Martindale continued
Thursday, May 1, 1975
Nothing much during the morning. I heard that Ron Pollock left last night, with some of the Vietnamese girls who were assisting in registering the Vietnamese passengers, to take one of the Pioneer vessels to Guam. It will probably take a week. I can get there before that by air.
Four of us took a trip with a Lt. Plask to the hangar deck, where he gave a very technical briefing on the ship’s fighters and bombers. Then to an observation deck above the flight deck and to the pilot’s ready room. The flight deck is full of helicopters but this carrier ordinarily launches fighters and bombers. Rumor is that we may leave for Thailand about 4:00 p.m. today, a 1 1/2 hour helicopter flight.
Well, we boarded the helicopters at 4:00 p.m. and stayed on board a little over an hour. Then it was called off and we returned to our same quarters. The sailors had just cleaned them out and were ready to move back in. Word is that there was difficulty with the Thai Government on our coming in. Maybe they thought we were Vietnamese. Now we are sailing all the way into Thailand and expect to get off about 8:00 a.m.
Waiting For Charlemagne 