General Quarters, General Quarters, This is NOT a Drill!

GENERAL QUARTERS, GENERAL QUARTERS!!  All hands man your battle stations!  This is NOT a drill!!!

I have only heard that phrase one time in my Navy career.  Every other time, the announcement went, “This is a drill, this is a drill.  General Quarters, General Quarters.  All hands man your battle stations…”.  This was the real deal and weapons were going to be released.

The USS Forrestal deployed to the Mediterranean Sea in 1981.  Sailors who never served on her called the Forrestal the USS Zippo, or the USS Forest Fire.  This is because of the tragedy that happened in the Gulf of Tonkin during the Vietnam War in 1967. That incident resulted in 134 killed, 161 wounded, and 21 aircraft destroyed.  Those of us who served on her know her by another name, “The Mighty FID”.  The
Forrestal was the first supercarrier in the Navy, and I made 4 of my 6 deployments onboard her.  She was the best ship I ever served on, and I have fond memories of my time onboard.

The Line of DEATH

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Towards the end of our deployment we were in the eastern Med off the coast of Lebanon.  We were due to be relieved by the USS Nimitz, who just entered into the western Med.  We steamed west, they steamed east and we met somewhere in the middle.  Before departing the Med and going home, we had one final mission to complete.  We were going to cross THE LINE OF DEATH,…again.  Libya’s Muammar Ghaddafi was doing some sabre rattling and declared the entire Gulf of Sidra to be Libyan territory even though international law only recognizes a 12 mile limit off shore.  During our deployment we had purposely crossed this LINE OF DEATH many times just to show Ghaddafi that he didn’t own the gulf like he thought he did.

This time we were going to really try to piss him off by sending TWO battle groups, about 20 ships, across the line.  Not only that, we told him we were going to do it.  A few days before we crossed, the skipper came on the ships 1MC (kind like the ships intercom) and said, “Gents, this is the Captain.  For the next week we will not be having any drills.  Any announcements will be the real deal.”

The Real Deal

Sure enough two days later at about 0700 (7 am) we heard the announcement of General Quarters.  I gotta tell ya, the guys fell into two general categories; those who were excited, and those who were terrified.  I was excited, but apprehensive.  I just put on my flight deck gear and went to the Flight Deck, since that was my Battle Station and I wanted to see any action if possible.  A surprising number of young sailors were of the opinion of “I didn’t sign up for THIS! I don’t want to die!”  It did get a little tense when the announcement came over the 1MC during GQ saying.
“Missiles inbound”. 

About an hour later the skipper came on the 1MC and told us what had happened and why we went to GQ.  The Libyans sent some aircraft out to intercept the battle groups and fired missiles at some of the aircraft.  They missed. We didn’t.  Two Libyan planes were shot down.  We stayed in the area for a few more days
then started our trip home.  Here is a more extensive report on the incident: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Sidra_incident_(1981)