40th Anniversary of the crash of Liberty 603

 

Liberty 603, and E2C Hawkeye part of the Liberty Bells Squadron VAW-115 crashed at 0200 on 17 August 1985.

Of the seven people aboard, five were rescued.

Haven’t seen you in almost 40 years!

With a whim of an idea to find a digital version of my ships cruise book, I discover a website with cruise books for just about every navy ship that’s sailed in the last 70 years. Suddenly, it’s not the Towers I want to find, but the carrier USS Midway. Maybe - I thought - just maybe the squadrons are included. As clicked through the pages I saw his name, Kuhnigk, and then saw his entire face for the first time. 

The U.S. Naval Aviator in this photo is one of my guys. A Navy Aviator  whose name I never knew until I started this journey not that long ago. 

August 17, 2025 will be the 40th anniversary of the crash of Liberty 603, and the loss of Lt. Kuhnigk, and Ensign Christopher Mims. 

If I’m to believe what I’ve turned up on the internet, Kuhnigk was one of the two in the cockpit, likely the co-pilot. Chris Mims was in the tech area of the aircraft in the rear. So this means it's likely Kevin is one of the men I saw in the plane, unconscious, water at their chests and rising. 

The co-pilot, Kevin Kuhnigk - is still out there. 

Fair winds my brother. Someday I will visit your granite memorial in California and leave a quarter, some tears, and a firm salute. But we will talk first. Not that we haven't done that a lot already, but somehow, standing there, I think it will feel different.

Finding this cruise book page led to a couple other discoveries. Memorial lists of all the Midway sailors lost durring a deployment in those years. My years. The years USS Towers was assigned to the Midway Battle Group.

The memorial pages contain the names of shipmates, pilots, air crewmen, and shipboard sailors, those who were lost to an accident of some kind, and those that either fell, or were so troubled they stepped overboard intentionally under cover of darkness. 

Each name on the list represents 3-days of SAR efforts by escort ships and aircraft.  We never found what we were looking for, but we wouold find their 'things.' 

Step one - to me - they are no longer nameless young men who were lost at sea. They are Steven Seitz, Christopher Hayes, and John Payton. 

 

Now in the next cruise book (below), there are more names. These are the ones I feel closer to - responsible for because in these years I was a surface rescue swimmer and not only searched with my eyes from the deck of USS Towers, but I also swam to anything and everything that could be related to what we were looking for. 

 

On one swim I retrieved a helmet of a sailor who was blown off Midway's flight deck, I also retrieved pieces of F-18's, pieces of gear, but never the person. The ocean it seems, just wants to hold on to them.

Reading the names now makes me wonder why.  Some were clearly aviators and lost in incidents with their aircraft. But not until the last few years could I process what would cause a shipboard sailor to simply "step off" their ship in the night. The circumstance of what sent them into the water isn't important - finding them in time and getting them back was the goal. We tried. I tried. We tried to bring you home. 

And with this new information fresh in my brain there is no sleep, as now there are names and stories for each of them - and their families - that I’ll never know.

And no, I do not believe I’ll try to learn more. It won’t change the fact that they’re all gone. 

 

These men were different. I never saw them alive... and I was always ready to swim to get them and bring them home. 

 

It's when you see them alive - and are not able to go get them - like with Liberty 603 - that haunts your thoughts for the rest of your life. 

 

After the Liberty 603 incident, I requested to be sent to Pilot Rescue Swimmer School.

 

I graduated in the top 3. 

I had many swims from Towers after that, none of them allowed me to use all my training. I never had the chance to deal with a pissed off pilot who just crashed his plane. Never had to cut a parachute loose at sea, just in training. Never had to dunk a combative pilot, or treat w wound before rescue. No faces - but today I have names.

 

Now, as for Liberty 603, Ensign Mims, I will continue trying to find your photo and more of your story as well as Kevin’s. 

 

Of all the men lost and mentioned here - I only saw the two of them - and it’s my mission to learn all I can and share the story so that more people realize the price of freedom often is paid in the mundane readiness of training. 

I will not let you be forgotten or abandoned.

 

Rest easy... I have the watch.