Forum Quiz: Question #6

Sharpe · **Sharpe**

The weather reports were ominous. Typhoon conditions could be expected in the Western Pacific sector into which the U.S. Third Fleet was headed. Fleet headquarters did not distribute the information; captains and crews learned of the pending disaster on the evening of ------------- 1944, when winds whipped up to 100 knots and gigantic waves crashed across their decks.

Among the ships suffering from the heavy pounding was the light carrier -------------, a small Independence-class ship commissioned just 18 months before. F6F “Hellcat” fighters lashed to her hangar deck broke loose and began skittering about. Several of them — crewmen later could not agree on exactly how many — collided and exploded into flame. The flames spread and eventually 18 aircraft — almost two-thirds of the little ship’s air group — were aflame. The carrier’s air recirculation system sucked in smoke and flame, spreading the fires throughout the ship.

On the bridge, --------’s captain, ---------------, received a direct order from the fleet commander, Admiral William H. Halsey, to abandon his ship. With the carrier ablaze from stem to stern, it must have seemed the only rational choice. But ----------, looking at the 70-foot waves crashing over his flight deck, knew that none of his wounded could possibly survive going over the side, and likely few of his crew. He as yet had no clue as his casualties, only that the numbers would likely be very large.

“We can fix this,” he snapped at the admiral, and cut the connection. He turned to the only officer on the bridge, the ship’s anti-aircraft battery officer, and snarled, “Get below.”

The “island” on light carriers like ------ was very small, properly referred to as a “pilot house.” Access to the bridge was by a steel ladder on its outside structure. As the lieutenant climbed down the ladder, a powerful wave flung him onto the flight deck, smashing him onto the timbers flat on his back. As the ship’s 25-degree list sent him skittering toward the opposite edge and the churning waters of the Pacific below, he twisted and leapt for the catwalk edging the flight deck. He caught the two-inch steel edge of the flight deck with his fingertips, and with a surge of adrenalin-fueled brute strength hauled himself onto the catwalk and safety.

"I was lucky,” he recalled later. “I could have easily gone overboard."

Gathering sailors into an impromptu damage control team, the lieutenant’s first task was to remove the wounded from the boiler rooms, then restore three of the four boilers to operation so that the ship could make headway into the storm (the fourth remained in action, the only reason -------- could operate her high-pressure hoses). Seven hours later, badly burned and shaking from exhaustion, the lieutenant and his team had restored boiler operation and saved the ship.

Who, better known for a career in an entirely different field, is being described here?
_________________