Tulare (AKA 112) - Naval Cruise Book

Page 46 text:

5 L, The AMPHIBS A cruise is by no means all play, and we hadn't been in I apan more than a few days before we got underway for operation BEACON HILL, involving more than one hundred ships and many thousands of men. We loaded combat cargo at Okinawa and trained our boat crews at White Beach in preparation for the biggest amphibious landing in the Pacific since World War II. BEACON HILL, a rugged training exercise, was conducted at Dingalan Bay, on the island of Luzon in the Philippines. TULARE carried elements of the 3rd Marine Division, and we baked 'em a cake. We worked hard again during operation RED CROSS, at Chigasaki, lapan, where we tested procedures to be used in evacuat- ing casualties from a beach. Our hatch crews, boat crews, and helicopter deck per- sonnel broke all records during this one. Near the end of our cruise we went to Pusan, Korea, to plan operation OSDEX in which TULARE was the senior participating unit. When we made the landing in August at Ulsan-Man with our strange cargo of -1 dia., gg. -. S vehicles, lime, ink and soap, we were test- ing the feasibility of off-loading cargo across a beach-assuming that normal port facilities were not available. The hands on deck worked with safety . . . and set better and better records at the hatches. The wings of our bridge sported the Assault Boat Insigne: we knew we were good. Amphibious exercises mean a lot of things: steaming sometimes for many days to an operating area, anchoring before dawn, and off-loading the boats tPage 437. Then there's the work at the hatches, booms lifting cargo out of the holds, swinging it across the decks and into the boats along- side: troops scrambling down- debarkation nets: casualties coming aboard at the litter hoists, and boats circling alert to calls for more and more cargo tpage 443. During every operation there comes a break, time for a rest, during which the boats can be tied up alongside, repair gangs can re- place bent screws and work on the en- gines, and weary men may settle down to some hot chow Cpage 455. An amphibious operation means manning the guns at gen- eral quarters, communicating with other ships, and standing taut engine room and C.I.C. watches tpages 46 and 47l. But there is more to the operating sched- ule of a ship assigned to WESTPAC than the work at the beachheads. The ship fuels at sea, conducts transfer of personnel and

Page 45 text:

? f 11 ' H I CV f 7 W QQ , f KW gf f R99 X f f f if f ' W ,MW W' V ad? ,..k M-W I lf, an f M

Page 47 text:

freight by highline, fires gunnery exercises flike the one that got the E l, holds engi- neering drills and full power runs, and trains her communicators and Combat Information Center by steaming in for- mation and operating with aircraft and submarines. The sailor is busy at sea, learning his ship and training to fight. We may have been a little green when We left San Diego. We were rough and tough by the time we got back. Q -,