'Perfect Storm' ship Tamaroa set to be sunk Wednesday
Sometime Wednesday morning, if the waves remain calm, the former U.S. Coast Guard cutter Tamaroa will make its final voyage to a point on the ocean off Cape May, where it will be sunk.
And then the storied vessel, which played a central part in two dramatic rescues in what became known as “The Perfect Storm,” will begin its final mission as an artificial fish reef on the ocean floor.
“It will still continue to serve a useful purpose,” said Larry Brudnicki, a Rutherford native and 30-year career Coast Guard officer who served as captain of the Tamaroa while it was based in New Castle, New Hampshire, from 1991 to 1993.
“Of course, it will no longer be rescuing people; it will no longer encounter drug operations or anything like that,” Brudnicki added. “But what are the other options? Cut it up as scrap? Turn it into razor blades?”
TIMELINE:The history of 'The Perfect Storm' ship Tamaroa
Brudnicki was captain of the Tamaroa when it undertook the mission the vessel is best known for: its role in the Oct. 30, 1991, rescue of seven people in 40-foot waves in what author Sebastian Junger chronicled in his 1997 book “The Perfect Storm.”
The book later became the basis for the movie with George Clooney.
The movie told three stories: the deaths of the six men on the fishing boat Andrea Gail, the assistance to three people on a small sailing ship and the rescue of four members of a downed Air National Guard helicopter. A fifth airman, Sgt. Rick Smith, died.
The 74-year-old ship had a storied history long before "The Perfect Storm," having served in World War II towing damaged vessels across the war-torn Pacific.
Today, the Tamaroa is very fragile. The hull is rusted after springing a leak in 2012 that flooded a substantial portion of the ship while it was docked in Norfolk, Virginia. The damage was so extensive that it ended efforts by a group of veterans to turn the ship into a museum.
The sinking of the ship has been delayed for months. A plan to sink it late last year was halted until environmental regulators were assured that all contaminants, such as cancer-causing PCBs, had been removed. It was delayed again because of rough seas over the past month.
"In order to make the final voyage from Norfolk to the reef site a safe one, the ocean has to be as calm as possible," said Larry Hajna, a spokesman for the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection.
A tugboat began hauling the Tamaroa from a Norfolk shipyard Monday afternoon, and it was slowly making its way up the Eastern Seaboard on Tuesday morning, according to a website that tracks ship movements.
If all goes well, organizers say, the Tamaroa should be sunk around 10:30 a.m. A series of holes were pre-cut into the hull and covered with temporary patches that will be removed to allow the ship to sink.
The Tamaroa will join other military ships as part of the "Del-Jersey-Land Reef" off New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland. The former Army freighter and Navy support ship Shearwater, the minesweeper Gregory Poole and the 563-foot destroyer USS Arthur W. Radford, the largest vessel ever deployed off the East Coast, make up the the reef.
Long before "The Perfect Storm," the Tamaroa had an illustrious history when it was called the USS Zuni and served as a U.S. Navy tug. The Zuni arrived three days after the assault on Iwo Jima began in 1945 and stayed there for a month.
After the war, the Coast Guard inherited the 205-foot ship. It was one of the first vessels to reach the sinking luxury liner Andrea Doria of Nantucket and helped rescue more than 1,600 passengers and crew members.
Jim Yost, an Atlantic City native, was the engine mechanic on the Tamaroa when it came to the rescue of a boat off of New York in the early 1950s.
After initial attempts to cast ropes to the other ship failed, the Tamaroa came alongside so close that the waves smashed the two ships together, damaging the Coast Guard cutter’s flying bridge
The Tamaroa managed to pull the crippled ship to port and then had to undergo repairs.
“It wasn’t a perfect storm, but it was a hell of a storm,” Yost recalled.
Tamaroa timeline
July 31, 1943: Launched as the USS Zuni from Portland, Ore.
July 24, 1944: Participated in the assault on Tinian.
October 1944: Towed the cruiser USS Houston to safety after the ship was struck by two torpedoes during a Japanese aerial attack.
November 1944: Towed the cruiser USS Reno 1,500 miles across the Pacific after it was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine in the Philippines. The Tamaroa prevented the heavily damaged ship from capsizing.
February to March 1945: Participated in the Battle of Iwo Jima, pulling transports off sandbars and deliberately running into the shore to provide ammunition to a disabled ship.
June 29, 1946: Transferred to the U.S. Coast Guard and renamed the Tamaroa.
July 26, 1956: Assisted the Italian luxury liner Andrea Doria after it collided with the Stockholm, 50 miles off Nantucket, Mass.
1950s to 1990s: Participated in hundreds of search-and-rescue missions on the East Coast while based in New York Harbor and, later, New Hampshire.
Oct. 29 to Nov. 2, 1991: Helped rescue seven people, including four Air National Guardsmen, during the famed "Perfect Storm" off the coast of New England.
Feb. 1, 1994: Decommissioned by the Coast Guard
Sources: Naval History and Heritage Command; U.S. Coast Guard