CLAANNNGGGGG!

28. Make your family turn out all the lights and go to bed at 2200, saying, “Now taps, taps! Lights out! Maintain silence throughout the ship!” Then immediately have an 18-wheeler crash into your house (for the benefit of aircraft carrier sailors).

Most living quarters for the enlisted on the carrier were several decks down from the hanger deck, but on the Constellation, on which I did one six-month detachment, they were a lot higher up, they were on the O3 Deck. The O-3 deck is usually just offices and squadron ready rooms as it is one deck below the flight deck, but for some reason there was a small berthing area on this level about midships slightly towards the aft. Because our squadron was not a full time member of the Air Wing and were just assigned to the ship when it came to the Western Pacific we were low men on the totem pole and relegated to having sleep in this compartment.

The metal deck of an aircraft carrier is probably about an inch thick and it formed the ceiling of berthing area. Try to imagine if you will, the sound of a 20 ton jet slamming down on a metal roof about 12″ above your bed. As close as possible civilian simulation would be to take a metal trash can and hold it over your head and shoulders and have a friend hit the outside of it with a baseball bat. But that’s not all, after the initial boom there is the sound of the jets engine at full throttle, followed by the tail hook being dragged behind the plane. In this hook (hopefully) is the 4″ diameter arresting cable bouncing along the deck in sync with loud whir of the powerful engines used to slow the cable and the plane down. Repeat every 2-1/2 minutes 20 to 25 times. And, if they are flying extended night ops, 90 minutes later, right about the time you are in a deep sleep, the cycle happens again.

This made for quite a few restless nights at first, but the human animal is fairly adaptable, so after about a week or two you no longer heard those 18-wheelers crashing into your house.