"Larry" wrote in message
...
"mmc" wrote in
g.com:

I wasn't ships crew on the MSOs just TAD with EOD teams providing
support for training and exercises.
The CO on the Leader gave us each a letter of appreciation for
recovering a Mk 6 mine that was about 90% buried (and still the sonar
crew found it!). The mine hadn't released from the anchor and if it
was a warshot the HE had rotted out before we found it. There was a
hole where the extender was supposed to be and 2 octopus living
inside. We must have been quite a show trying to dig the damn thing up
with dust pans! Funny, ships don't carry shovels....
I beleive the CO made a gift of the mine to the MINEWARCOM HQ and it
should still be there.
Good times Larry.



The EOD guys were in our building around the corner from my lab. Scary
guys for the mere ETs and other geeks.....(c;

Glad you survived. I'm amazed anyone could take that kind of pressure.

Did you ever see the mine exploder ship, I've forgotten its name, that had
4 diesel outboard-style motors on its sides whos "foot" flew up when the
mine exploded under her hull filled with steel balls to absorb the
pressure? The crew superstructure was on springs to absorb the shock away
from the men. Of course, she was crewed by "expendables". Her "captain"
was an LTJG so noone "important" had any chance of being hurt if things
didn't go as planned.....sorta like a PT boat.

Evidently the idea worked. But, it was hell on the radio gear!

Never heard of that ship Larry, I'll have to google it and see if there are
pictures on the web.
I rode a FF before I went EOD and figured our most important job would be to
"take the bullet" (torpedo) for the high value target (carrier, etc) if we
were lucky enough to be in the right spot and had enough time. Now, that
doesn't make you feel expendable?
Yeah, I'm lucky - still got all of my major parts. Left some tissue and bone
in the desert but I'm much better now.

"mmc" wrote in news:495e164a$0$4870
:

Now, that
doesn't make you feel expendable?


ALL enlisted prisoners are expendable, just like enlisted soldiers or
marines.

It took me 20 years to look back on the USN before I finally came to the
realization we were all, once the contract was signed, simply prisoners in
a floating penal institution. Don't think so? Just say "NO" when you were
told to do something, even killing women and kids at Mi Lai.....

People get mad at me when I say I joined the Navy as a way to hide from the
draft....a legal way to hide. Of the 19 of us boys that graduated from my
high school in 1964, 9 of us survived Vietnam. Of the 10 who didn't come
home, 3 are STILL unaccounted for and noone seems to care. Of the 9 who
survived, the two guys who fled Prison America to Canada and Sweden are the
best off of the entire class. One is a retired executive of a Canadian
metal company. The one who went to Sweden because CEO of a major Swedish
corporation. He now lives in the Med, in a mansion overlooking the Greek
coast.

Everyone's lives were "changed" forever, most ruined.