Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, April 15, 1990 TAG: 9004150154
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Medium
"With most accidents, you have the accident and then it's over. With all the press and the problems related to the investigation, this just doesn't go away," said Dale Schelin, whose son, Geoffrey, was killed.
On April 19, 1989, seconds before the Iowa was to fire test shots from its three-gun No. 2 turret, an explosion in the center gun killed all 47 men in the upper turret.
The Navy, which plans to mothball the battleship, concluded the most likely cause of the blast was sabotage by gunner's mate Clayton Hartwig, who died in the blast. The Navy said Hartwig was suicidally despondent over a broken friendship with another sailor.
The families, however, doubt the Navy's conclusion. They want to know more about the age of gunpowder that ignited in the blast off Puerto Rico and about possible malfunctions within the huge gun turret.
"The gunpowder in the turret was stored in the summer of 1988 on barges for 60 days when the temperature exceeded 100 degrees," said Hartwig's sister, Kathy Kubicina. "It is supposed to be stored at 70 degrees. The high temperatures cause it to destabilize."
"I have evidence that indicates the gunpowder was starting to turn green," Kubicina said. "When it turns green, that means it is starting to destabilize. . . . In my brother's autopsy and other ones, it says there were green foreign materials in their bodies."
Kubicina said she has asked the Navy for a chemical analysis of the propellants removed from the bodies, "but I've been told no chemical analysis was done."
Sharon Ziegler's husband, Chief Gunner's Mate Reginald Owen Ziegler, 39, was the senior enlisted man in the Iowa turret.
"It's so hard to believe that men working side-by-side with each other, depending on each other - that the Navy would pinpoint one man," she said. "If they had picked on my husband, I would have fought them just like the Hartwig family.
"My husband always said there were many things that could go wrong. He always said it all depended on his kids pushing the right buttons. Their lives depended on that."
Tests by Navy experts found residue in the center gun of material the Navy concluded was a detonating device. Those findings were not duplicated by FBI experts.
A subcommittee of the House Armed Services Committee said the Navy's conclusion were not supported by the facts.
Krieg Brusnahan, a lawyer for the Hartwigs, said any legal action will be announced on the anniversary of the blast Thursday. "The Navy is not going to get away with trashing the Hartwig family name with its uncorroborated accusations," he said.
The future of the Iowa is uncertain. Launched in August 1942, the Iowa won nine battle stars in World War II and two battle stars in Korea.
Former Navy Secretary John F. Lehman Jr., who brought the Iowa out of retirement in 1983, said mothballing the ship is a mistake.
"We still need naval power to deter and contain state-sponsored terrorism," Lehman said.
Today, the Iowa is at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard being prepared for mothballing.
A plaque listing the 47 sailors who died was dedicated privately last week.
The families don't want to see the warship put in reserve.
"She belongs at sea," Sharon Ziegler said. "There is the pride of all the guys who went to sea on her, who fought on her. That's how she needs to be remembered - proudly riding the waves. That ship carries the ghosts of 47 men in her turret."
by CNB