Sea stories

If the Winona could talk, she could go on and on about stories at sea.

Nearly 30 years of U.S. Coast Guard service would make that possible.

But, to get the short version of those experiences, we’ll let crew members have the floor as they will when they gather for a Winona all-crew reunion Sept. 19-21 at the Best Western Plus Coeur d’Alene Inn.

Let’s bring Ken Amundson of Coeur d’Alene, who served on the ship from 1959 to 1961 and is the reunion ringleader with wife Darlene, out of one corner for the opening bell.

Amundson had a knack for getting involved with the Sunday boxing smokers on the ship. One of Amundson’s foes came out wearing a sheet for a cape and acting like Superman.

“The catwalks were full of men watching and cheering,” Amundson said. “I got to laughing so hard I had trouble boxing and almost got my butt kicked. I did win.”

The Winona was launched in 1945 and scrapped in 1974. It served a variety of missions, including patrolling fisheries, ocean stations, the Bering Sea and the Gold Cup hydroplane races in Seattle; search and rescue; research; communications; and during the Vietnam War. About 150 served aboard the ship at a time.

Tom Waits, of Vancouver, Wash., served on the Winona from 1964 to 1968, including during the Vietnam War.

The Winona was the first high-endurance Coast Guard cutter since World War II to singly engage and destroy an enemy vessel.

Waits vividly remembers that action offshore from the CuBoDe River, a waterway south of Saigon.

“We challenged a 125-foot trawler that was so loaded with arms that water was over the midship,” Waits said. “We were trying to get the North Vietnamese away from our Marines. We pulled up pretty close to them in the middle of the night and flipped on our lights. They didn’t even know that we were there.

“We battled with them for about 10 minutes until we got a direct hit and it exploded in flames like an A-bomb that had a cone shape.”

Waits said about 25 were on the enemy vessel. There were no deaths on the Winona during the battle, but a few were injured.

“We had a lot of holes and dents from the trawler’s fire,” he said.

Waits also recalls chasing Japanese and Russians out of U.S. fishing waters off the coast of Alaska.

“One Japanese ship cut its nets when we went after them,” he said. “When we pulled in their nets, we filled five 55-gallon trash containers with crab. That’s all we ate for a few days.”

Terry Jones of Coeur d’Alene, who served on the ship from 1969 to 1971 and is assisting the Amundsons with the reunion, recalls enduring “some pretty humiliating stuff” during the Imperial Order of the Golden Dragon initiation for crossing the international date line.

“You had to kiss a guy’s belly that had grease and mustard and you had to crawl through shaft alley,” Jones said. “Everybody would howl but you. It’s an entertaining day to say the least. It breaks the monotony, but it’s worse than a fraternity initiation.”

Enormous waves often rocked the Winona’s world.

Albert West, who served on the ship in 1947, was assigned to mess cook duty in heavy seas during evening chow. Tomatoes and hot dog mixture were the main course.

“Suddenly the ship changed course and rolled to starboard and every tray of food went airborne and plastered the bulkhead with tomatoes and hot dogs,” he said. “I was in my whites and would try to stand up but was slipping and sliding through those tomatoes and wieners and soon my whites were red.”

Amundson recalls getting caught in a storm off the Oregon Coast that cracked the hull, busted the cables holding the main mast and smashed a boat on the side of the ship.

“Man, it got scary,” Amundson said.

One of Waits’ fondest memories of serving on the Winona was returning to its base in Port Angles, Wash., after the Vietnam War.

The reception was contrary to many returns from the war, he said.

“Fire boats and private yachts came out to meet us,” Waits said. “The dock was completely filled and I got to see my 8-month-old boy for the first time.”