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was on board with Doc Gage, having relieved Rizzo in Las Palmas just before she was hurriedly refloated. Survivor of the Lavino Shipping Company massive goat roping expedition in the Atlantic, without propulsion. Helped get emergency diesel generator which was not cannibalized, operational with IC tech Overby? Worked with Vince Blunn, Scotty Peterson, and RM Mc Kinney, and Rob Muse. I do remember Patrice, Rob's girlfriend, and radioman April Ziems. Spent many long hours repairing fried UYK-20(V)'s on that thing, and working with Vince Blunn on the SINS. Repaired many blown sonar power amplifiers, and aligned many disc packs while there. Fixed Marisat and one of the '2' radars (Raytheon) that the ship had. Manually painting varnish on the homemade contactor solenoid for that diesel generator was fun, me on one side of the room spooling the dried wire onto the coil form, and Overby blopping on varnish onto the spooling off the main roll of wire end of it. The ensuing fires when the 120 vdc bus got energized, were particularly horrifying, as all we had was bucket brigade seawater to throw on the fires in the aft portion of the ship. Being adrift in the Atlantic, trying to keep a sense of humor, was a bit tough. Sure glad I brought my STS AV-7600 aircraft radio with, it turned out to be the ONLY operational radio on the vessel after the ship lost power. Sulfated batteries in the ship's main radio room meant we were screwed, blued and tatooed after the Lavino crew let the boiler feedwater drop below the safety level that day we lost the load. I'll never ever forgive Rizzo for not closing that junction box up the night I arrived in Las Palmas and found them flooding the drydock in a hurry to get us underway. Bad bad idea to assume the hull would not be breached, as it indeed was, taking the SASS down to beam intensities of 2's and 3's at best, due to those cables in the junction box being huge wicks of greasy oil from that void down there in the engineroom. Very bad deal Rizzo dealt us by not sealing that up before leaving. Oh well, he's been long dead, and I guess many of the others who were there now may also be.
Unfortunately for the U.S. Navy, this ship was in such terrible condition due to ungodly zimbabwe technology rigging, it was a miracle it didn't dissolve in the sea from total utter neglect under the M.S.C. crew who turned it over to Lavino.
Anyone find the two tennis balls in my stateroom after I departed? the attached note beneath those taped to the bulkhead balls was something like this;
'whomever takes my place here must have balls AT LEAST this size..or you just won't make it on this pile of ridden hard and put away wet steel.."
Doc Gage's soul no doubt still walks the decks of T-AGS-21, mumbling about that goddamned Cimino..
Last time I laid eyes on Bowditch, it was just before Christmas after we were towed into Rio harbor (before she was rammed by the Italian freighter and 'sunk' there). I remember April Z. was on the motor whaleboat or launch, going in.
There's nothing like having armed guards escorting the gang of us civilians who were leaving, to our departure flight to Miami on Pan Am. State Dept. had to pay Brazil about 8k bucks a piece for each of us so we could leave...I do remember that...as none of us had visa's to be there. Nor did we for the time we spent in Abidjan, Cote D' Ivoire, just before the ship went D.I.W. due to the Lavino crew incompetence. :(
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