THE REST OF THE STORY By Ted Smedberg I was in VS-33 at the time and we had been on the Hornet all day, and half of the night, qualifying our young “nuggets.” We made a final trap around2230 in order to refuel for the flight back to North Island. We shut down on the deck and went to the ready room to get plane assignments. I was given an aircraft and three young Ensigns to fly back. Enroute to the flight deck, one of the Ensigns asked if he could be in the left seat for the fly-in. I said “Sure,” but during the pre-flight changed my mind because I had been in the right seat all day. We manned the A/C, had an uneventful start and engine checks, and waited for 5 planes to be launched before us. Finally we got on the port catapult, the shorter one!!, at about 2345 and were the last plane to launch. As stated, the night was pitch black, as only nights off Southern California under a 5,000 foot fog bank can be. We tensioned out on the CAT, the only sense of any motion what-so-ever was white-caps speeding by on my left out of the corner of my eye. Full power, lights on and wait for the kick in the pants. Well, instead of the expected G-force we got a big jolt which shook the plane rather dramatically. I knew something unusual had happened but had not a clue as to WHAT!! My initial response was to stop (throttle and brakes) but could see the white-caps whizzing bye so had no idea of my speed over the deck. [Remember, it was SO black that we couldn’t SEE the deck.] The fear, however, of dribbling off the bow, going inverted and having the ship run over us took over so I “cobbed” the engines, over-boosting both!! I got the gear up immediately and tried to keep the wings level so as to be in a good ditching attitude. I noticed that the airspeed needle was at 53 knots, so KNEW that we were not going to fly!! While this was going on I keyed the mike and said “MAYDAY, MAYDAY, MAYDAY, ditching off the port CAT”! wanting to alert the plane guard destroyer that he was about to get some business. I also said “Blow your hatches aft” so that the two Ensigns in the back could get out quickly once we were in the water. We dropped so fast off the bow that the crash alarm was sounded from the Bridge. The Catapult Officer said later that he ran forward and saw the propellers stirring up the phosphorescent water surface!! According to the ship’s CIC Officer we were one and a quarter miles ahead of the ship before we had enough airspeed to start climbing! The “cushion” of air between the wings and fuselage, and the water was the only thing that kept us airborne. [That and the guardian Angel my mother aoways said resided on my shoulder!] It was determined later by the Grumman and Wright Reps at North Island that the A/C could not/would not fly under the conditions (25 knots of wind over the deck, 186 foot deck run and fully fueled) at the time. Exactly what happened on the deck that night will, of course, never be known. The two possibilities were: 1) I had let-up on the brakes a fraction of a second before the A/C was tensioned out, allowing the bridle to fall enough so that it came to rest directly on the tip of the hook, instead of being seated properly or 2) The bridle man, who had been on duty on the flight deck for 10 hours, had been inattentive and not seated the bridle properly on the hook. I rather think it was the young bridle man’s fault because two days later CO Hornet sent a message to CO VS-33 inviting Lieutenant Smedberg to fly to Hornet the next day for several lands and several “confidence building” catapult shots. My skipper let me accept the offer and upon trapping on the Hornet the next afternoon, I was told to shut down and report to the Bridge because the Captain wanted to see me. He told me he was happy that things turned out the way they did and that no one had been hurt. He asked why I had not reduced power and applied the brakes immediately because the CAT Officer had told him that I had moved only several feet after the initial impact. I explained my actions and he seemed to understand. When I mentioned my “MAYDAY” calls he seemed surprised, picked up a phone and asked the CIC Officer to play, on the Bridge speakers, the tape of the last few launches of that fateful night. We got to the last launch, heard the tower give Abilene 14 (my call sign) a vector after launch for North Island and then a totally garbled transmission in shich there was not a single distinguishable word!! The adrenaline rush that I was experiencing at the time caused me to speak so fast that no one understood a word I said. In the final analysis, it was determined that the failure of the two young Ensigns in the rear seats to hear my “Blow your hatches” order saved our lives. The Grumman Reps said that the hatches leaving the plane would have caused enough added drag to put the A/C in the water. [The guardian Angel at work again!” Ted Smedberg (5/15/2005)