When the errant rocket launch occurred and the fires started the ship went to General Quarters immediately by order of either The Captain or the OOD on watch on the Bridge. That order would be noted in nearly all log books on the ship. McCain upon exiting his burning craft would report to his squadron ready room for further orders. I can explain why. He was a pilot that was his station because he was attached to a squadron. Ships Company Officers are the ones who take over repair parties and oversaw operations involving functioning of the carrier.
I'm going to explain a little bit more of the issue which made a bad situation worse. Fire fighting wise on the Forrestal or any other carrier of the day laked having a system which was later to be developed called a Hi-CAP. It's an automatic sprinkler foaming system using Aquios Film Forming Foam aka AFFF as we called it in the day. It is designed for foaming the flight deck and hanger deck below. Once it was installed on carriers foaming could be done in a matter of seconds once the HI CAP station was activated. Foaming before then required time and a bucket brigade type of set up to carry five gallon buckets of foam up to the hose station. A Hi-Cap could do in seconds what it would take crews many minutes and lots of manpower to accomplish.
In the case of this incident with what was happening with the bombs it likely would not have stopped the carnage looking at the time frame involved from the rocket launch to a bomb exploding. The fires and there were many were so intense that the Triage for the injured had to be done all the way up at the Forecastle portion of the ship which is close to the bow and anchors in the forward most part of the ship. I would assume because that was where air was better and for communication capabilities with the bridge which I won't go into specifics on.
Had the helicopters caught fire an even bigger issue would have happened because you are dealing with a Magnesium fire the worse of the worst type of fire. The way to extinguish a magnesium fire safely is to throw the craft into the sea and it will continue to burn even then until the magnesium burns up. It makes its own oxygen source when burning.
The Forrestal Fire is the most scrutinized Naval fire in USN history. Coverup people may say? How when there were live cameras rolling with time stamp. The only thing McCain had to do with the fire was being in his aircraft when the fires began. The Navy has used the footage of that fire ever since the early 1970's maybe earlier as a training aid Navy wide. It's horrifying and shown so sailors take fire fighting and Damage Control training serious. Every sailor who attends bootcamp sees in meaning all sailors. Every sailor who is sent to fire fighting or DC school sees it. I went to Firefighting school several times myself over 4 years for fire department training and saw it.
The Navy changed some ways of doing things even into the late 1970's when they began a permanent fire department on the carriers pooled from all SHIPS COMPANY departments. I did two different stints at that. The second time as One on One for my duty section. Before that the Hull Technicians were stuck with the fire fighting task at sea and not a good idea because all of the welders could be wiped out in a below deck fire.
The Flightdeck and Hanger Deck managed by the Air Department has their own fire department called Crash and Salvage. They also handled the flightdeck crashes. After Forrestal the Navy put actual fire trucks on carriers and the fire truck was manned by a crew two or three of them IIRC wearing asbestos suits during Flight Ops. Weapons Department also had their own responders. Due to security reasons only security clearance cleared sailors could enter weapons spaces. Why? Because they carried Nukes back then.
If you go to the link that was posted for the thread and look at the aircraft spotting charts that will more than debunk the wet start rumor and others like it. The launch came from the starboard side aft of McCain who was forward of that craft but across the flightdeck.
A person can not like nor support McCain's politically or even personally and still understand that that fire was not his doing by any of the scuttlebutt rumors going around. Almost any sailor who did time on a carrier can debunk it and definitely any Navy pilots or aircraft handlers known as Aviation Bosun Mates. There are many Freepers quite capable of debunking the McCain caused it rumor whether they like him or not and I know of no one who does including myself.
For those among us who have no experience with flight deck operations or aviation ordnance, I found and watched a good documentary on this incident. Of particular interest is the part that steps us through the investigative forensic analysis of the sequence of events.
USS Forrestal Aircraft Carrier Disaster
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6g6l_gjxXM4
This clears up all the writing that I’ve read about safety pins and pigtails and whatnot.
Earlier this morning I found the purported source of the ‘wet start’ rumors- a video that was published just before the election in 2008 and is an obvious piece of political propaganda. The video was uploaded to Youtube on August 3rd of 2008. Here is the Democrat propaganda piece: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIWeq2DL_N4
I don’t like McCain either, but I don’t see a shred of credible evidence that he caused the disaster.
Well said, cva66snipe.
Well said.