Yet another reason I’m glad I went Army and not Navy. My Dad is a Navy Man and an avid sailor (still into his 70’s) but I’m terrified of being stuck in the middle of an ocean with my “home” sinking beneath me.
I’m a ‘Land Lubber.’ I must get that from Dear Old Mom. ;)
I used to be on the USS JFK, and while I never really thought about it much, I had never considered much the implications of being in a shooting war.
One night on the ship, I had this dream. I dreamt I was in a lifejacket, treading water astern of the sinking ship, when the stern settled, and the bow began to come out of the water. It went up, up, up against the black sky lit by the stars, and I could see the black shape of the flight deck hundreds of feet above me as it blotted out the stars.
Slowly, it began to fall...directly down on me. 85,000 tons of ship began to come down right on top of me. Then I woke up. That was a pretty scary nightmare.
I once met a guy who was the ship’s doctor aboard the USS Indianapolis. I spent several hours with him... I shudder to think what kind of nightmares he had.