Fire on the Hangar Deck: Ordeal of the Oriskany

Sea Power, Jun 2002

FIRE ON THE HANGAR DECK: Ordeal of the Oriskany, by Wynn F. Foster. Annapolis, Md.: Naval Institute Press, 2002. 224 pp. $26.95. [Internet: www.NavalInstitute.org] The USS Oriskany, loaded with high explosives, volatile fuels, and flaming engines, fell victim in 1966 to a catastrophic fire that led to the deaths of 44 men, injuries to hundreds more, and millions of dollars of damage.

The Essex-class aircraft carrier was conducting combat flight operations in the Gulf of Tonkin when a night illumination flare ignited on her hangar deck and turned her into an inferno. Foster, an attack pilot who flew missions from the Oriskany, draws on his own firsthand knowledge of the ship and her systems, and uses extensive documentary research and in-depth interviews with survivors to tell this gripping tale. With index, two appendixes, and 19 black-and-white photographs.