After the majority of the hangars blew down, that terrific wind started blowing the blimps, autos and airplanes all over the place, causing gas tanks to be ripped apart spilling gasoline all over the deck. Then, the gasoline ignited, probably due to the metal scraping the concrete producing sparks.

While this was happening, we were under a heavy workbench and my fellow chief was really praying out loud. I was doing some praying also, but mine was silent. It was pitch dark and so noisy you couldn't hear yourself think. I crawled out from under the bench to try and see what was going on. One of the technicians asked "What can I do chief?"

I answered "For now, get back under there and help the chief pray." Then "POW!" the whole hangar lite up in flames. I told the men who were with me "Guys, you are on your own, I'm going to try to get the hell out of here. Good luck!" I threw a chair through the window and started climbing out, while the other chief discharged a fire extinguisher toward the door of the shop keeping the flames back.

Being on the lee side of the hangar that blew down, broken hangar beams from the main structure of the building fell on that side. I started climbing over that wreckage. At one point, I fell down through that wreckage. The sharp splintered beams cut me to pieces; however, that didn't bother me at the time. In fact, I hardly realized I was cut; my thoughts were on getting out of there. I still remember some of the thoughts that came to my mind at that time. I was wearing an ID bracelet on my right wrist. I visualized my right arm sticking up above the wreckage and rescuers coming by the next day identifying my body by that ID bracelet. I thought, "Because I have no wife or children, it's not as bad for me as for some of the other guys who do have wives and children."

Anyway, I managed to work my way up to the top of the wreckage again and across the debris and wreckage of the building. By that time I was out to the runway and felling the full blunt of the storm. The rain drops felt like shots or small pebbles hitting my body with great force. Then, "swash!" a gust of strong wind actually lifted me off the runway and was blowing me through the air like a leaf. I remembered hearing about winds so strong that they could drive a straw through a tree. I could just see ole' Arch being driven through a tree at the end of the runway. I knew I had to do something to get down. So, I arched my body like going into a dive and dove to the ground. This may have been when I broke my hand. I may have landed on it. I was now laying on the runway listening to the roar of that terrible wind and still being hit by flying debris.

Due to lightning or the light from the burning hangar, I saw a mound of dirt beside the runway so I rolled behind that mound of dirt. This protected me from the wind and flying debris. I watched large pieces of wood and other junk fly over my head. I was downwind from the hangar; so, as the fire from the burning gasoline, aircraft, autos etc. increased, so did the smoke coming my way. The smoke became so intense that I had to give up my safe haven behind that pile of dirt. There were some woods nearby, so I worked my way over to them. The wind had broken most of the trees off about two feet from the ground. I crawled behind the largest stump that I saw. Then with the flashing of lightning, I saw a larger stump and worked my way to behind it. I repeated that several times until I found a tree stump that was large enough to protect me from the fury of the storm. I stayed there until the eye of the hurricane arrived.

Suddenly the howling winds stopped blowing and it became deadly still and calm. There wasn't a breath of air stirring. I came out of the woods to see what was going on. The hangars were engulfed with flames; I didn't want to go back there. About that time six other guys who had been weathering the storm in the woods came by. One of them knew where the ammunition dump was and said that we could find safety there for the other part of the hurricane. That sounded good to me, so I was happy to join them. To get to the ammo dump, we had to leave the base by the back gate. Of course, there was no guard on the gate at this time. Starting down this road we passed a home that was still standing. This was a low, flat roof, wooden building that was well built and had previously been a store. It had withstood the first half of the hurricane and the family was out surveying the damage when they saw us in the road. They insisted that we come in and ride out the other half of the storm with them. They took one look at me and said "Oh my God! We must do something for you." They started cleaning my cuts and bruises. They cleaned the cuts with hydrogen peroxide and bandaged me up stopping most of the bleeding. This was done using a flashlight and a kerosine lamp for light. They put me to bed, gave me some medicine for pain and I don't remember much about the other half of the hurricane except for the noise and feeling the building rock.

As the wind subsided, base rescue personnel were out looking for survivors. They put me into a jeep and rushed me to the base hospital, which was still standing and using emergency power. To my surprise, there were not a lot of injuries, only thirty-eight, and only one death. Sailors on the opposite side of the hangar from us were able to get into the stairways of the hangar's concrete pillars for protection from the storm. The death was a civilian fireman who was out in the hangar inspecting the early roof damage, when the whole thing came down. Falling timbers got him.

Soon after I arrived at the hospital, two bus loads of volunteer doctors and nurses arrived from Miami. But, due to the relative small number of casualties(32), the Navy didn't need a lot of help. The chief surgeon started working on me. He was working using emergency lights and power, but that didn't slow him down. He was displeased that the nice people at the farm house had used hydrogen peroxide to clean my cuts, but I was happy that they had. He gave me a shot and knocked me out. Then, he cut away some of the torn skin and tissues and sewed up all my serious cuts. They found a large bone broken in my left hand; so, they put a cast on that.
The above is what was left of the debris that I had to climb over.

After a few days in the hospital, I learned that our Chief's Club, which was in our barracks, was going to close and needed to get rid of all our stock. To do this, they had decided to open the bar to all chiefs - free drinks! Anything, any time we wanted it until the stock was gone. When the doctor came by I asked him "Being that I'm just lying around here doing nothing, why can't I do the same thing in the chief's quarters?" He said "O.K. Chief! If you will promise to just lie around, take it easy and come back here once a day so we can check you over." Then he laughed and said "You probably won't need as many pain pills there." He was right and that was a much nicer atmosphere for recovering than lying around in a hospital.

Source of information on this page is from http://www.kilroywashere.org/003-Pages/Arch/Arch.html