The Red Planet

During the Korean War our ship crisscrossed the Pacific continually between San Francisco and Korea. Four of us took turns in rotation standing four hour Officer of the Deck watches on the bridge. The Captain was usually on the bridge only on entering or leaving port and during general quarters; however, he did like to come up on the bridge around sundown, check with the O.D. that everything was going OK and then stroll out on one wing of the bridge to enjoy the evening air before going back down to his cabin. The O.D. was expected to instantly answer any questions he might ask.

One evening it was my turn to take the 2000 to 2400 watch. I got up there 15 minutes early, as was customary, to relieve the O.D. The sun had gone down earlier and the bridge was dark, with the only light being the glow from the compasses and the radar. The O.D. said “If you could see my face right now, it is very red”. I said, “Oh, what’s the matter?” In a strained voice he replied, “The Captain was here earlier after sundown. He went out on the starboard wing of the bridge and almost immediately said, ‘What is that red light on the horizon?’.” (Here, let me interject that a red light on the horizon way out at sea would most likely be the port running light of a boat or a ship and under the International Rules of the Road that vessel would have the right of way and you would need to change course or slow down if necessary to avoid a collision.) The O.D. continued, “I was shocked! I had been watching the radar. There had been no blips on the screen. I had been scanning the horizon with my binoculars and had seen nothing. This caught me completely off guard. I thought fast. So I said to the Captain, “Sir, I have been tracking it on the radar and it should pass us three miles abeam”. (Here again, the radar would generally pick up any oncoming ship before it could be spotted visually.)

As he said this, I thought to myself, “Are you nuts to lie to the Captain!”. He continued, “But as we watched it, instead of it getting closer it started getting higher and higher above the horizon!” I said, “So what was it, a plane?.” “No”, he groaned, “It was Mars.”

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 11th, 2009 at 2:34 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.