Foul Weather and Risks

Heroes Remember

Foul Weather and Risks

Transcript

We were a fairly large convoy coming out of, I believe it was Montreal. We had a full load of munitions and we formed out, outside the Gulf in the Atlantic and we were heading out. We didn't know really where we were going so we went down the coast and we rendezvoused with an American convoy coming out of New York and the sight was just unbelievable because it was all this maneuvering around. I think we had about fifty ships on our convoy. So there was this maneuvering around to let these American convoy ships get into position cause we were sort of going this direction and then they had to go this way to go towards the UK. That's where we were heading, unknown to us at the time, but eventually we ended up in England. Well, prior to forming up for that particular convoy, we hit a fog in the St. Lawrence River and thinking back on that, that was kind of scary because we dropped anchor. It was just about around, oh I think it was a little further from Quebec City and heavy fog, and there was just constant blowing of whistles and warnings that there was a fog, other ships to let them know where we were positioned and I thought you know, I didn't think then. Today I often think back, if we'd have been hit by another ship it would have been an awful explosion, because we were just loaded down. Getting on a little further, I'm trying to think, on that particular trip we were carrying, I'm not sure whether it was six or eight, probably eight tanks on upper deck. And the way they hold those tanks down, they sort of welded a cleat around the track that held it in position and we hit quite a large, strong North Atlantic gale and I can remember sleeping in my bunk one night and hearing this awful noise up top and what it was, one of these tank cleats had broken loose because of the shifting of the ship and the rolling, but the deck hands managed to latch it down and everything was under control like. That was a memory that I won't forget. So we were lucky to get there because when I think of the storm we were just thrown around something crazy. Of course, everybody was too, it was a large convoy.

Description

Mr. Colcomb describes forming up a convoy in the fog-shrouded St. Lawrence River and being nervous because his ship was loaded with munitions. He also describes an incident during that crossing in which a tank lashed to the deck breaks loose and is re-secured without any damage occurring.

Ross Colcomb

Ross Colcomb was born in Montreal, Quebec on July 2, 1926. After being an Air Cadet in his early teens, he enlisted in the Royal Canadian Air Force at age seventeen, and took air crew training. The demand for air crew was low near the end of the war, so Mr. Colcomb was discharged after nine months. He immediately joined the Merchant Navy. After a short period of engineering and gunnery training, Mr. Colcomb went to sea as a fireman aboard the SS Elk Island Park, which ferried war materials to England for the duration of the Second World War.

Meta Data

Medium:: Video
Owner:: Veterans Affairs Canada
Duration:: 2:41
Person Interviewed:: Ross Colcomb
War, Conflict or Mission:: Second World War
Battle/Campaign:: Battle of the Atlantic
Branch:: Merchant Navy
Units/Ship:: Royal Canadian Electrical Mechanical Engineers
Occupation:: Fireman

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Date modified:: 2019-04-03