by Dan Milton
“Do all your work in this room as it is totally secure as are the communication lines.”
“I will get right on it. Where can I reach you if I have questions?”
“Here is a secure number that you can call. I call in frequently. I will return the call when I get your message.”
With that, the senior agent left the room, and the second agent began to consider the information.
From his quick review, he realized that the American research was far ahead of theirs. He thought: When we get the electronics package it will move us years ahead. Over the next few days, he went through the documents in considerable detail taking copious notes.
He then began working on a detailed plan. He put a summary of the technology together. Next, he laid out specifically what Lewis was supposed to remove from the towed array and how to package it for shipment. He then provided a timetable as well as contacts for weekly progress reports. The plan specified who and how he was to communicate.
A week later he had a draft plan prepared for his senior agent to review. He called the secure number and left a message that he was ready to meet.
Later that day, he received a call from the senior agent stating, “I’ll meet with you tomorrow.”
Early the next morning, the senior agent arrived and began to review the draft plan. After about two hours, he asked several questions and then suggested several changes he wanted made to the plan. The second agent said, “I’ll have them done by the end-of-day today and in the diplomatic pouch ready to go to the Washington, D.C. embassy tomorrow.”
Two days later, the plan to hijack the Navy test sonar was in the hands of the Naval Attaché in the Russian embassy. Arrangements were made to fly to Anchorage the next day.
On arrival at the Anchorage airport, the Naval Attaché took a cab to a seafood restaurant not far from Buttress Park. Waiting in the restaurant was Peter Lewis. His briefcase was under the table. When the Naval Attaché entered, he recognized Lewis and headed for his table. They had met before on several occasions and easily recognized each other. He said hello, sat down and placed his briefcase under the table.
They conversed about a range of small topics while enjoying a splendid seafood dinner. When the bill had been paid, they stood, picked up their briefcases and said their goodbyes. Since the briefcases were identical, no one noticed that Lewis now carried the one that the Naval Attaché had brought. Lewis got into his car and headed home while the Naval Attaché found a cab and headed for a hotel near the airport. He had a return flight to Washington tomorrow.
Arriving home, Lewis began a perusal of the detailed plan for his next mission. After several hours, Lewis had a good feeling about the project and how he was going to achieve the results. He then made a complete list of what equipment he would need and who to contact to make arrangements to get to Lake Iliamna. Using the cover of a hunter, he would need to get a few items before he could take off. He would need to clean the M91/30 sniper rifle and pack it in its carrying case.
Over the next few days, he made flight and lodge reservations and assembled all the equipment he would need for the mission. He would be leaving in two days time.
At the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, Commander Carothers sat at his desk signing several outgoing letters. There was a knock at the door. Carothers said, “Enter.”
The Communications Officer walked in, stood at attention and said, “Commander. I have a ‘Captain’s eyes only’ message for you. Would you sign here, please?”
“Thanks, Lieutenant. That will be all.”
When the Communications officer had left the room Carothers opened the envelope. He stared at the message for a few minutes then put it in the burn envelope. The message read: OPERATION ILIAMNA PHASE ONE UNDERWAY.
Hat Island
It was early afternoon when Ernie and Jeff anchored in the cove at Hat Island. After going ashore, to drop off some supplies at their base camp, they headed back to the boat to work on the towed sonar. The cavitation would be a continuing problem in analyzing the results if they did not find the cause. After several hours of effort, they determined that an adjustment to one of the fins was necessary. They made the change, tied the sonar down in its cradle and took the skiff back to the island.
“Ernie, you never told me what Commander Carothers response was to our problem.”
“He was very concerned and urged caution. He thought Russian involvement was possible and reiterated the importance of what we are doing. We’ll both need to keep our eyes open. Let me plan out the next few days of testing while you get us some food.”
After they had eaten, Ernie reviewed the test plan with Jeff. Both agreed that the next few days would be very busy.
Tomorrow morning they returned to the area in Knutson Bay where they had conducted the previous observation test on the towed sonar. This time Ernie put on the dive gear and entered the water while Jeff piloted the boat. He would make an identical test run towing the sonar at a 20 foot depth while Ernie would observe from below.
The test run went off without any problems. After Ernie was back on board, he commented, “Looks like we solved the cavitation problem. The towed sonar looked superb as it passed by my view.”
“I had a creepy feeling that we were being watched during the test. Maybe I’m just paranoid but something did not feel right.”
Jeff said, “I kept looking around, but didn’t see anything. I also had an uneasy feeling.”
“Let’s hook up the movie camera, the still camera, and the acoustic recorder. We can record several passes with the towed sonar to see if we get the expected results.”
The rest of the test day went well. At about 6:00pm they stowed their gear, packed up the recording results and headed back to base camp.
At camp, they had dinner and then documented the results for the day in the log. Ernie said, “Jeff, grab some more film canisters for me.”
Looking into the chest with a quizzed expression, he said, “I packed all the film and recording tapes in here myself. Have you been in the chest recently?”
“No. I haven’t been in there since we were last in Iliamna.”
“Well, someone has. It’s not the way I left it. I wonder if anything else was disturbed.”
After a thorough look around camp, they came to the conclusion that someone had gone carefully through their stuff while they were in Knutson Bay.
Ernie said, “We had better keep the log and our recorded data locked up on the boat.”
“Let’s get some rest. We need to hook up the sea sled tomorrow to calibrate the cable length and see what changes we need to make. We also need to fire up the compressor first thing in the morning to charge up three of the tanks.”
Next day, in the protected area of Knutson Bay, they launched the sea sled behind the boat. Ernie had the first test ride to check out the engineering aspects of the sled. The sled had a ‘V’ shaped Plexiglas front to protect the diver. There were two hooks that fit under the armpits of the diver. The sled was easily steered using two movable blades. There were handheld grips used to turn the blades. The vanes could only traverse a 45 degree up and down angle. They were also spring loaded to the up position should the diver and sled separate. The sled was also buoyant and would float to the surface once set free underwater. A safety release was connected to the diver so he could release the towing cable connection to the sled at any time.
Once Ernie was in position on the sled, Jeff moved the boat forward at a steady 3-4 knots. He let out enough wire to keep Ernie 125 feet behind the boat. Ernie began simple maneuvers with the sled taking it up to the surface and then down. He started a slow right turn and then one to the left. The sled was easy to steer and very maneuverable. The vanes turned easily, and there was only a moderate pressure on the armpits.
After about 20 minutes on the sled, Ernie began to feel the cold since he was expending almost no physical energy. He surfaced the sled and signaled Jeff to stop and reel in the sled. When Ernie was back on board with his tank, weight belt
, fins and mask off, he discussed the test run with Jeff. Ernie asked, “Would you like a try?”
“Sure, I’ll get my gear on.”
Ernie, with his wetsuit still on, helped Jeff get into his gear.
Once Jeff was on the sled, Ernie moved the boat forward at a steady 3-4 knots. Jeff went through the same practice maneuvers as Ernie, getting comfortable with the sled. It was Jeff who would be spending the most time on it.
What neither Ernie nor Jeff could hear was the clicking of a camera on a knoll just a short distance from where they were testing the sea sled. Mounted on a tripod and well hidden in the trees, a high-speed camera, with a powerful telephoto lens attached, had been used to take several rolls of film.
Jeff and Ernie finished checking the sea sled and headed back to camp. They discussed the next day’s testing which was to shoot live movies and still shots of the towed sonar. It would be a busy and eventful day.
After dinner, they logged the test results for the day. With a big day ahead of them they went to bed early.
About two in the morning, both Ernie and Jeff awakened to the sound of crunching gravel on the beach near their tied skiff. They got up, dressed quickly and headed down the slope. Jeff grabbed the Winchester on the way out of the tent.
As their eyes focused in the semi-darkness, they saw a huge shape standing near the skiff and another large one coming out of the water onto the beach. After their eyes had adjusted, they stopped in their tracks. Standing beside their skiff was an enormous cow moose followed by her mate, which was sporting a massive rack.
Not wanting to cause a situation, Ernie and Jeff began a slow and careful retreat back up the slope to their camp hoping the moose would not take notice of them. From there, they watched the two moose wander slowly down the beach away from the skiff. A short time later, Ernie and Jeff grabbed their stuff and headed to the skiff. They did not feel totally secure until they were on board the boat. The moose could easily have wandered through their camp at any time during the night. Thousands of pounds of angry moose would not have been pleasant. They slept the rest of the night on the boat.
When morning came, they saw no sign of the two moose. They must have swum back to the mainland.
A somewhat restless night had left Jeff and Ernie a little ‘on edge’. They had something to eat and then left for Knutson Bay to begin their test runs.
After Jeff had set up the underwater movie and still cameras on tripods near the buoy anchor, he placed the audio recording equipment on its tripod. It was tuned to the frequency of the sonar unit. He then surfaced and said, “I’m ready for the bypass runs. Cameras and sound equipment are in place.”
Ernie said, “Okay. The first three runs will be for the movie camera. The next three will be for still photos. Keep the sound recording equipment going the whole time. Any problems, just surface and signal me.”
Jeff watched Ernie get underway and let the sonar unit out as he made a wide sweeping turn to enter the recording run. Jeff submerged and manned the 16mm Bolex. After the first three runs, Jeff switched to the still camera to take shots of the towed sonar for the next three runs. All went well on the first run for the still camera. Ernie began his full turn for a second run. In his peripheral vision, Jeff spotted something coming very fast from behind him. It shot past him knocking over the Bolex camera and its tripod. Then it was gone. A thousand thoughts went through Jeff’s mind as he thought: What the heck was that?
Jeff retrieved the Bolex and tripod and headed up the anchor rope to the buoy. On surfacing, he signaled Ernie to stop. Ernie recovered the towing cable until the sonar was just a few feet behind the boat. He idled up to the buoy and shouted, “What’s wrong?”
Jeff explained what he had just seen. Ernie said, “I’ll anchor the boat here. Pass me what you have. Let me get my gear on, and we’ll retrieve the rest of the equipment. One of us can take the spear gun in case whatever it was, shows up again.”
In less than 15 minutes, they had retrieved the rest of the equipment, had pulled in the boat anchor and headed back to camp.
That night, over dinner, they discussed what may have been seen by Jeff. Thankfully the Bolex was not damaged, and all the film taken was intact.
Next morning Ernie radioed Major Bowman at King Salmon and explained what had happened to Jeff. “The missionaries told Jeff the Indian legend about a large creature in the lake. Am I getting a little paranoid or can you shed some light on what Jeff saw?”
With both Ernie and Jeff listening to the radio response, Bowman said, “I would guess that neither of you has heard that there are freshwater seals in the lake. They are a variant of the harbor seal that, at some time in the past, swam from the salt water of Bristol Bay up the river to Lake Iliamna. They found the food great there with all the salmon and decided to stay. They are not known to attack humans, but they are large and can be trouble. The fishermen hate them. They are upward of 5-6 feet in length and weigh some 250 pounds. Jeff, what you saw was probably just a curious young seal pup. But, you might also keep in mind that no one has yet disproved the large creature legend!”
Jeff chimed in, “Funny! Funny!”
Ernie replied, “Thanks, Major Bowman.”
Jeff and Ernie headed back to Knutson Bay to finish the work they had started yesterday. Jeff had a slight hesitancy in entering the water. He was constantly looking from left to right. After a little while, with nothing happening, his confidence returned, and the work got seriously underway.
At the end of the day, on their way back to Hat Island, Jeff and Ernie discussed the need to straighten up the boat and base camp. Commander Carothers, the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard Towed Sonar Project Manager, would be arriving tomorrow afternoon. Ernie said, “First thing in the morning we will get things orderly and then get our results tabulated and summarized. We can show him around and give him our report of what we have accomplished.”
They began work early the next morning and by noon, they were ready for the arrival of Commander Carothers.
In mid-afternoon, a US Navy JRF-5 Grumman Goose flew low over the island before circling and lining up for a landing on the lee side of the island. The Navy pilot brought the Goose into the cove near the boat. A seaman on board the aircraft threw out an anchor. Ernie brought the skiff to the Goose and picked up Commander Carothers. The Navy Pilot and the sailor stayed on board the aircraft. Carothers said, “We will only be here for an hour.”
Ernie and Carothers joined Jeff on the boat. They gave Commander Carothers a tour and explained how the tests were being conducted. They reviewed the results and what they had found. They gave Carothers the report they had prepared and then discussed the next phase of their testing. Carothers said, “Looks good so far. I am pleased with the results. Don’t forget to save some time for the University Research Team. You need to assist them in surveying several areas of the lake both visually and with the sonar unit.”
Ernie said, “Will do Commander. We have set aside time to work with them before we transfer our efforts to the Lake Clark testing phase.”
With that, Ernie and Jeff took Commander Carothers in the skiff back to the anchored Goose. As they said their goodbyes, Carothers handed Jeff some bags. Carothers said, “Thought you could use some fresh food.”
As the seaman pulled in the anchor, and they slowly moved out of the cove, the pilot turned around and said, “Where to Commander?”
Carothers responded, “Take a heading toward Anchorage. Once you’ve cleared Pedro Mountain drop down to 500 feet. We’ll land at the upper end of Pile Bay. A boat will be there to meet us. No need to anchor. I will only need about 10 minutes.”
Their flight path followed the shoreline on the north side of Pile Bay. The pilot found an open stretch on the East end of the bay and brought the Goose in for a smooth landing. In about five minutes, Carothers spotted the outboard powered skiff heading toward them.
Carothers jumped into the skiff, and it motored off. When it was far enough that the pilot and seaman wo
uld not be able to hear them, Carothers said, “Lewis, it’s good to see you again. Let me fill you in on the next phases of the sonar testing. They have completed the observation tests and will be heading up to the Kokhanok area to conduct open water trials. Following that they will be moving the testing to Lake Clark. The time to steal the sonar electronics will be when they return to Iliamna from Lake Clark just before they take off for Anchorage. They should be in Iliamna 3 or 4 days to clean up and package the test results.”
Lewis said, “I’ll make the necessary plans.”
Lewis dropped Carothers off at the Goose and then headed the skiff toward his anchored boat. Just before reaching the boat, Lewis heard the sound of the Goose taking off. He looked up and saw the Goose gaining altitude on its way to Anchorage.
That night Ernie’s and Jeff’s taste buds enjoyed their steaks and baked potatoes. They had almost forgotten how fresh food tastes.
Ernie said, “Tomorrow we will need to pack all the equipment necessary for the sonar open water trails. In the late afternoon, we’ll run over to Porcupine Island and check in with the University Research Team about the surveying they want us to do on the South side of the lake.”
After a hearty breakfast of bacon, fresh eggs, and toast, they packed and loaded the boat and secured all the gear for the next couple of weeks of testing. As they were getting ready to leave, a light misty rain began to fall. They set off for Porcupine Island about mid-afternoon. Ernie said, “I radioed them last night to let them know we would be coming. We should be there in an hour. They said to anchor in the cove and come into the beach by skiff.”
Following directions given Ernie last night on the radio, they had no trouble finding the location where the University Research Team had their base camp. On arriving, Ernie cut the throttle, and Jeff threw out the anchor. They pulled the skiff alongside, piled in and motored to the beach. Several of the research team were on the beach to greet them. After the introductions, the group walked up a gradual slope to the main tent. There they met the crew supervisor for the research team—a well-seasoned Marine Biologist, who has been conducting research on the sockeye (red) salmon every summer for the past five years.
