RICHARD G. “NICK” NICKELSON
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Richard G. "Nick" Nickelson
1963 |
Nick Nickelson (left) w/ R.D. Russell
1998 |
A TIME OF REFLECTION
Story by Richard G. “Nick” Nickelson
© 2003 Richard G. Nickelson
At the time it seemed like nothing more than an average couple of days spent as
a member of UDT-12.
The couple of days I refer to happened during an operation that would qualify
UDT-12 as combat ready, for a two-year period, and is highly important in the
eyes of top Navy brass. The Marines conduct beach landings after UDT has
performed reconnaissance of all landing beaches, the inland area surrounding
those beaches, and cleared any obstacles that may have been placed to prevent
the Marines from coming ashore.
Along with members of the six swim teams I boarded the submarine, U.S.S. Perch,
and headed for a pre-determined drop location four miles off shore from the
designated beaches we were to reconnoiter. The Perch was one of the few
remaining World War II diesel submarines still in commission and was primarily
used by
The principal purpose of the lockout chamber is to provide a mechanism for the
submarines crew to escape to the surface in case of an emergency
underwater. The chamber is cylindrical in shape with three hatches, one
on top, one on the side, one on the bottom, and can easily accommodate two
swimmers at one time. The swimmers enter the chamber thru the bottom hatch,
close and flood the chamber, turn the flood valve off when the water level
reaches the top of the side hatch, then open the side hatch and swim up a line
(rope) tied to the periscope. A second line is attached to the periscope
with twelve spaced knots, one for each swimmer. As each swimmer reaches the
surface he then takes his place in line, holding onto one of the knots, while
waiting for the remainder of the swimmers to complete their lockout
procedure. During this lockout period, the submarine is traveling at roughly
one to two knots, or just above stall speed. This enables the six swim
teams to remain together until the submarines skipper dips the periscope three
times, the predetermined signal for the swimmers to drop off. With that
completed it is then time to make preparations for the four mile swim to shore.
The night was particularly cold and dark. It was indeed perfect weather
for this type of an operation. A storm had brought both wind and rain and
that would mean that anyone patrolling the beaches would be cold and not as
attentive to their duties as they otherwise might be. Each swimmer wore a
wetsuit top and wetsuit bottoms cutoff just above the knee to prevent
chafing. A k-bar knife, mask, UDT fins, life vest, and plastic slate, (to
write down pertinent data found during the reconnaissance), comprised the basic
gear. There would be no food but that wouldn t present a problem because
if all went well we would be back aboard the Perch the following night at
twenty hundred hours or
It would be important to orient ourselves, prior to starting the swim to shore,
because we were to rendezvous with the submarine at roughly the same location
the following evening. The trick to getting the proper bearings is to
line-up two permanent and recognizable lights on shore, place one behind the
other, and keep them properly aligned during the entire swim to the beach. By
doing this you would then have a reference the following evening when swimming
back to the submarine. This is extremely important if you want to be picked up
by the submarine. Missing your pick-up location would mean another swim back to
the beach and possibly jeopardizing the entire operation. A four mile
swim takes approximately two hours, so leaving the beach at eighteen hundred hours,
six p.m., would put us back at the submarine right on time. The swim to the
beach did in fact take two hours so it was agreed that we would rendezvous at
the same location, as we had landed, and depart at eighteen hundred hours the
following evening.
At that point my swim buddy and I headed to a spot just off the open beach and
changed into our camouflage shirt and pants. They were wet and did little to
keep out the cold. The wind howled and blew the rain so hard it felt like
pin pricks to the exposed skin. It remained like this for the next six hours.
Now everyone has experienced being cold and can tell you a story about their
coldest moment. But, to someone in the Teams, cold is when your testicles
retract back into your stomach. In the Teams and during training you
experience this condition often enough that you learn to live with it. It
is just part of the job. The hours crept by slowly as Charlie and I lay there
in the mud, shivering and doing what little we could to fend off the cold.
I should tell you about Charlie before we go much further. His real name
is Hal Tune but we gave him the nick name Charlie Tuna, yes, because he could
swim like a fish. I liked to operate with Charlie because he always gave
one hundred percent and never complained no matter how difficult the
situation. I was a runner and Charlie a swimmer so we complemented each
other and made a good team. One thing I should make clear is that every man in
the Teams shared one common trait, each was an operator, otherwise he wouldn t
be in the Teams. This was a special fraternity of brothers and between these
men, bonds were forged that can never be broken.
By dawn the skies had started to clear and I must admit, the prospects of
a warm sun gave us both something to look forward to and a reason to be
happy. Our night had been spent, huddled in a washed out ravine, several
hundred yards off of the beach, so it was important for us to move further from
the beach and into the hinterland where shrubs and overgrowth could provide
some coverage.
On the beach and the surrounding area were marines, acting as the opposing
enemy forces, whose job it was to repel this operation and find us at all
cost. We moved slowly thru the brush and then thru a drainage ditch under
a freeway that ran parallel to the beach we were to reconnoiter. It wasn
t until ten hundred hours, or ten a.m., that the warmth of the sun wore thru
the cold of the previous night making it possible for us to confront the job
that we had been inserted to do. By mid afternoon we had performed a
reconnaissance of our assigned area and settled in until it was time to return
to the staging area and the swim back to the submarine.
During the latter part of the afternoon we had a run-in with a marine
patrol but were able to elude them. We then moved out to the area where
we had buried our swim gear earlier that morning. I should say where
Charlie had buried his swim gear while I had camouflaged mine near a
tree. The spot we had chosen to hide our gear was the same spot that the
Marines later chose, as a dumpsite, to dispose of empty sea-ration cans and all
their trash. It turned out that this decision led to the Marines finding
my swim gear but not Charlie’s. For me that was bad news. In the Teams there
is a saying, In UDT you must learn from the mistakes of others because you won
t live long enough to make them all yourself . This was a big mistake and
for me it would mean that a very important decision was looming on the horizon.
We made our way back to the staging area and by eighteen hundred hours all
six-swim teams had reported in. Their missions successfully completed, all were
now geared-up and ready to start the two-hour swim back to the submarine. But
now a decision had to be made, due to the fact I had no swim gear. I
could either make the two-hour swim, without the protection of a wetsuit, or
surrender to the opposing forces. Now, for those of you who have braved the
Pacific Ocean, in mid November, I think you might agree that the wise decision
would have been to turn myself in. I would have then spent the next three to
four days as a prisoner but after all, this wasn t a real wartime situation.
The worst thing that I would have to face was the disgrace of putting myself
into this situation to begin with. Without giving it much thought, I chose
option one and the swim. This would later turn out to be a near fatal decision,
though I didn t know it at the time. To make the swim more bearable for me,
Charlie, who I mentioned was a strong swimmer gave me his swim fins and wet
suit bottoms. Jim Foley, from one of the other swim teams and also a strong
swimmer, gave me his life vest and a thicker, reversible t-shirt, known in the
Teams as a blue and gold . With that we started our two-hour swim to the
waiting arms of the U.S.S. Perch.
The night was cold and the weather had started to turn bad once again as a
light rain began to fall. The initial impact of the cold water, as I
slipped under a wave, caused me to bite my tongue. It s always a shock to the
system when your upper torso and cold water first make contact. With the
initial shock behind me I joined the other swimmers and we swam out about five
or six hundred yards. At this point we reoriented ourselves by lining-up
the two permanent lights we had used to guide us the night before. With that
accomplished, we reestablished and set our bearings then started what would
turn out to be the most difficult part of the mission.
The first hour of the swim was uncomfortable but bearable. The previous
nights swim, cold night spent in the mud and rain, then gathering
reconnaissance data during the day had exacted a toll on all twelve men
although none complained. After all, if everything went according to plan we
would be back on board the U.S.S. Perch in about an hour. The second hour was
more difficult for me. The cold water was starting to take its toll, but I knew
that soon this operation would be concluded so I ignored the pain. In the Teams
you learn to live with pain and I know some who live by the axiom if it doesn t
hurt, you aren t trying hard enough. By twenty hundred hours we had made
it to what we felt was our predetermined rendezvous point. The two lights
on the beach were still in alignment and we had been swimming for two hours.
Now it was a simple matter of waiting for the submarine to locate us.
President Kennedy had a wooden plaque on his desk with the inscription, Oh God,
thy sea is so great and my boat is so small. I was soon to realize just
how small and insignificant twelve men are, floating in the Pacific Ocean, in
the dark of night, looking for and hoping to find a boat. Two hours turned into
three and by now hypothermia had started taking control. I no longer felt the
cold and started slipping in and out of consciousness. I would have visions of
things past and things yet to come but during all of this I cannot remember
feeling fear. I could function at some level but I remember Charlie, or
one of the other Team members, pulling the toggle to inflate my life jacket so
I wouldn t slip under.
By twenty-two hundred hours, or ten p.m., we had been in the water four hours
and were concerned that we would soon have to make the decision to swim back to
the beach. Each swimmer carried a flare, one end for night and the other
end for day, so we started setting off flares, each at five-minute intervals.
After the night flares had been exhausted and the submarine had yet to find us,
we started setting off the smoke, or day end of the flare and shining a
flashlight on the smoke. We hopped this would alert the submarine to our
location although this seemed like a real long shot. I remember being
told that it had been decided that we would return to the beach when I heard
loud shouting and saw the submarine slowly approaching, it was twenty-three
hundred hours.
The submarine had surfaced to pick us up and I remember being pulled onto the
deck but nothing after that. Two hours later when I regained consciousness I
found myself in the engine room, the warmest place on the boat, snuggling up to
one of the diesel engines. The other swim teams and Charlie had reported all
details garnered from the reconnaissance, which was then forwarded to Command
Operations. Our mission now complete we remained aboard the submarine and
returned to our homeport, Coronado, California.
In a debriefing, our Commanding Officer, Captain Robinson, gave rave reviews to
the six swim teams for both the pertinent reconnaissance data gathered and for
an unwavering commitment to duty. There wasn t a man who hadn t been pushed to
his limit by this operation, but there wasn t a man to ever complain of that
night or what might have happened if the swim back to the beach would have been
required. Five hours in the frigid waters of the Pacific Ocean, on a stormy
November night, seems like a noble feat and one worthy of praise. But I
feel that way now because I am nearly sixty years old and realize that this is
a situation not many have faced, or at least faced and lived to tell
about. As for the time that it happened, well like thousands of
unrecorded accomplishments that could and should be attributed to members of
the Underwater Demolition/