V - Very Funny (or not)

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WestPac '95 was a very eventful cruise, wrought with plane crashes and the like.  One day, while in the Persian Gulf, we were doing a routine underway replenishment (UNREP) with our oiler, the USS Sacramento AOE1.  (also known as the Scrapmetal!)

This is one time I wish I'd been on the flight deck with the rest of the postal peeps, but I was working the window that day.  We were getting ready to open for business when an alarm started sounding.  All alarms are tested before getting underway, so you sort of get conditioned to hearing the 3 alarms; general, chemical and collision, all together in a pattern.  So hearing the collision alarm going off made the few of us in the PO pause and look at each other in confusion.   Then a huge jostle happened that almost knocked us over!  Each area has a TV showing the flight deck.  We saw a quick glimpse of chaos on the plat before it shut off.

The Sacramento had lost it's steering and went off course - crashing into the side of the Lincoln!  Minimal damage was done to us - the catwalks along the edge of the flightdeck were crushed, a couple planes had tail damage, but nothing horrible.  

 The Sac, on the other hand, sustained a LOT !  These pictures are from the cruise book.  This area of the Sac is the bridge wing - the lookout areas and such next to the bridge where the ship is steered from. The oil booms were also damaged.  I heard a very high-up officer had been standing out there, observing the UNREP and barely got out of the way!

So the running joke became "The shortest route across the Gulf is thru Sacramento!"

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