The SS Ioannis K aground after hitting a small island just offshore from Vietnam.  The Greek vessel somehow kept plowing through the shallow water and was firmly beached.  Lipan couldn't maneuver in the shallows and it was near impossible to get a line over to the stranded ship.  We sent a crew to the Ioannis K with the ship's boat and they arrived as the vessel's master, distraught over his ship's grounding,  committed suicide by slashing his wrists.  Circa 1968.
Bosun McWilliams sent the Gunnersmate to retrieve a rocket from Lipan's magazine and we attached a line to it in an attempt to shoot a towline to the Ioannis K.  With a great "WHOOOOOSH" the rocket leapt of Lipan's forecastle and we did get a line over to her but we were called away before ever making an attempt to pull her free.  Note in the photo you can actually see the rocket above the Ioannis K as it streaks toward her.
We laid some beach gear for the pull on the Ioannis K but never used it.   Most likely we were called away for a more urgent mission.  I doubt we could have ever freed the vessel anyway.  She was totally out of the water and surrounded by shallows.  It amazes me that a vessel's momentum could carry her so far towards the beach.
One of the few times we highlined with another vessel off Vietnam.
A P3 subhunter aircraft, similar to the downed aircraft we searched for off Vietnam.  The P3, made by Lockheed I believe, had 4 turboprop engines, a crew of about 11, and could find subs underwater and then kill it.  Note the "MAD" (Magnetic Anomaly Detector) boom sticking out the back of the aircraft like a hornet's stinger.  It measured magnetic disturbances in the ocean caused by a submarine and with this, and sono-buoys which the aircraft dropped, it could corner a sub.  Circa 1968.
The target sled we towed in this exercise with the P3.   The sled was small, perhaps ten feet long and a few feet wide and it had elbow-shaped pipes at its stern which would shoot water up in a rooster-tail fashion so the aircraft could more readily see it from the air.  The P3 was equipped with depth charges, bombs, torpedoes, and underwing rockets and it was using rockets in this exercise.
Two rockets bracket the target sled.  The P3 could shutdown two of its engines to conserve fuel and remain on station for quite a lengthy time.  They flew so low that they were becoming corroded from sea spray and special washing mechanisms were used to keep the underside free of salt.  They were/are remarkable planes that could detect and kill an enemy submarine without them ever knowing they were even being watched.  Circa 1968.
BM2 Bob Carroll watches as a P3 streaks across Lipan's wake.  Typically they'd come in higher and dive upon the target sled, releasing their unguided rockets.  They were pretty accurate and most shots landed right on target.  Today, with the end of the cold war, we have less need for the P3 and their numbers have been reduced dramatically.
Mission end and the P3 streaks past Lipan about fifty feet off the water, wagging its wings, in a gesture of thanks for a successful exercise.
Some days things just don't go right.  This is a shot of an overturned target sled, the big old heavy timber type.  We'd towed it out for a gunnery exercise and it flipped over and we couldn't get it back upright so we had to limp home slowly towing the submerged sled.   Circa 1968.
Some airbursts from shells fired from another vessel hitting near the towed target sled.
AKA 106 USS Union getting underway in Subic Bay in the Philippines.  Circa 1968
USS Moctobi ATF 105 steams past us in the channel at Pearl Harbor Hawaii circa 1968.
A boat belonging to one of the locals in Subic bay Philippines circa 1968.  These one-piston sampans (nicknamed one-lungers) could be seen and heard all over the Western Pacific.  The loud putt-putt-putt sound could be heard well before the vessel was in sight.
Unidentified LPD steams past us on its way to Subic circa 1968.
USS Vancouver LPD 2 with some of hers boats alongside in Subic circa 1968.
Two unidentified LPD's in Subic circa 1968.
Eddie Gooch SN, our ship's servicman (in white hat), and Paul Silman SM2 sitting on the forecastle during a break.
Ron Davis SN on the left and me catching some Sunday sun atop the  afterhold's hatch cover.  Circa 1968  some place in the Western Pacific.
Fred D. Jones GM3.  He went by the nickname "Fatdog".    A nice guy who borrowed my knife one time to cut a rope and almost cut his finger off.   I Applied direct pressure on his finger, wrapped in a rag, and took him down to Doc Beyers to get stitched up.  All the while I listened to a lecture from Fatdog about how "NOBODY, not even a Boatswainmate should have such a sharp knife."
Paul Coverdale a YNSN in this photo circa 1967.  "Covey" or "Rock", as we called him, became a YN2 before leaving Lipan.  He was a popular guy . . . picked up our pay, picked up our mail, picked our movies, typed all our orders and handled our leave.
Cliff Harding SN.  Cliff had been aboard Lipan for a while when I boarded in 1966.  He wore that big bushy mustache all the time and when his enlistment was up he shaved it off a couple of days before he departed Lipan and nobody aboard recognized him.
Cliff Harding SN after a hard day's work.  Actually, Cliffy's dungarees had been washed so many times that they were threadbare and he started ripping them.  We all pitched in and then stuck a knife through his left pantleg for this photo op.

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