Iwo Jima (LHD 7) - Naval Cruise Book

Page 41 text:

Running with the winds and seas, there is very little rocking and rolling. With the exception of one extremely ominous rain squall, the skies have been cloudy but clear, the visual horizon seemingly unlimited but absent of any surface traffic. We saw only one or two brave merchantmen today, one heading away from the storm towards the Straits of Florida and one intrepid merchantman heading to the vicinity of the Entrance to the tvlississippi, some enterprising mariner perhaps, hoping to be the first up the river after it is reopened. While Rita remains a dangerous storm, there is cause for some hope here. The weakening of the system from an intensive Category 5 down to a Category 3 storm is a good sign. It is hoped the system decays rapidly after it goes ashore and doesn ' t linger dumping many inches of rain in the already hit areas. We received word this evening from our shipmates at the Oklahoma National Guard still in New Orleans, Contrary to a news report that they had evacuated the city, they are all still at their posts. There have been two breaches in the Industrial Canal levee and the 17th Street levee, bringing flood waters into recently flooded, but evacuated, areas The Army Corps of Engineers had worked so desperately hard to repair the previous breaches, strengthen the levee walls, and dram all the neighborhoods and parishes of the residual flood waters is disheartening to see their work reversed. But I believe the worst has passed for New Orieans (and not a repeat of Katrina) and in approximately 3 hours, Rita will make landfall in Texas and Western Louisiana, And we ' ll see what missions await us.

Page 40 text:

Heavy Weather Thursday, 22 September- The eye of Hurricane Rita passed us early this morning at a distance of about 300 miles. The storm system is so massive that it fills the entirety of the Gulf of Mexico. We maintained a southeasterly course throughout last night and today in an effort to pull away from the heavy seas and high winds of the storm system. However, with the eastward movement of the high over the southern United States, Rita has curved to northwest, as we had expected. The end result was that we were never really pulling away from the eye, which moved at about 9 miles per hour, and so remained afflicted with heavy weather throughout the day. We did a modest amount of rocking and rolling last night (mild by comparison to my days on good ship MCCLOY in the North Atlantic). You feel a lot more swaying on the 0-6 level where the At-Sea Cabin is located compared to most of the berthing compartments on the main deck - six stories below - or the main spaces - ten stories below. We have had the ship ' s bow dead into the seas and swells for the past 24 hours which allows the ship to ride reasonably well. At 40,500-tons with saltwater compensated fuel tanks, the ship provides a stable ride if handled correctly in the winds and seas. The winds stepped up from about 20 knots yesterday evening to about 40 knots sustained at 2000 this evening. At one point today, we observed 16 to 20 foot seas with the occasional spray flying over the bow and winds gusting up to 60 knots. The weather decks remain secured to all hands for the obvious safety reasons. I had a chance to venture down to the focsle this afternoon and stuck my head out the bullnose (an open chock at the very front of the bow about 50 feet above the wateriine) to observe IWO JIMA ' s bow cutting through the heavy seas. I could cleariy see the ship ' s bulbous bow rise completely out of the sea and then pound back in with an explosion of spray and foam, sending a mild shudder throughout the ship. An awesome and impressive sight. Hurricane Rita remains problematic. Given the storm ' s size, it is impossible or impractical for us to steam around her and come up on the southern side of the system, a transit of several hundred miles. That would take days. The southern half of the storm, her left side, is considered the less dangerous half (or semi-circle quadrant). The right side is considered the more dangerous quadrant, packing the highest winds. Given the storm ' s latest track, the eye is expected to hit landfall near the Texas Louisiana border, bringing the less dangerous left hand side of the storm onto northeast Texas and the more dangerous right hand side onto western Louisiana and the southern part of the Mississippi delta. Last report indicated that New Orieans should see 35 knot winds and upwards of 3 to 5 inches of rainfall, which has everyone the most concerned. We suspect the greatest need for our assistance will be back in New Orieans and the surrounding area, but we have planned for just about every possible contingency. It was reported today that Rita achieved the distinction of the 3rd most intensive and powerful system in Atlantic history before weakening slightly to a strong Category 4 hurricane. It is hoped that the cooler waters of the northern part of the Gulf of Mexico will further weaken Rita, but the storm remains powerful nonetheless. Our intention is to maintain our safe course dead into the winds and seas, heading southeast, and then when the sea state lessens, reverse course and head to the northwest towards the Mississippi delta and the anchorages off Gulfport and Biloxi, running with the seas and winds at a fast bell. We do not know nor are we able to predict with any degree of accuracy when that will be. Our hope is to be in a position eariy Saturday morning to render assistance soon after the storm makes landfall, but all that depends on Rita. When you think about it, in heavy seas, the most important person on the ship is not the Captain, but the 19 year-old seaman apprentice who stands the watch as helmsmen. With one incorrect twist of the rudder and the ship can pitch or roll, sometimes violently, sending people tumbling throughout. We have been watching the rudder angle indicator very closely for the past 24 hours. It was a quiet day on the ship. About a hundred Sailors and Marines, out of the 2,131 onboard, made the pilgrimage to Sick Bay in the hope of finding some wonder drug to ease the sea sickness. I saw quite a few gray and tired looking faces throughout the day I consider myself blessed not to have ever gotten sea sick (Truthfully!) in over 26 years. I recommend saltines In Trail of Rita Friday, 23 September- After about 36 hours of heavy seas, IWO JIMA reversed course at about 0800 this morning and headed to the west northwest in trail of Hurricane Rita. As the storm curved to the northwest yesterday, it was actually drawing nearer to the ship. We got as close as 258 miles before we started to open up. By eariy this morning we had pulled away sufficiently and elected to safely turn the ship in behind the storm. The seas are confused in the wake of the hurricane. The constantly shifting but powerful winds from this cyclonic system churned the seas up in many directions with long rolling swells coming from one direction and strong wind-swept waves coming from another. After conducting a rendezvous with sister ships SHREVEPORT and TORTUGA, and the replenishment ship PATUXENT we transferred 30 to 40 pallets of supplies among the ships by vertical replenishment using IWO JIMA ' s embarked H-60 aircraft. At about noontime, we pulled away from the group, put the swells and winds off our port quarter, and headed through the seas at 20 knots to the vicinity of the Mississippi delta. With the storm still tracking at about 9 knots, we were able to gain a hundred miles every 8 to 9 hours on Rita. Al Carver, as usual, asked the salient question, When you think about it, chasing a hurricane is like a dog chasing a car. What do you do when you catch it? A good portion of the day was spent doing contingency planning : devising branch plans and courses of action for any number of missions or contingencies that might come our way. The many staffs from Carrier Strike Group TEN, Amphibious Squadron FOUR, Naval Beach Group TWO, and Marine Forces RITA and the ship worked through numerous courses of action. In the meantime, Air Department was able to bring aircraft up from the Hangar, spot them on the flight deck, and conduct 6 hours of flight operations to move cargo and personnel, but also to prepare for potential search and rescue missions eariy tomorrow morning. We hope to be approximately 50 miles south of the Entrance to the Mississippi at first light, ready to for flight quarters, if the weather permits and the mission require it. We won ' t know until the morning. It is ; surprisingly quiet this evening, following in the wake of Hurricane Rita

Page 42 text:

be worthy of our heritage iday, 25 September- Our participation here in the Gulf of Mexico is winding down fast, I expect we jet word to head home sometime in the not-too-distant future. From the decl plates, there is a feeling ■ we ' re done. Once officially detached, it will take about a week to get back to Norfolk, after we refuel, ick up the LCAC, drop off the helicopters and the Marines, conduct our engineering Inspection, maybe refuel again, then pull into homeport. We could not have predicted the ending to all this; it was certainly not what any of us expected. We expected a clean ending in New Orleans, but Rita changed that and dragged it out. And our contributions to relief efforts over the past three to four days in the wake of latest hurricane were not as extensive as during Hurricane Katrina, which is a good thing, but our pilots and aircrewmen proved their worth and made a number of rescues and evacuations over the past two days. The surveys of the areas show damage and flooding, but there is great activity on the ground and things are recovering quickly. The capabilities of our naval force appear to be no longer needed. But, when you prepare for the worst, you always bring a full tool box even though most of the tools will never be used. It has been an extraordinary month. It seems like it was a year ago, not a month ago, that we hastily departed Norfolk and raced down to the Gulf Coast. I don ' t think anyone could have predicted the events that took place, the missions we ended up divining for ourselves, the people we would meet, having the President visit the ship three times and inspire the crew along with over 50 admirals and generals (we lost count) and an equal number of Senators, Congressmen, local dignitaries, and senior officials, and the remarkable things that would be accomplished. There is a great deal of satisfaction by the crew that in the end we made a difference and when you sift through all the anxiety of gearing up for missions, the frustration of constantly changing requirements, herding cats, and the tedium of routinely being in waiting station, there remains the satisfaction of a job well done. Regretfully (or perhaps thankfully), this will be my final Update. These updates started out as nightly rituals to send an email narrative to my wife, family, and a few close friends - an opportunity for me to collect my thoughts at the end of a long and sometimes frustrating day - and report on the events I had seen and the extraordinary accomplishments of all onboard this ship and around us. Despite all the tragedy I witnessed, there were always pockets of hope stubbornly persevering in a sea of despair On one hand 1 saw the extraordinary generosity of the American people and witnessed the abundance of aid and relief, the dedication of First Responders who stayed in the field while Katrina raged helping to save others and restore hope while politicians and the media from a thousand miles away condemned them for being too slow or not responsive enough, and thousands of volunteers that just put their personal lives on hold and stepped up to the plate to bring relief and comfort to those in despair And on the other hand, I was disappointed to see partisan politics in the midst of a national crisis of Biblical proportions. As with any human endeavor, there will be blame thrown about and shameful grandstanding. But in the end, it was clear to me that the Country showed her true self, that ordinary people stepped up to the plate and helped out, that the right things were done by our government and local authonties, and our President would find the right man in the person of Vice Admiral Thad Allen, United States Coast Guard, at the right time to command recovery efforts in the wake of Katrina. I never imagined that my nightly Updates would have reached such a wide audience, but after a few early responses from strangers across the worid or shipmates in high places I became aware of that fact. Over the past two weeks I have been inundated with emails of praise and kindness for what the Sailors and Marines of USS IWG JIMA were doing in New Orieans and in the wake of Hurncane Rita. To all of you, 1 am grateful for your confidence in us and thank you for your kind words. One in particular struck my heart and soul. It was from a former Marine who quoted the famous ancient Greek mathematician and philosopher Archimedes. This Marine wrote: Archimedes said that if he had (a lever and) a place upon which to stand he could move the earth. ..Looks like the folks down in New Orleans have found a place to stand. Semper Fi IWO JIMA. In March of this year, we held a ceremony on the ship back in Norfolk to commemorate the 60th Anniversary of the Battle of Iwo Jima. We had some 50 survivors from the Battle in attendance, some on oxygen machines and in wheel chairs but damned if they would miss the event. The Commandant ' s own Drum and Bugle Corps and Silent Drill team performed for several hundred guests, but the highlight of the evening was the presentation of American flags flown from the ship ' s mast on 23 February - the 60th anniversary of the raising of the national ensign atop Mount Suribachi so immortalized in the famous Joe Rosenthal photograph - by this generation of service men and women to the Greatest Generation as well as the unveiling of a memorial wall with the names of the some 6,000 Marines, Sailors and other service members who made the ultimate sacrifice on that small volcanic island. At the time I wrote, We, the Sailors and Marines of this IWO JIMA are forever mindful of the heritage that has been entrusted to us by the ship ' s name. It is both a burden - one we willingly shoulder - to forever uphold the traditions set by those who sacrificed so much, and a source of great inspiration, all for the same reason. We hope that when it is our time to answer the Nation ' s call, as these young men did over 60 years ago, we will do so, inspired by their actions, and hope to acquit ourselves honorably so as to be worthy of that heritage. It is my fervent hope that we are worthy of that heritage. May God continue to bless America.