There had been a number of well dones from time to time for our flight deck crew. During the operational readiness operations, the crew on barrier number one prevented two barrier crashes; recently they prevented another two crashes, and last night they prevented two more. One of the pilots who was saved from a barrier crash last night, smiling Jerry Canaan, went down and bought a box of cigars for the boys on the barrier number one, and sent them up with this note: "Here is a box of 'Butts' for the boys who saved mine."

The night was barely over. The Bogey hovering around our Task Force had taken a powder, and the probable Sub which for awhile paralleled our course was evaluated as a Whale. Our aerologist arose at his usual early hour, and hastily gulped his coffee to stimulate his forecast. Our early morning hecklers indeed found the weather just as forecast except someone forgot to mention a cloud bank, and where do you the cloud bank was? Right in front of the carrier and our pilots were launched right into the center of it.

Bad enough being launched as this unholy hour of the morning, and to hit a bridge at that, and now an engine is conking out on me, thought LTJG Rountree. As the story goes, enroute to the target area, Rountree's engine began to act up, the engine on the plane that is, so he and his Junior Partner, "Cheerful" Jerry Canaan, turned back toward the Task Force. Roundtree's oil pressure gradually became lower and he steadily lost altitude. After jettisoning his bombs, the oil pressure became still lower so he said "It looks as thought this is as far as I go, Jerry" and then descended slowly toward the sea making an excellent water landing. Remembering his training in the Dilbert Dunker, he got his life raft out and sat in it, broke out the line and tackle and fished for an hour and a half until rescued by the Tingey DD-539, LT Rouintree had a delightful day pitching around on the destroyer and remained on it until they brought him home. The Tingey was given the customary ten gallons of ice cream, and then vanished off into the distance. Welcome back Sir Roundtree, Sir.

Today a man discovered that he had missed a word someplace. The crew of the ship may recall an incident that occurred several months ago. That was the day some of our pilots, whose names have not yet been publicly released, were drawn into a flak trap while on a bridge strike over North Korea. Well today, one of more brilliant Al's, who briefed and debriefed the pilots. This particular Al always receives the word sooner or later, but this situation poses the question, how late can one be?

The story we received is as follows:

Two of our newest pilots, whose names are now classified, were on a heckler mission in the vicinity of         . The night was dark and the two planes became dangerously separated. One roared over his phone system, "Where are you?" "I'm five or six miles south of          headed for the river", responded the other. There was a "roger" and a voice continued. "Let me know when you get over the river". "OK", came the reply. Then twice more the anxious voice cried, "Let me know when you reach the river". When the two planes met over the river, and made their replies, all Hades broke loose and every kind of flak conceivable broke around the planes. Then one Lieutenant remembered that the other had picked up a slight accent someplace. To make a long story short, the pilots left the area on the double. We presume that some Chinaman will have a real war story to tell back there in his laundry business. To impress this experience in the minds of other pilots, a poem has been written. It follows:

Flying his trusty Skyraider, LCDR Waldman was following another plane which was in the process of dumping a couple of 500 pounders and a 2000 pound delayed action bomb on a target. Seemingly the explosion of the two smaller bombs set off the big boy with the result that there was a tremendous upheaval of this and that. Trying to level off after pulling out of his dive, Waldman discovered that his elevators were jammed And that even the application of both feet to the stick had no effect. He was about to bail out, but gave it one more try and by rolling the plane, managed to stop boring into the wild blue yonder and to assume a more a more sedate angle in relation to the horizon. At a slower speed he found that he had some control. CDR Funk heard of his plight and came over to give him a hand. Cautiously letting down his wheels and then his flaps, Waldman headed for King 18 where he made a successful landing. Investigation revealed that the elevator was jammed against the baffle plate, and that damage had been done by flying rocks, which were still in the elevator mechanism. Judicious application Of a sledge hammer freed the elevator and CDR Funk and LCDR Waldman came on home. Now rocks have officially entered the war as a hazard to our planes. This is unusual, but what makes it all so strange is Mr. Waldman swears he was at 3000 feet when it happened. Perhaps our little friends the Gremlins are returning to hamper our air strength.

One of the most exciting and heroic activities undertaken by UN forces is the designated "Night Heckler" missions. These planes leave the decks of the Bon Homme Richard late in the evening to raid the Chinese and Korean supply movements. Flying at night presents many hazards, and our story tonight is about a hero of one of these missions. While participating in a routine reconnaissance attack, one of the crewmen in the radar compartment was very suddenly jostled from his dreamy thoughts of home when he felt a sharp twang in his back. Crewman Rash AL1, of VC-35, in an AD piloted by LTJG Probyn, turned to his fellow crewman Heacox and said "I believe I've been shot". Calmly, coolly and courageously, a quick inspection was made. No one was excited; these men were veterans of the deadly dangers of war. The results showed that a 60 caliber steel bullet had entered the underside of the plane, penetrated the crewman's seat and expended itself in the back pack type parachute that crewman Rash was wearing. The sharp twang felt in his back was caused by the bullet coming to rest against a bottle of dysentery tablets he was carrying. We are happy to report there were no bodily injuries. The parachute had to be surveyed, the plane patched up from the flying flack, the seat replaced and the dysentery tablets put into a new bottle, but Rash is back up in the blue skies tonight, thinking shakily, "It's all in a days work". Of course all damage cannot be repaired, and four dysentery tablets are still missing.