It was likely, once he was back aboard Rochester, that the medical corpsmen would want to cut the frogman suit off of Crawford in order to quickly start warming him from such heat loss as he may have suffered.  "No way I'll let them do that!" he said.  He wasn't chilled enough to warrant such urgent action.  When we arrived on board he even objected (without success) to the corpsmen's insistence that he ride down to sickbay in their stretcher and covered with blankets.  Hollis was on hand to inform that the ship's doctor was on his way aft, to be delivered to Collett on the way to pick up Laney.

Ernie Crawford arrives back aboard Rochester

The doctor arrived momentarily, escorted by two of my men who helped stuff his quite large body into an anti-exposure suit.  He didn't look comfortable, and also did not look happy.  In fact he was quite otherwise in both regards, very eager to make that fact known to all around, and to blame me for his discomfiture. "Why the hell didn't you bring him here," he shouted, "instead of taking him to the destroyer?"

"Because," I replied, probably then without rancor, "I'm not sure I got him to the destroyer in time, but I know he would have been dead by the time I got him back here."

"Well, they say he's alive..." I heard the doctor say.  There followed a further tirade about better facilities aboard the Rochester, how would I know he'd be dead if I'd brought him to the cruiser, and so on.  But I'd started tuning the doctor out immediately after he'd said the man was alive.  Whatever else he might have to say right then was of no interest.  More important words were coming via the radio.  After a glance to make sure the doctor was strapped in, we lifted off to get on with the mission.

The doctor continued to complain as we flew toward the Collett, paying little or no attention to the crewman's explanation of the procedure for lowering him to the destroyer.  And being put down aboard a destroyer in the Sea of Japan could scare the daylights out of someone who hadn't paid attention to that.  The more usual state of that body of water was a series of swells running in one direction with wind and choppy waves running another.  On better days and certain courses, midst the rhythm of pitches and rolls, a destroyer might run flat and level regularly for a period of about 20 seconds.  On the course Collett would have to hold that day for delivery, her deck would level only momentarily as she rolled from side to side.  In order to put him on deck at that precise moment, we must start our passenger down while the ship was heeled full tilt.

The crewman had tried to explain all that to the doctor, and advise him not to look down while he was being lowered.  But the doc wasn't in a listening mood.  He looked down as the hoist began to lower, and grabbed the bottom of the doorway with both hands.  (That scene was also filmed by the engineman CPO with his small movie camera.)

Jokingly, I told the crewman not to step on this one's fingers since he was a doctor and might need to use them.  Actually, it posed a serious problem.  The crewman had to make sure there was no slack in the cable.  Nor did he dare hoist up for fear the doctor might try to get out of the sling and fall.  Meanwhile, time was being wasted which would be much better spent getting to Laney.  When he was finally pried loose and lowered, we had to hold the poor fellow suspended for a while until we could synchronize again with the ship's roll.

The aircraft covering Laney had set up a beautiful cloverleaf pattern, leaving hardly a moment when there was not some firepower ready for release on the enemy emplacements.  They conserved that firepower until we might be in range of the enemy's weapons, then laid it on heavy during the time it took for pickup and departure.

Laney was visible from some distance out, directly ahead and upwind.  I veered off to the left, in order to make the approach crosswind for speedier pickup.  Laney assumed we didn't see him and set off a smoke flare.  That unfortunately might have served an enemy gunner as an aiming point.  If so, no rounds came close enough to be heard during the pickup and departure.

Again in that pickup the extra hours of practice and talk sessions with the crewman paid off royally.  Tilted leftward in a sideward flare to stop directly above Laney, he remained within my view as the crewman let the sling slide down and virtually lassoed him.  There was no need to pause in hover, the man was properly in the sling.  Just a touch of power until the cable became taut, then full power to take us upward and seaward as the cable was retrieved to bring Laney into the cabin.  We were well out to sea by the time Laney was actually in the helicopter.

Laney asked at once about his wingman, and the crewman who'd gone into the water after him.  Told that Abbott was apparently all right, he mentioned that the two of them were classmates in flight school and had worked closely together ever since.  He sat in silence for a while, then suddenly blurted out:

"Oh dammit!  I forgot my camera!"

"You forgot What? I wondered if I'd heard correctly.

"My camera!" he said.  "I had a camera with me, and I know I got some good shots of you picking him up.  But I left it in the damn plane!  I forgot it!"

His disappointment with himself was great.  He could use a bit of kidding.  "Now that was awfully careless of you," I said.  "Really no excuse for it.  D'you think we ought to go back and pick it up?"

That broke his tension.  He laughed in amusement at himself.  We bantered a bit more about it and decided there was probably no point in going back since one of those "thievin commies" probably had stolen it already.  Now that this rather hectic operation seemed to be winding down, a little levity was good for myself as well.  Besides which I shared his disappointment about the camera.  His pictures of the pickup would have been very nice to have, together with the a copy of the movie film I hoped might be gotten from that chief aboard the Collett.