Images And Information From Fred Bock

Images	Comments
	View From The West Facing East
	View From The West Facing East. TT-4 Aug 60
	A View from the East facing West, "C" leg is closest to the camera. Notice The Above Water X-Bracing
	A View from the East facing West, "C" leg is closest to the camera. Notice The Above Water X-Bracing
	TT-4 Sep 11, 61 beginning of hurricane Donna
	A pin connection on the legs (K bracing system) whereby the contractors took the K brace loose and then took underwater pictures of the 600 lb steel pin that the K brace was mounted to. It shows over a 1 inch wear on that very stout pin.
	This is a picture of the TT-4 crane and it is in position for Chopper operations, right up against the equipment deck next to the bubbles with the boom parallel to that thus giving choppers more room for landing.  You can also tell chopper operations are eminent since the mesh metal railing on the flight deck is in the down position to give choppers an extra 3.5 foot clearance as they came in low to try and hit the deck right on target.  The boom on the crane had the doughnut attached and ready in case the chopper ditched and they had to recover personnel from the water.  It was always a highly coordinated operation when we had either chopper operation or boat operation.  The boat would tie up to C leg with the rear of the boat pointing north and they would keep the prop turning to gently pull back away from c leg.  Over time due to the strong tide down the coast from north to south, it would begin to wrap the AKL-17 around the other side of C leg towards A leg, then they would brake the mooring and the AKL-17 would come around and again approach C leg from the north and start the whole process over again.  Most times if they were unloading fuel or had a lot of cargo, this process would repeat three four times usually during the night.  This had to do with tide tables and all that, it always seemed boat operations were at night, rarely was it done during the day.  There is a misconception about the legs, I often hear that the diameter was 12.5 feet, this is incorrect from what I remember.  Due to the fact that the legs were so long and had to be floated out to site, weight was a consideration.  Steel was 15/16 inch high grade steel.  After the tower was in place, they brought in sleeves that were around 60 some feet long and these were 12.5 ft in diameter.  These were lowered from above down into the existence legs and put inside.  They were lowered so they were even with the top of the existing legs and then secured.  They extended down not quite to the level of the water line.  They welded them in place and closed off the bottom area and then they put steel rods between the inner and outer legs and poured concrete in between the two layers of steel, thus it drastically stiffened the legs and aided in compensating for the fact that such thin plate steel was used in construction due to weight considerations.  What I cannot explain is why they did not run the sleeve all the way down to the ocean floor and stiffen the entire leg, no one has ever given me a satisfactory answer to that perplexing question.  I guess it might have to do with affecting storage area for fuel in the legs to the point where they worried about total capacity, but I really don't know.  It is significant to note that the two legs that snapped off, snapped off right below where the sleeve ended, about ten feet below the water line.  I do not suggest that if they had been stiffened to the ocean floor it would have saved the tower, but I would reason that it might have given those guys a chance to get off the tower in the lull of the storm due at 3:00 a.m. Monday morning.  A further note, In the weeks just prior to the tower collapse, quite a few tons of the black sand was delivered that was to be utilized in sand blasting metal surfaces on the tower to prep for red leading again and painting, that was an ongoing thing on the tower all the time.  This significant amount of bags of this special black sand was stored on deck.  On that fatal Sunday, one of the delays in trying to start possible chopper rescue prior to winds getting too high for such a operation was that they simply had to jettison the bags of sand in order to make room for chopper operations.  This was the task that MSgt Troy Williams and his guys would have been doing.  Also, after Hurricane Donna it was determined we were going minimum manning which was the 28 guys.  By the way, it is a myth that we averaged 71 guys on the tower - truth was that due to ongoing repairs and all that stuff the average personnel on board averaged much closer to 118 and 120.  After Hurricane Donna we never brought up high power tropo scatter again.  This would have entailed keeping two more men on board and it was reasoned we did not need 100 to 200 data channels to shore since we were not active on the radar at all and were sending no data to NYADS at McQuire AFB, NJ.  We operated strictly on exciter power, which did not entail firing up the 7ft high Klystron tubes that put out 50,000 watts of RF.  The exciter equipment only put out somewhere between 100 and 200 watts and therefore we had drastically reduced number of phone lines to shore.  That is one reason Capt Phelan had requested we limit our phone time and he wanted to pass that data every evening to his wife on shore.  To my knowledge high power Tropo was never operational after Sept 11, 1960.  I could be wrong but I don't think so.  Also, in ops the Audubon Society had one scope with a camera mounted on it.  They furnished 1000 ft flanges of 35mm film and pictures were constantly taken of search radar scans in the spring and fall in order to follow the migratory flights of birds up and down the east coast.  They allowed us several flanges of film for personal use and we loaded out own cartridges for our 35 mm cameras - black and white of course.  Also, we had a detail especially in the spring and fall - they would shut the radar down in the morning and guys would go out on the catwalks around the three radar bubbles and sweep all the dead birds off into the water.  They would get too close to the radar and get sick and sit down and get cooked.  There was one hawk that hung around and fed on these birds,  Whatever that bird was, he was not affected by the RF in the radar sweep nor in the rf from the tropo, he would often sit right on the feedhorn of the tropo dish and eat his catch.  I never did know what species that partly type of bird was.  Life was always somewhat of a challenge out there.
	Doughnut - is used to transport five people at a time from the tower to the Akl-17 or vice versa.  It is a scary ride, usually done at night and being out in the middle of no where in the dark and wildly swinging to and fro is really an experience the first time you are subjected to it.
	TT-3, winter, the doughnut sitting on the flight deck
	TT-3 Boat operations AKL-17 supply ship and above is whale boat for emergency evacuation in case of fire
	TT-3 Boat operations AKL-17 supply ship and above is whale boat for emergency evacuation in case of fire
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	My friend Gordy, prior to onset of chopper operations and a trip to shore, July 60
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	TT-4 - shot taken from back of dining hall towards the serving line - it depicts a typical evening of organized chaos at mealtime and then the prep to show the evening movie, once dishes were cleared.
	TT-4 Dining Hall, picture of MSgt Cullen, a guy from the hills of West Virginia, served in the Marine corps for ten years and then transferred to the Air Force.  He was the oldest man on the tower to my knowledge, 55 years of age.  We lovingly referred to him as "the Old Man" and sometimes on occasion he was referred to as "The Ancient One".  He was unique I worked for him and he was capable of winding any coil you might need to very exact specs, he also could make capacitors to order and they were very accurate of  ratings and size.  He also made his own crystals and used pumice to slowly grind away material and get the exact frequency he needed, then he would encase the crystal in the correct case.  He was remarkable and yet somewhat of a dinosaur.  We all loved the old man
	TT-4 Dining Hall - if you look at the far wall, right up at the top you'll see the movie screen that is rolled up, that is where the movies were shown.  In the far distance on the right is where the BX out window was, you could get beer, soda or some snacks and I still have a 30 jewel Elgin self winding watch I bought at the BX there, paid for it $15.00 at a time.
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	TSgt DeFong And Fred Bock
	This is port at New Bedford, Ma, home of the AKL-17 - the town was at one time a world center for production of leather shoes and since has steadily deteriated.
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	Not Moby Dick But "There She Blows"
	This is from Dec 61 and I had a letter from Squadron Commander allowing me to travel to Oklahoma City.  My wife and I were married just two weeks prior to my assignment to Texas Towers.  She had been in Boston but went back to Oklahoma City before Christmas due to failing health of her Grandmother who had raised her.  So, I managed to go with another guy who was driving across country, he was heading for Texas and we took turns driving a ancient Citreon (french car).  My wife was less than pleased with me and accused me of having an affair while on the tower.  I told her right, there is a good looking girl behind every tree and every bush on board.  It was not taken kindly.  So, it was a rough Christmas.  We went to visit the Radar center on the South side of Tinker AFB to see how they had converted to SAGE from the old manual setup.  I checked in at the gate and showed my ID card and my copy of my ten day passes.  After about ten minutes, they arrested me and detained me.  They said, ya sure, you got a ten day pass, can't you come up with a better story for AWOL than that?  They finally got a hold of Major Sheppard and I was released with an apology.  No one had ever heard of that infamous ten day pass.  My mission was not successful and my wife left Oklahoma City for San Francisco to meet with her boyfriend, who had worked in the post office in Boston, MA.  I went back to Otis and got ready to leave for Minnesota
	This was the set of orders assigning a bunch of us officially to Tower Duty - many of us were already on the tower, it was a formality and necessary because by law Texas Tower duty was officially classified as overseas duty and that is literal "Over".  A ruling was later given by the Comptroller General that rescinded overseas payment to people serving on the towers, he said in his ruling that Tower duty did not qualify for overseas duty since they were located on "continental Shelf" which meant they were still part of continental USA.  Pay section was directed to start collecting back from people that had collected overseas pay which for the average airman was 20 some bucks a month and we all resented his ruling, reasoning that we were in the literal sense Overseas.  When the tower went down, MSgt Troy Williams who was one of the two corpses recovered some 30 miles south of the tower the following day.  He had a wife and 8 children and his wife was expecting a 9th.  When she received his pay and allowances from USAF and then his Life insurance, Air Force Dutifully took out what he owed back from overseas pay.  This was latched onto by his congressman and he raised a stink about the whole thing.  Congress passed a forgiveness bill saying no one assigned tower duty would be required to pay back overseas pay and it passed unanimously, a rare event.  Since tower duty was considered an overseas movement by USAF, we were all told that missing a shipment on manifest by chopper or boat was not AWOL but would be charged as desertion.  We all thought, make up your mind, is it overseas or in continental US, they seemed to change their minds depending on the subject.
	This is a copy of the infamous Texas Tower ten day pass that we were authorized when on shore for the 14 day break (the other four days were reserved for med appt, processing in pay and other appointments).  It did not count against accumulation of leave time (30 days a year) and was unique to the whole Air Force.  No one else in the world had a program like this.  Terms were rather specific in the Squadron SOP, you had to be available on 24 notice to return and could not go more than 500 miles from Otis without specific authority from the Squadron Commander in writing.
	This was my PCS order upon completing tower duty and sent to 739th Radar Sq, Wadena, Mn.
Other Writings	Text-01, Text-02