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When I was a kid we went out on a boat ride. It started off as a nice day. My parents, sister and I had set out into the Gulf of Mexico to enjoy a day on the water. After we had our fun and had made it about 30 minutes off shore, my dad noticed some terrible storm clouds rolling in. Before long, lightning began to light the sky to the east of us and the familiar soft roll of thunder was coming from the distance. Though he made his best attempt to head inland, we were still about 15 minutes from shore when it was right overhead. It was moving so quickly! The waves became choppy and harsh, the wind was getting strong, and the sky around us got dark. Our little family boat was not prepared for these conditions. I remember becoming frightened. My mom made us all hold rope that was anchored to the boat and tightened our life jackets as a safety measure. I wrapped the rope around my hands so tight that later it would leave welts on my hand. Each wave we hit I came up out of my seat a little. My dad's face was intense and my mom held tightly to my sister. I wanted to cry, but the wind was too strong and made my eyes too dry to let tears form. When we made it to land we worked quickly to get the boat out of the water and made it into our vehicle just before the clouds opened up. The rains that night spawned tornadoes and resulted in flooding; it turned out to be our worst storm in years. That storm was a perfect example of the dominance of nature. I also consider it a life experience that puts the 1944 typhoon that devastated the US Navy Task force 38 into perspective.

It was December 17 of 1944 when task force 38, a fleet that donned by the Navy as the United States Pacific Fleet had just completed a 3 day raid on Japan. They had experienced some battle damage and many of the ships were in desperate need of refueling. The winds began to pick up due to a storm that was set to hit an area north of their location about 300 miles E of Luzon, a region of the Philippine Sea. Despite the winds they attempted to refuel with little success. The plan then was to remain together at their current location until the storm passed, they could successfully refuel and return to command. The storm, however, suddenly took the team by surprise when it hit considerably south of its expected track. It was spotted heading toward them from the West, they had no time left and no choice but to ride it out.

Most of the ships were caught in the eye of the storm. Thought it had been relatively

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