The ship had been abandoned and nothing working. Man there was one hell of a lot of noise as things were banging around and the crunch/grinding of the metal bottom being torn away on the reef. We started to actually walk down into raw gas. I told Shorty there was no way we could start an engine in these gas fumes without blowing all to hell. It was one of those really eerie situations where it was so dark we were actually going by feel as we went down the stair well and all the banging noise. Shorty and I had to go back to the ship and wait until daylight and we could see.
We did. As daylight came we were sent back over. This time when walking down the stair well we could see a bit better but still dim. We waded down into the gas and I timed the ships roll so the banging "junk" drifted away from the hatch and opened it to look in the tank hold and could just see a jeep tied to the back of the hold and 50 gallon gas drums flying all around loose and leaking gasoline, and the jeep was getting beat all to hell by the gas drums. I quickly closed the hatch and told Shorty we needed to get the hell out of there. The Ship had a hole in the bottom that the jeep could have been driven through. The reef was all that was holding her up. We went back to the Ship, reported to the Chief. With Whale boats and a series of lines, we got a cable on the LST, jerked it off the reef and made a run with it for the beach to shallow water and let her sink there..
Memory Posted By: Don B
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