250320 Thirty Days

Old memories come to me at odd times.

This story is all true. It was a horrible 30 days to live through.

I was an aircrew member stationed on Guam, but regularly on temporary detachment to the Philippines, usually they were for 15 days at a time and we usually flew out of Cavite in the PI. We flew nighttime radar coverage for the 7th fleet aircraft carriers operating off the coast of Vietnam.

For some reason unknown to me, we were sent to Cubi Point in the PI. We were still going to provide coverage for the 7th fleet. We happened to be there during the monsoon season. It rained for 30 days, every day and night we were there. We enlisted men were billeted to a barracks that had no air conditioning. The heat was oppressing the humidity at 100%. We sweat all day and night the bunk beds never dried out from our sweat. My locker had a pair of boots in it and the boots turned green with mold in them. The only way to be comfortable was being inside our aircraft with its air conditioning.

One night we were off duty, so I went over to the enlisted men’s club. The rain was still pouring, but somehow things weren’t as bad after a couple of beers. The club was not air conditioned, the roof was leaking like a sieve. There were huge buckets a foot high and 3 feet across and they were overflowing.

It happened that there was an Australian navy ship stopping at Cubi Point. Their liberty party ended up at the enlisted men’s club. Those sailors were guzzling down beers one after another and they were drunk in short order. The Aussies sent their shore patrol police along with the liberty sailors. As a sailor would pass out at the table, the shore patrolmen would drag them over to those buckets and dunk them to wake the sailor up so he could drink more at the tables.

I was headed out when I saw a pinball machine. I couldn't pass that up so I was there having a good time. There was an Aussie playing pinball next to me. He began to talk to me, and what he said was, “Why don’t you yanks drop an atomic bomb on Vietnam so we can all go home?”

Here I am 60 years later and this memory came back to me. This old brain, full of memories, releases a story at odd times. No complaints, they give me something to write about. Hopefully something for you to read.

Brother Bill