
This couldn’t possibly end well, I thought, as we entered a long room with padded aircraft-style seats in neat rows. There were a bunch of people in kakis and flight suits there, apparently waiting for something. The Petty office walked up the central aisle and stopped next to a mustachioed figure who was holding an aluminum box containing messages. The Petty Officer pointed to the seat next to him. “The XO will be with you shortly,” then vanished out a door behind the podium at the front of the room.
I sat down gingerly next to man who was about to determine my fate. He looked down, and flipped a page on the message he was reading. The drama was palpable. He finished reading and closed the box with a metallic click. He turned to me and I noted his wyes were the color of seawater.
He spoke slowly at first. “Where the fuck have you been, Socotra?”
I had intended to explain that I had official orders from the Bureau of Naval Personnel, I was entitled to leave, and was sorry about any inconvenience to the big steel boat or any of its occupants, but I didn’t get far. The XO responded with increasing speed and volume about the various offenses I had committed, that House Arrest was like, prior to Captain’s Mast, and that my life, as I knew it, was effectively over.
I swallowed hard. I had not intended to commence my forward deployed experience in the Brig…but that appeared to be precisely where I was headed. I wondered if they still did the bread and water thing as the XO’s tirade went on, and then seemed to reach a crescendo and climax. “Anything you want to say, Socotra?”
I shook my head “no.”
Them the XO smiled. “Welcome to FITRON 151. I’m Lieutenant “Water” Mallon.” He stuck his hand out to shake mine. I extended my hand and realized the room was packed behind us with my new squadron buddies. There was a round of applause for the “XO’s” performance commenced. I smiled uneasily.
“Water” got up and walked back into the crowd wearing a shit-eating grin A tall guy in a green zoom-bag who was later identified as CDR “Petey” Burggren said: “”Water” was the last guy who was UA on his arrival. Welcome aboard. He shook my hand. “Now, this is CDR Denny “Rattler” Wisely, MIG-killer and Silver Star-winning fighter pilot. He is the real XO.”
I looked up. Denny was whipcord slim and in a flight suit with the Squadron nametag on the left breast. He sat down in the seat next to me. He had a thin smile and his dark eyes glittered like his namesake. “Welcome aboard, Son.”
“Thank you, Sir,” I managed to say. Maybe this was going to be OK.
“Now. Tell me where the fuck you have been?”
I had a suspicion it was going to be a long cruise. I was right.
Copyright 2015 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com
Twitter: @jayare303