By UXO Guest Writer, LTC Danny M. Johnson, (USA Ret)

The Port Chicago Naval Magazine explosion became the worst home-front disaster of World War II. On July 17, 1944, the massive detonation of 3.5 million pounds of high explosives killed 320, injured 390, and caused an estimated $12.5 million in property damage (in 1944 dollars).

Port Chicago, about 30 miles north of San Francisco, was developed into a munitions facility when the Naval Ammunition Depot at Mare Island, Vallejo, California, could not fully meet the war effort. By the summer of 1944, expansion of the Port Chicago facility allowed for loading two ships simultaneously around the clock. Unfortunately, safety requirements were overlooked in the rush to keep up chaotic loading schedules. Nevertheless, white naval officers and senior enlisted personnel assigned generally segregated African-American units to the dangerous loading operations. For the most part, these men had not been trained in handling munitions.

On the evening of July 17, the SS Quinault Victory and S.S.E.A. Bryan, two merchant ships, were being loaded. Their holds were packed with 4,600 tons of explosivesbombs, depth charges and ammunition. Another 400 tons of explosives were nearby on rail cars. Approximately 320 workers had been on or near the pier when, at 10:18 p.m., a sequence of huge explosions over several seconds destroyed everything and everyone in the vicinity. It was reported that blasts were felt as far away as Nevada and the resulting damage extended as far as San Francisco. Most of the buildings in Port Chicago were damaged and people were literally knocked to the ground. Fire and smoke could be seen almost two miles into the air. It was rumored that a pilot of a plane flying at 9,000 feet in the area reported that metal chunks from the explosion flew past him.

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By UXO Guest Writer, LTC Danny M. Johnson, (USA Ret)

April 28, 2016 will be the 43d anniversary of the Southern Pacific, Roseville, CA rail yard blast, during which catastrophe struck when 18 of 21 rail cars loaded with 7,056, Mark 81, 250lb bombs destined for the Naval Weapons Station, Concord, CA for further naval shipment to Southeast Asia exploded in the then Southern Pacific Railyard.

The train arrived from the Naval Ammunition Depot at Hawthorne, Nevada at the Roseville Yard entrance at 0605 and was arranged in the westbound division yard by 0630. The train was too long for the yard, so the forward cars (which are the ones that exploded) were set on a track isolated from the remaining three cars, which were loaded with more than 1,000 bombs. These three cars were saved with just minor damage.

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By UXO Guest Writer, LTC Danny M. Johnson, (USA Ret)

The Battle of Okinawa was part of the Ryukyus Campaign. Code named "Operation Iceberg," it was the largest amphibious landing in the Pacific theater of World War II. It also resulted in the highest casualties with over 100,000 Japanese casualties and 50,000 casualties for the Allies. Some called the battle for the Island of the "typhoon of steel" because of ground combat, naval ships, aviation, and air corps units all raining destruction throughout Okinawa.

On September 29, 1944, B-29 bombers conducted the initial reconnaissance mission over Okinawa and its outlying islands. On October 10, 1944, nearly two hundred of Admiral Halsey's planes struck Naha, Okinawa's capital and principal city, in five separate waves. The city was almost totally devastated, yet the bombing continued. From April 1 to June 22, 1945, 287,000 troops of the U.S. Tenth Army battled 130,000 soldiers of the Japanese Thirty-second Army. At stake were air bases very important to the anticipated invasion of Japan. Losses were extremely heavy on both sides.

The Battle of Okinawa landing is recognized for its sheer strength of the fighting and the quantity of munitions that were expended. Out of the countless ordnance fired on and onto the island of Okinawa, some failed to explode and resulted in unexploded ordnance (UXO) dormant in the earth for years. It is unknown how many tons of UXOs were removed by the U.S. military between the end of World War II and 1972.

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