Midway Island Revisited

[kcghost]

I served in the European Theater during the Viet Nam War so I missed out on getting a free visit to Midway. I gather there was something of a ruckus over the island in 1942.

 

[kanaia]

kanaia, Interesting! An R&R tour to Kure, what a concept. I thought the Navy food was pretty good, boot camp, ship, and Midway Island, but I'm glad the Coast Guard had better food; that was an isolated duty station at best, even with visitors from "big metropolitan" Midway. Good to have a fellow Islander in Forums. It really was a distinct part of the world, what space travel should have been. I'm glad you didn't meet any of those local tiger sharks in your diving. Those things were hugh, like 15 feet and more. A sailor was lost off one of the Sunfish sailboats and he never reappeared. The Island commander went out shark hunting and harpooned a huge one, but no sailor inside.

Remember those little 13' Boston Whalers we use to rent to go out diving? One day I was standing up front looking for coral heads so we wouldn't hurt the propeller. As we approached a coral head I told the driver to turn right a little so we would avoid it and when we passed it we noticed it was moving. Circling back we got even with the shark I put my mask on to see what kind it was and sure as shit it ws one of those tigers. It was at least 2-3 feet bigger than the boat. As you know there are many sharks there but as far as I know nobody has ever been eaten. I think they are too well fed due to the baby goonies out in the water learning how to fly. We spear gunned 3-4 foot sharks for the barbecue while there.