the ship, its nose tilts up, and the machine is flung toward the sky. A jet that fails to reach sufficient speed crashes into the ocean.
The blast from takeoff can knock crewmen to the ground; anyone not working on the plane tucks his hands under his armpits to protect them from the heat. As the last jet takes offâplanes can launch, day or night, every thirty seconds from four different catapultsâcrewmen turn around and find the first aircraft of an incoming mission. In seconds, it hits the deck and accelerates, trying to hook one of four "arrest wires" stretched across the ground. (Accelerating, though seemingly counterintuitive, gives the plane speed to take off again if it misses the cables.) Once hooked, the wire pulls taut and stops the jet; if it breaks, it snaps across the deck and can cut through a crewman like a weed-eater. And if the plane fails to stop after it engages the wire, without enough speed to become airborne, it will slam into a barricade or tumble helplessly into the ocean.
The
Independence
suffered two violent accidents on its Pacific cruise. On July 20 a Vigilante jet, returning from a reconnaissance flight, broke its arrest wire, could not stop, and dribbled off the carrier ninety feet into the sea. Two aviators were killed. Later, a tank on a Phantom ruptured on takeoff, spraying the flight deck with four thousand pounds of fuelâwhich was then ignited by the plane's afterburner. Roaring flames devoured the next plane in line and spread into a compartment belowdeck. Sixteen men suffered burns or injuries; no one was killed. The Phantom flew safely to shore.
If the flight deck represented organized tumult, then frenetic clatter buffeted the rest of the ship. Helicopters whirled above while squealing elevators lifted jets from their hangar bays to the deck. Carts drove bombs and missiles through the ship. Rock music blared in the cafeteria and bunkrooms, where men slept in three-decker cots, the gray nozzle of an air conditioner humming from above. Doors clanked. Pipes groaned. Chains crashed. Twenty feet beneath the water line lay a metallic jungle of valves and gauges that jeered and squeaked. Then there was the steamâthe hissing vapor that whipped the planes down the catapults, cleaned the clothes and dishes, and powered the engines at 30 knots across the sea. At night, taps was broadcast throughout the ship.
It was Navy Ensign Porter Alexander Halyburton's first cruise, and not one he had envisioned. He had thought his first trip might be to the Mediterranean, whose exotic portsâNaples, Barcelona, Beirut, Malta, Genoaâwould have been romantic rendezvous for him and his wife, Marty (a nickname for Martha). But Halyburton volunteered for the
Independence.
He had been a Navy officer for only fifteen months and decided he should do as he'd been trained: fly in the back seat of a fighter jet as an RIO, a radar intercept officer, responsible for navigating flights and identifying targets.
Halyburton was no warmonger. Known as Haly, he was interested in literature, poetry, and prayer as befit a gentleman warrior, giving him what one friend called "a rich inner life." Another friend thought it was easier to envision him covering a war as a journalist than fighting in one as an airman. In fact, Halyburton had no intention of making the Navy his career. Years earlier he had rejected a coveted appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy because he could not abide its rigid way of life. Instead, he attended Davidson College in Davidson, North Carolina, his hometown, and in 1963 graduated with a degree in English.
He considered becoming a journalist or, enjoying the camaraderie of academic life, perhaps working as a college fund-raiser. He thought he needed to go to graduate school, but uncertain about his career and pressed for money, he could not justify the cost of an advanced degree. The military was not so much an option as an inevitability. He assumed he would be drafted, for
The blast from takeoff can knock crewmen to the ground; anyone not working on the plane tucks his hands under his armpits to protect them from the heat. As the last jet takes offâplanes can launch, day or night, every thirty seconds from four different catapultsâcrewmen turn around and find the first aircraft of an incoming mission. In seconds, it hits the deck and accelerates, trying to hook one of four "arrest wires" stretched across the ground. (Accelerating, though seemingly counterintuitive, gives the plane speed to take off again if it misses the cables.) Once hooked, the wire pulls taut and stops the jet; if it breaks, it snaps across the deck and can cut through a crewman like a weed-eater. And if the plane fails to stop after it engages the wire, without enough speed to become airborne, it will slam into a barricade or tumble helplessly into the ocean.
The
Independence
suffered two violent accidents on its Pacific cruise. On July 20 a Vigilante jet, returning from a reconnaissance flight, broke its arrest wire, could not stop, and dribbled off the carrier ninety feet into the sea. Two aviators were killed. Later, a tank on a Phantom ruptured on takeoff, spraying the flight deck with four thousand pounds of fuelâwhich was then ignited by the plane's afterburner. Roaring flames devoured the next plane in line and spread into a compartment belowdeck. Sixteen men suffered burns or injuries; no one was killed. The Phantom flew safely to shore.
If the flight deck represented organized tumult, then frenetic clatter buffeted the rest of the ship. Helicopters whirled above while squealing elevators lifted jets from their hangar bays to the deck. Carts drove bombs and missiles through the ship. Rock music blared in the cafeteria and bunkrooms, where men slept in three-decker cots, the gray nozzle of an air conditioner humming from above. Doors clanked. Pipes groaned. Chains crashed. Twenty feet beneath the water line lay a metallic jungle of valves and gauges that jeered and squeaked. Then there was the steamâthe hissing vapor that whipped the planes down the catapults, cleaned the clothes and dishes, and powered the engines at 30 knots across the sea. At night, taps was broadcast throughout the ship.
It was Navy Ensign Porter Alexander Halyburton's first cruise, and not one he had envisioned. He had thought his first trip might be to the Mediterranean, whose exotic portsâNaples, Barcelona, Beirut, Malta, Genoaâwould have been romantic rendezvous for him and his wife, Marty (a nickname for Martha). But Halyburton volunteered for the
Independence.
He had been a Navy officer for only fifteen months and decided he should do as he'd been trained: fly in the back seat of a fighter jet as an RIO, a radar intercept officer, responsible for navigating flights and identifying targets.
Halyburton was no warmonger. Known as Haly, he was interested in literature, poetry, and prayer as befit a gentleman warrior, giving him what one friend called "a rich inner life." Another friend thought it was easier to envision him covering a war as a journalist than fighting in one as an airman. In fact, Halyburton had no intention of making the Navy his career. Years earlier he had rejected a coveted appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy because he could not abide its rigid way of life. Instead, he attended Davidson College in Davidson, North Carolina, his hometown, and in 1963 graduated with a degree in English.
He considered becoming a journalist or, enjoying the camaraderie of academic life, perhaps working as a college fund-raiser. He thought he needed to go to graduate school, but uncertain about his career and pressed for money, he could not justify the cost of an advanced degree. The military was not so much an option as an inevitability. He assumed he would be drafted, for
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