Subject: Fishing Balls for the Captain
1967 WesPac run across the Pacific from Pearl to Yokosuka was, all in all, a pretty uneventful trip for most of us on the Diodon fish. When we, the lookouts and OOD on the bridge, started seeing fishing balls from the Japanese fishing fleet that had broken away from their nets, the Captain was, of course, notified. After all, they were contacts.
One day while I happened to be on the Starboard lookout, the Cap't decided to visit the bridge. I casually mentioned that I would be more than happy to go swimming for one of the fishing balls, should he want to have a souvenir.
I don't remember what he said, (as I write this on Feb. 27, 2001), because it was only 34 years ago. But a day or two after my conversation with the Captain, while I was OFF watch, the boat slowed and the armed "Anti Shark Attack" sharpshooters were standing above the bridge on the sail with real bullets in the M-1 rifles. When the boat was stopped along side one of the larger fishing balls, the bow planes were lowered and I climbed down onto the port plane and dove in.
Right there in the middle of the big, BIG, blue Pacific Ocean, I was taking a dip. I probably had to swim about 20 to 30 yards away from the boat, grab the thing in one arm and swim back along side. Sounds easy enough, even for an experienced swimmer. But with a 15 inch glass sphere to take with me, I found it to be quite the challenge.
Anyway, when I got along side the bow plane, I noticed that the calm Pacific, wasn't really as calm as I would have liked. The plane was in and out of the water by maybe 6 - 10 inches with every wave. I waited until I thought I had a chance to climb aboard, with the ball coming with me, and as I hefted myself up onto the plane with my left arm, the right arm with the ball followed.
Unfortunately, just at the same moment, the plane was coming out of the water, going up as the ball was coming down. You guessed it, C R A C K ! ! ! So much for the Captains souvenir. He was gracious enough, but I had disappointed not only him, but myself as well, for a job not done so well. Afterwards, he did tell me that the next time he would make sure there was at least two other bodies ready to lift the ball out of the water before the swimmer tried to get out.
Makes sense after thinking about what had happened. Made me feel a little bit better, but not much. We didn't get another chance at another fishing ball before arriving in Japan.
And the rest as they say, is history. The Captain left well before I did. We all know that story. The return trip to Pearl didn't have me standing lookout watches, and the new CO didn't seem to be interested in a take home show'n' tell. Oh, well!