44 years ago today - USS Forrestal Fire kills 134 sailors

[Dennis Donovan]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_USS_Forrestal_fire



The 1967 USS Forrestal fire was a devastating fire and series of chain-reaction explosions on 29 July 1967 that killed 134 sailors and injured 161 on the aircraft carrier USS Forrestal (CVA-59), after an unusual electrical anomaly discharged a Zuni rocket on the flight deck. Forrestal was engaged in combat operations in the Gulf of Tonkin during the Vietnam War at the time, and the damage exceeded US$72 million (equivalent to $474 million today) not including damage to aircraft.

<snip>

About 10:50 hours (local time) on 29 July, while preparations for the second strike of the day were being made, an unguided 5.0 in (127.0 mm) Mk-32 "Zuni" rocket, one of four contained in a LAU-10 underwing rocket pod mounted on a McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II, was accidentally fired due to an electrical power surge during the switch from external power to internal power.

The rocket flew across the flight deck, striking a wing-mounted external fuel tank on a Douglas A-4 Skyhawk awaiting launch, aircraft No. 405, piloted by LCDR Fred D. White, The warhead's safety mechanism prevented it from detonating, but the impact tore the tank off the wing and ignited the resulting spray of escaping JP-5 fuel, causing an instantaneous conflagration. Other external fuel tanks overheated and ruptured, releasing more jet fuel to feed the flames which spread along the flight deck, leaving pilots in their aircraft with the options of being incinerated in their cockpits or running through the flames to escape. LCDR White leaped from his burning aircraft but was killed instantly, along with many firefighters, when the first bomb cooked off and exploded. LCDR Herbert A. Hope of VA-46 (and operations officer of CVW-17) jumped out of the cockpit of his Skyhawk between explosions, rolled off the flight deck and into the starboard man-overboard net. Making his way down below to the hangar deck, he took command of a firefighting team. "The port quarter of the flight deck where I was", he recalled, "is no longer there." With his aircraft surrounded by flames, LCDR John McCain, pilot of A-4 Skyhawk side No. 416, escaped by climbing out of the cockpit, walking down the nose and jumping off the refueling probe. He would later become a U.S. senator and presidential nominee.

The impact of the Zuni dislodged two of the 1,000 lb (450 kg) bombs (World War II-vintage AN-M65s), which lay in the burning fuel. The fire team's chief, Gerald Farrier (without benefit of protective clothing) immediately smothered the bombs with a PKP fire extinguisher in an effort to knock down the fuel fire long enough to allow the pilots to escape. According to their training, the fire team normally had almost three minutes to reduce the temperature of the bombs to a safe level, but the chief did not realize the "Comp. B" bombs were already critically close to cooking-off until one split open. The chief, knowing a lethal explosion was imminent, shouted for the fire team to withdraw but the bomb exploded seconds later - only one and a half minutes after the start of the fire.

The detonation destroyed McCain's aircraft (along with its remaining fuel and armament), blew a crater in the armored flight deck, and sprayed the deck and crew with shrapnel and burning jet fuel. It killed the on-deck firefighting contingent, with the exception of three men who survived with critical injuries. The two bomb-laden A-4s in line ahead of McCain's were riddled with shrapnel and engulfed in the flaming jet fuel still spreading over the deck, causing more bombs to detonate and more fuel to spill.

Nine bomb explosions occurred on the flight deck, eight caused by the "Comp. B" bombs and the ninth occurred as a sympathetic detonation between an old bomb and a newer H6 bomb. The explosions tore large holes in the armored flight deck, causing flaming jet fuel to drain into the interior of the ship, including the living quarters directly underneath the flight deck, and the below-decks aircraft hangar.

Sailors and Marines controlled the flight deck fires by 12:15 hours, and continued to clear smoke and to cool hot steel on the 02 and 03 levels until all fires were under control by 13:42 hours. The fire was not declared defeated until 04:00 the next morning, due to additional flare-ups.

Throughout the day the ship’s medical staff worked in dangerous conditions to assist their comrades. HM2 Paul Streetman, one of 38 corpsmen assigned to the carrier, spent over 11 hours on the mangled flight deck tending to his shipmates. The large number of casualties quickly overwhelmed the ship’s Sick Bay staff, and Forrestal was escorted by USS Henry W. Tucker (DD-875) to rendezvous with hospital ship USS Repose (AH-16) at 20:54 hours, allowing the crew to begin transferring the dead and wounded at 22:53 hours.

</snip>

:patriot:

[TheDebbieDee]

1. Didn't "Five-planes" McCain start that fire?

And it was 44 years ago.........

[Dennis Donovan]

2. Shit! Thank you!!

:blush: No idea why I wrote 34 - I knew it was 44...:crazy:

Well, he was in it, but the Zuni missile came from an F-4 Phantom behind McCain's A-4 Skyhawk. That was one of his lost planes... ;-)

[cherokeeprogressive]

16. Take this from a former flight deck sailor.

On the fantail, where this incident occurred, planes are parked FACING each other. There would have been no plane "behind" McCain's A-4.

I know people who were there that day.

[Dennis Donovan]

34. You're absolutely correct:

A drawing of the stern of Forrestal showing the spotting of aircraft at the time. Likely source of the Zuni was F-4 No. 110. White's and McCain's aircraft are in the right hand circle.

[SwampG8r]

18. nm

[cherokeeprogressive]

20. This is so far off of the mark it would be funny if you weren't serious.

Go to youtube and look up the flight deck camera footage of the fire. McCain's plane was parked on the port side of the fantail WITH NO PLANES BEHIND IT. They don't park planes on flight decks so as to endanger other planes when their engines start. They're parked TOW, or Tail Over Water. On the fantail, all aircraft are parked facing each other. The missile that started it all came from the STARBOARD side. Please go look at the footage.

You do a terrible disservice by spouting this false claim. Sailors died in this incident, some of them after doing things no man should ever be expected to do. McCain had no responsibility in it whatsoever, no matter how hard you wish it to be so.

[Obamanaut]

31. No, there was no plane behind the A-4 McCain was in. There are no planes

behind ANY aircraft due to start for a launch OR for a turn-up for maintenance.

[csziggy]

3. No, he was cleared of any wrong doing

Too bad since maybe then he would have stayed out of politics and a lot of damage to our country could have been avoided.

This section of the Wikipedia article explains the causes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_USS_Forrestal_fire#Investigation

[indepat]

8. Who was CINCPAC at the time?

:shrug:

[csziggy]

11. I don't even know what the acronym means

So I have no clue.

[jmowreader]

14. CINCPAC = Commander in Chief, Pacific Fleet

According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commander,_U.S._Pacific_Fleet, Admiral Roy L. Johnson was CINCPAC when this happened.

According to his own Wikipedia page at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy_L._Johnson, he gave orders to return fire in the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, was the plankowner captain of USS Forrestal and fought in World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War.

[csziggy]

15. Ah, OK, Thanks for the explanation. n/t

[SwampG8r]

19. sad day

[Kaleva]

5. The rocket came from an F4 and not from McCain's SkyHawk

[roguevalley]

13. people have said he did a forbidden thing and threw his engine

on while in line or something. What a hero, our John.

[cherokeeprogressive]

17. "people have said"

No one who was there nor anyone who's worked the flight deck would say that.

"threw his engine on while in line or something." That doesn't even make sense in the context of flight deck operations.

I spend plenty of time talking about things I don't know anything about but in this instance, having been a flight deck sailor, I do know what I'm talking about.

Dislike John McCain for other reasons. He was lucky to survive the incident. He did so ONLY by climbing over the front of the canopy and jumping off of the nose of his aircraft.

On this I will defend him every day of the week because bullshit spouted by people who don't know what they're talking about denigrates the death of people responsible for some pretty heroic actions that saved possibly hundreds if not thousands of lives.

Those who died that day were my Brother Sailors and it chaps my hide no end when people who know nothing of what they say use their deaths to try and score points.

[RamboLiberal]

21. +1 on your response

I remember your rebuttals with the truth when those "people have said" wet start crap popped up so often during 2008 election.

Thanks.

[cherokeeprogressive]

24. Can't tell you how much I hate being in the position of wanting to defend McCain

And truthfully it's not him I'm defending; it's the memory of those who died that day. This BS trashes the memory of some pretty heroic Brothers.

Count on me to speak up for them every time this distasteful subject is broached and people who know nothing about the incident spout untruths in order to score points.

Peace.

[krispos42]

25. Why didn't the A-4 pilots eject to safety?

With flaming jet fuel splashing everywhere and ordinance cooking off, that would seem to be the most expedient way to escape.

[cherokeeprogressive]

26. I don't think 0/0 ejection seats were in Naval aircraft at the time.

Ejection from a stationary aircraft without a 0 altitude/0 airspeed ejection seat would have meant certain death. 0/0 ejection seats were only being tested in the mid-60's.

Other than that, with what was happening on the ship, rescuing a couple of pilots in the water might have been unlikely when the entire ship was at risk.

ETA: On the second point, I am merely making a guess.

[krispos42]

27. No Martin-Bakers yet?

Yikes.

And I figured the plane-guard destroyer would have been there to yank them out of the water, if they had the appropriate ejection seats.



Fire at sea... a bad place to be. The downside of being safe from the NVA and VC... no place to run when there's a fire.

[cherokeeprogressive]

28. Here's the seat used in the A-4.

So far as I can tell, though I never worked on A-4's, they never were fitted with Martin-Baker seats. The S-3's I worked on were, and I was under the impression that the Martin-Baker Escapac 1E-1 was one of the first zero/zero seats. I was scared to death of 'em.

You're right about the plane-guard destroyer. I forgot about that. During my time plane-guard duties were assigned to the H-3 Sea Kings we had on board. I can remember plenty of times we conducted flight-ops without a single ship visible on the horizon.

http://www.ejectionsite.com/escapacfr.htm

[krispos42]

29. Hmmm... doesn't give ejection parameters there

Still, the entire ejection process is only fun in the sense that is beats walking through fire.

When was your service, if I may ask? I'm basing the plane-guard destroyer idea on fiction stories such as "Flight of the Intruder", which took place circa 1971. Although as soon as you mentioned it, I recalled reading that the plane-guard function had been being done by a SAR helicopter for quite a while now. Which makes more sense... a helicopter is much more agile, and faster, than a destroyer or frigate.

And a helicopter won't accidentally run over you and turn you into chum, either.

[cherokeeprogressive]

40. I was in from '80-89. AMS1 at the time of my medical discharge. Blew the ACL in my left knee.

It was a blast. Taking a broken airplane, figuring out what was wrong, and fixing it were very satisfying things.

Saw some scary sh!t on the flight deck too, I tell ya. Nothing like those poor souls on the Forrestal though.

[Obamanaut]

44. I was on the John F Kennedy when it collided with the Belknap. There

was not a shortage of volunteers to fight fires.

The Belknap was much worse than the Kennedy. When it ran into the side, it was under the angle deck, a JP line burst and was pouring a stream of fuel down onto the burning Belknap.

Our squadron corpsman heloed over to assist, and he said later it looked like a hole all the way down to the keel.

But as you said, ours (the Kennedy) was nothing like the Forrestal. I think the Belknap might have been close though.

[krispos42]

45. A whole decade? Very nice.

:patriot:

Carrier aviation is inherently dangerous. There is just so damn much that can go wrong!

[Obamanaut]

32. Having served in airwing squadrons aboard several different aircraft

carriers (USS John F Kennedy, USS Midway, USS Eisenhower, USS America, USS Independence), AND having worked on the flight deck of all of these, I can agree with everything in your response.

I do not like John McCain, but it is not based on these bogus rumors and erroneous "information" that keeps popping up.

[cherokeeprogressive]

33. When were you on the America? Me: VS-32 '81-85

Hard to believe she sleeps with the fishes...

[Obamanaut]

37. I'm not real sure. I think it was in 1986, with VA 46. I joined the squadron in Spain after

terminating shore duty, made nearly the full deployment. After that one, the Air WIng went on the Ike, and I made one full Med cruise and then retired in Sep 1988.

I was on shore duty prior that last one, in an HSL squadron at Mayport, and lasted a full 10 months. It was the worst 10 months of my whole 28 year career.

BTW, VA 46 is the squadron McCain was in for the Forrestal fire, when they flew A4's. It's also the squadron I was in from 1974 to '77 when I made chief. I was maintenance chief when I retired, and it was an awesome feeling - being maint chief in the squadron I made chief in 10 or 11 years earlier.

[cherokeeprogressive]

38. Wow that's awesome.

You must have joined VA-46 just after I went to shore duty. My two best friends were in VA-46. They were flying A-7's then. In fact, a VA-46 A-7 blew me off of the #2 elevator into the safety net while taxiing to the starbard cat from the "six pack".

I used to love Cecil Field. When I first got there in '81 there was nothing out there on 103rd but the airfield, a Circle K, and a trailer park, which I lived in LOL.

Congrats on an awesome career 'naut. I was an AMS1 soon to be up for Chief when I got out in 89. A blown out knee made someone in the Nav decide I was no longer fit for service.

Peace, my Friend.

[Obamanaut]

39. People from the bowels of the ship used to stop by our maint control

to ask if they could go on the flight deck.

I'd take them myself usually. Get them helmets, vests, etc. so we could go up on a launch cycle.

My brief was sorta like "Stay within arms length of me. If I duck, you duck. If I run, you run. If I go over the side, you stay behind and tell someone." I thought it was cute.

Except for that miserable HSL episode, I liked my job every single day. We were watching some sort of carrier ops movie one night, and Miz O said "You miss it, don't you." Yes, I do.

One tour I was a flight engineer in WC 121 aircraft flying into typhoons out of Guam. That was exciting.

[cherokeeprogressive]

42. Do you ever hear the sound of the radar when watching footage of flight deck ops?

Zzzzzzzzzzit. Zzzzzzzzzzit. Zzzzzzzzzzit.

I was at LAX not long ago, and the smell of burning JP took me straight back to the flight deck.

[Kaleva]

23. That's been debunked years ago but some keep promoting it.

One finds on the internet that how McCain started the fire was by "wet starting" his A-4 in order to shakeup the pilot in the F-4 behind him and that cooked of the Zuni rocket which struck the plane parked next to McCain's plane.

However, there was no plane behind McCain's parked A-4.

Here is a link to FactCheck which has an illustration showing where McCain's plane (#416) was at the time of the incident and where the F-4 was parked (#110). The A-4 stuck by the Zuni was #405.

http://factcheck.org/2008/09/mccains-plane-crashes/

[Obamanaut]

30. Actually, no. nt

[trof]

4. I have a friend who was there.

A-4 pilot.
It was grim.

[Dennis Donovan]

6. By all accounts, it was as bad as it gets without the ship actually being completely destroyed

[RamboLiberal]

7. Thanks for posting - I remember seeing a very good film doc on this

Also read excellent book - Sailors to the End by Gregory A. Freeman.

I was disappointed quite a few DU'ers tried to trot out the false accusation during 2008 election that McCain started the fire by a juvenile stunt starting his plane. I and a couple others here got tired of refuting it.

From book's author:

Hot topic Question: Did John McCain start the 1967 fire on the USS Forrestal?

No.

The recent presidential race gave new life to some bad information about McCain and the Forrestal fire. As my book Sailors to the End explains in some detail, the fire actually was started by an unusual combination of electrical glitches and human errors by the flight deck crew, which resulted in a Zuni rocket being fired across the deck and into McCain's plane. Theories about a "wet start" and other possible causes were disproven soon after the fire. McCain was never suspected of causing the fire because investigators determined immediately that the rocket misfired from the other side of the flight deck. (The pilot of that plane also was not at fault.)

The real culprit in the 134 deaths on the Forrestal was the Navy's decision to supply the carrier with very old, unstable bombs that exploded on the flight deck once the fire started. Bombs typical for 1967 would have withstood the fire long enough for the crew to put out the blaze, but the old bombs blew up almost immediately and turned what could have been a manageable fire into a disaster.

Some detractors are citing the Forrestal fire as an example of McCain's supposedly reckless behavior or poor performance as a pilot, but the facts do not support this conclusion. Regardless of what kind of pilot McCain was, on this day he was essentially a bystander to the cause of the fire, just like all the other pilots. He didn't cause it and he narrowly escaped death by jumping out of his plane as it was engulfed in fire. Once on the flight deck, McCain was injured when a 1,000-lb. bomb exploded. He then went below decks and assisted the crew with the difficult task of throwing bombs overboard to prevent them from blowing up in the fire. Afterward, he went to the pilots' ready room.

http://www.gregoryafreeman.com/faq.html#1

[csziggy]

12. National Geographics Seconds to Disaster series did an episode

One it. That was a good series - they would show a disaster, break down the elements of what happened, then show a point by point timeline of the various events that resulted in the disaster. Very detailed, very clear, with really good explanations.

I had seen the Forrestal episode prior to the 2008 campaign season. It never mentioned McCain, if I remember correctly. But during the campaign and when the allegations that McCain was at fault, at some point NatGeo re-rain the episode and I watched carefully. Actually, McCain was lucky to get out alive.

Nat Geo runs the Seconds to Disaster series often - usually one day a week they run various disaster shows. For a while it was on Tuesdays. If you get a chance, it is worth watching.

[RamboLiberal]

22. I saw that episode

I think history or discovery had a doc as well.

[hedgehog]

35. +1 Blame McCain for Palin, but not this.

[Permanut]

9. Thanks for posting, Dennis

I was on a Navy ship, a tin can, half way around the world on that day, and I'll tell you we really wanted to know every detail of what happened, and we took fire drills more seriously after that day.

[lpbk2713]

10. The names of the dead ...

http://www.virtualwall.org/units/forrestal.htm


I went through boot camp with one of the young sailors that didn't make it.

[BlueCheese]

36. We're not going to do to John McCain...

... what those Swift Boat slimeballs did to John Kerry, are we?

[Dennis Donovan]

41. The OP doesn't say anything at all that swiftboats McCain

? :shrug:

[cherokeeprogressive]

43. It doesn't. You are correct. However, just the mention of the Forrestal or McCain

brings out those who know nothing about what happened other than what they've read here on DU, posted by others who know nothing about what happened.

The OP was fine. Those young men who died should never be forgotten. I just hate when their deaths are denigrated in order to score points.

[Dennis Donovan]

46. I'm in complete agreement. I see a similar situation regarding another naval incident....

...ANY discussion of the attack on the USS Liberty is forbidden on DU because it's too much for the Likudnik contingent on DU. I know - I have a trail of removed posts about the incident.

[BlueCheese]

47. Sorry.

My post wasn't directed at the OP, but some of the other posts in the thread. Apologies for the misunderstanding.