HMCS ATHABASKAN STORIES


GUIDED MISSILE HITS TRIBAL
by Petty Officer Bob Starkes

Another incident about ATHABASKAN speaks of the first guided missile (Chase Me Charlie) hitting her from about 10,000 feet and not exploding until it went through the deck and out the ship's side. As it went out the other side, the fins sheered a signalman's both feet at the ankles. He stayed conscious long enough to apply tourniquets on himself. His name was Chuck Kent and he was from Calgary.

When we got home on leave in 1944, we found him in Col. Belcher Hospital getting used to his new feet. Of course, he was taken out in the town many times and the more he drank, the more his stumps would swell so the evening always ended with two of us making a chair with our arms for Chuck while he carried his feet. It must have been a macabre sight but not to us. The tears only flowed when he was seeing us off at the train station. Later, he married a beautiful girl and stopped drinking entirely. Chuck is now gone and he was a real swell guy.

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