On board HMCS Nootka in the late summer of 1952, I was on the middle watch in the Operations Room as an ABRP3 attending to the Sperry radar set. We were in our patrol lane off the Onjin Peninsula (Korea) somewhat west of the island of Haeju in the Yellow Sea and fairly close inshore.

About 0200 hours I picked up a bogey on the radar and reported it immediately. "Action Stations" was sounded and the Operations Room crew closed up. As this was taking place I reported that the bogey had split in two and one part disappeared from the screen. McIlvoy MacDonald, the Senior R.P. rating at the time wasn't sure what happened and cautioned me to keep a close watch. Shortly thereafter Capt. Steele entered the Operations Room just as the bogey split once more and disappeared. I reported the same directly to the Captain and McIlvoy.

Cmdre. Steele asked me what I thought was happening, it came to mind that the disappearing bogeys had to be mines. At first he seemed perplexed by this, then I mentioned that our ship was about 1000 yards from where the first object disappeared. He gave orders to alter course 20 degrees to Port. Had he not done so, we would have sailed right over where the first object disappeared. I was then relieved of my position which was taken over by the killick of my watch, Scotty Morrison.

From there on, the Captain became convinced it was an enemy vessel and took the necessary action to capture it. After starshell and a few rounds of 4 inch to convince the crew to abandon their effort, all of them left the junk in inner tubes. Our seaboat was launched with an armed crew to pick them up. Six were pulled out of the water, one resisted and was shot, and another floated to a barren rock reef. He was picked up in the morning in a state of hypothermia. The abandoned junk was brought alongside in the morning and searched for documents, while we were careful about booby traps. It was then cast adrift and used for target practice by the different crews, then sunk.
The next day an American Minesweeper, with magnetic sweeping gear, blew up 3 mines to once more make our patrol zone safe. I watched one of the explosions - it was huge. If we had run over one of the mines, I'm certain the ship would have been sunk with lives lost.

I understand from Navy sources that our action is written up in the U.S. Official Navy History of the Korean War. H.M.C.S. Nootka was the only United Nations ship to capture and sink a bona fide North Korean Naval Vessel.