Some years ago, I was in a bookstore, and came across a book on ship breaking of US Navy ships.
It showed photographs of them in various states of being broken up, and it was sad and disheartening to me.
I know that some people scoff at the concept that men could find something elevated in a piece of steel called a warship, and fairly, when I served on one, I certainly found times (as a young man) to dislike it intensely and wish I were somewhere else.
But it is also true that men have cried with real tears and sadness as a ship they had lived in for years slid, flaming, steaming and hissing, below the surface of the water and disappeared.
Men often refer to ships as “she”, and I think I understand why. (although today, they may not. What do I know...)
But in this book about ships being broken up after WWII, there was a picture of a heavy cruiser (a Baltimore class, I think) whose bow had been removed all the way back to the #2 turret.
It struck me in the same way if you have ever seen someone missing a nose due to surgery or an accident-almost as an obscene defacement.
It really stuck in my memory.
my dad was a plank owner on the USS Sierra AD18
rode her all the way to China...
i thought i’d been shaving wi her when one day she popped up again
In September 1979, Sierra cruised one day behind Hurricane Frederic on her way to a shipyard in Mobile, Alabama, for an overhaul. The overhaul included the addition of female berthing quarters for the first female officers that began serving on the ship. During the first several months in drydock, her crew assisted the City of Mobile to help in cleanup and relief efforts after Hurricane Frederic. The crew received the Humanitarian Medal for their efforts in Mobile.