Chu Lai Vietnam, site of a Marine Corps air base.  The USS Mahnomen County LST 912  was driven ashore by an 18-foot surf and high winds from a typhoon on December 30 1966.    The USS Cocopa ATF 101 and other salvage vessels (I believe the ATF Sioux and ARS Conserver) attempted to free the vessel in January 1967 and Lipan was diverted to assist.  In the photo the LST is aground just left of center.

 
Cocopa and another ship with their beach gear stretched out to the grounded Mahnomen County.
A great tell all photo of USS Cocopa hooked up with its beach gear wire leading from its bow and a tow wire to the grounded LST.  Lipan is maneuvering to lay another set of beach gear which can be seen laid-out on her fantail.  Circa January 1967.
Another view of Cocopa hooked up in her beach gear harness.  Possibly the bow of the ATF Sioux showing on the left of the photo.  Multiple attempts were made to free the grounded LST but she was hard aground with a huge reef rock impaled in her bottom.
A helicopter from the Marine Corps Air Base at Chu Lai Vietnam flies over Lipan keeping an eye on things.  Although the base was right next to the disabled LST it was still hostile territory.  Circa January 1967.
This landing craft assisted the mission.  Here its hauling a towed line from Lipan to one of the other salvage vessels on scene.
Mahnomen County LST 912 hard aground as the surf continues to pound it.  Lipan would lay down its beach gear but be called away before it could participate in any further pulls.  We left our beach gear there to be used and retrieved by the other ships.  It was ultimately decided to abandon the LST and to strip it and blow up the hulk.
Navy divers assisting the mission.   Sadly, two of them lost their life in the attempt to blowup the ship to prevent it from falling into the hands of the Viet Cong.  They entered the LST to spread foam in its compartments and were suffocated from lack of oxygen.  This may very well be the last photo of them.  Circa January 1967.
The Firefish.  A remote controlled speedboat to be used as a high speed target for a gunnery exercise with a DLG.  It was equipped with a radar reflector to make it easier for the gun's radars to pick it up in the sea swell clutter.  Lipan was fitted with a control panel and we boarded some engineers to operate it.  Things didn't go quite as planned as the engine on Firefish was started.  Circa 1967.
Firefish gained speed as the engineer increased the throttle on the remote control panel.  He attempted to steer the boat but it kept going straight.  He tried to slow the throttle but it kept on its 35 knot pace.  He tried cutting the engine to no avail and Firefish was rapidly leaving the scene as Lipan quickly went to flank speed to try keep up with the errant speeder.  Circa 1967.
The flying bridge is awash with lookouts trying to keep track of Firefish as we give chase at flank speed.  It was a losing battle as the speedboat easily outpaced us.  We radioed the DLG to give chase and she also went to flank speed but Firefish was still outpacing us all.
The DLG begins the chase.  Fortunately her radar was powerful enough to keep the errant Firefish on her screen until the little target ran out of fuel.  Lipan finally caught up with both vessels, Firefish dead in the water at last, and we hauled it aboard and headed back to Pearl Harbor, arriving later than expected after the chase around Hawaiian waters.
The Soviets.  We chased them all over Yankee Station in the Tonkin Gulf and South China Seas during the Vietnam era.  These intelligence gathering trawlers would remain on station for months trying to gather as much information about U.S. war fighting capabilities.  You'll note in the photo that the vessel was festooned with antennae.  Circa 1968.
Each Soviet vessel would be given a code name "Skunk", followed by a phonetic letter designation (Alpha, Bravo, Charlie,etc).  I believe this is a photo of the trawler "Gidrofon" which we tagged "Skunk Delta".  When Gidrofon was relieved the new trawler would be tagged "Skunk Echo", and so and so forth.  They were a bothersome lot.
Aircraft Carrier Battle Groups plied the waters off Vietnam constantly, launching and recovering aircraft and the Soviets always tried to harass the carriers as they passed by us.  It was always a "cat & mouse" game with the Soviets trying to slip past us to get to the carriers.  A never ending chess game involving wit, cunning, and deception.   Circa 1968.
This photo tells the whole story.  A Carrier Battle Group approaches and sends a helo to us to drop off mail.  You'll note we are busy with the helo and in the distance is the Soviet Trawler, taking advantage of our activity and scampering after the Carrier.  Typically the carrier wouldn't launch a helo until it was sure it could outrun the Trawler.  15 knots vs. 30+ knots.  Chalk one up for the carriers.
Launching.  An Aircraft carrier in the Tonkin Gulf off Vietnam launching two jets as it steams close past us and the Soviets.  Carriers must maintain a steady course into the wind to conduct flight ops and the Soviets always did their best to try cut in front of them and harass the mission.  Lipan's job was to prevent it and to that end we and the Soviets did some incredible maneuvering trying to outfox one another.   Circa 1968.
Landing.  Another carrier steams past landing aircraft.  In this photo the pilot is "waved off" at the last moment and has to go around, to make another attempt.  These carriers were so close at times that we could hear the announcements over their 1MC systems.  On occasion their Destroyer and Cruiser escorts would be all around us to assist us with the Soviet if need be but we always managed on our own.
The USS Coral Sea CVA 43 steaming past.  Sometimes they'd appear on the horizon and just skirt past us in the distance and sometimes they'd be headed right for us.  Sometimes the Soviet would incessantly give chase and sometimes he'd lay dead in the water and let the battle group steam through unhindered.  Circa 1968.
Two Aircraft Carriers steam past us in the Tonkin Gulf.  Circa 1968.
Lipan was tasked to hunt for a downed P3A Orion Subhunter maritime patrol aircraft in the vicinity of An Thoi Vietnam near the Cambodian border.  We worked in concert with a Mine Sweeper (The Conflict) which did the ocean bottom searching with their sonar while we provided the divers.  This gunboat brought out two Australian explosive ordnance demolition divers to disarm any live weapon systems our divers might encounter.   Circa 1968
His name was Dave and he was big and rugged.  The two Australians made a stencil of a kangaroo and proceeded to spray paint red kangaroos all over Lipan.   Eventually we painted over them but years later we were still finding kangaroos painted in inaccessible areas.  We got even by stenciling "sea bats" all over their diving gear on the day they departed.  It did not please them but ... it was payback.
BM2 Bob Carroll, a Lipan diver, lifts the sidearm out of Dave's holster.    The area around AN Thoi was not all that secure and these guys came aboard with sidearms and M-16 rifles.  We looked for about a month for the P3 and never found it but we did catch some great Red Snappers and ate like kings.  The shipfitters made us a barbecue grill out of  a 55 gallon drum and "Ma" Spegal, our cook, was cooking the fish as fast as we'd catch them.

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