This also from Jerry (Mullet) Myers re: our 1958 Westpac Typhoon. I was standing lookout with Wop and we had to be tied
in.
I think the most significant event of the trip was typhoon Helen. If I remember right we
had went out to test some of the equipment that they had installed for the patrol. If it worked, we were to proceed
on. It didn't, so we were returning to Yokosuka to get it fixed when we got caught in the typhoon, just south of the southern
part of Honshu, pretty close to the coast. I remember we were snorkeling on the surface with the lookouts and OOD tied down.
Then it got so rough, they were ordered below. The head valve even cycled. We took one roll to starboard that almost
sunk us.We were just hanging there at about a sixty or seventy degree angle, with another huge wave heading for us. Some officer
ordered to put the low pressure blower on the starboard tanks to blow out the water that had gotten in there on the roll.
That probably saved us. It uprighted before the wave got there. I remember the weather report we got from radio
said the seas were described as mountainous, and the position they gave as the center was only nine miles from us. We were
naturally heading into the seas, but our positions showed us going backward. We only had radar and one Navigation light for
navigation. As I said, I remember loosing some deck plates and the anchor. Maybe someone else can add to this or correct me
if they remember it differently, but I never for got that one.
