Up from the Mud

The ponderous, delicate job of righting the U.S.S. Lafayette began cautiously last week. In his operations office aboard the wreck, Merritt-Chapman & Scott's tough, salvage-wise John I. Tooker signaled his pump men. Too slowly for a waiting eye to see, the big dead ship moved in her muddy grave. Only the high-water mark etched on her nearly vertical deck revealed the inching gain.

It was hard for "Cap"' Tooker. who had superintended the long preparations and who now shared with the Navy's Captain B. E. Manseau the responsibility of the raising, to decide which was worse: the dirty work of getting ready, or the strain of the final stage. A diver himself, he knew the obstacles overcome, the risks yet faced. But for Tooker, and for the hundreds of men who had worked on, in, and under the prostrate ship, her first, slight lift of life was a triumph of patience and courage.

Working by touch in the dark waters of the slip, so filthy that light could not penetrate, divers had cleared the wreckage of the fire (Feb. 9, 1942), plugged and patched hundreds of openings. The superstructure had been trimmed clean to the promenade deck. Since the ship lay on her side, stagings had to be built for the divers and the workmen above water. Bulkheads of timber and concrete were set in place to divide the ship into compartments, permitting the use of controlled pumping. The plan was to roll the vessel upright, resting on the port bilge keel. By pumping and flooding, movement could be controlled and slowed to prevent a sudden lurch when the ship broke free.

Gradually, water and air jets cracked the suction. The ship lifted.

Even when floated free, she cannot be righted quickly. Held at an angle of about 45 degrees, she is to be pulled into the middle of the slip by beach gear--great cables and winches whose function is not to lift but to harness side movement. Finally pumped dry, the Lafayette will still heel over until tons of bulkheading and refuse are removed.

This week the ship was free of the mud. The danger interval was past. But newsreel crews, photographers and reporters watching from their gallery along the elevated highway would play through many a stud game before the job was finished. The Navy would have to wait longer still before the reborn Lafayette made people forget the burned Normandie.

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