August 1st Program Overview

On August 1st we are going to do our first program about a man named Colin McKinzie who was at Pearl Harbor aboard the U.S.S. Pennsylvania, a battleship that was in dry-dock at the time but still able to play her guns on the Japanese planes that attacked them on Dec.7 1941.

The initial attack was at 0755 local time, that was when battleship row was attacked, the Arizona, Oklahoma and the others were sunk or badly damaged.

At about 9am local time the Japanese Admiral Nagumo ordered a second attack and that was when Mr. McKinzie’s ship the Pennsylvania was attacked and hit by one 500 lb bomb, killing and injuring many aboard including Colin who was burned and hospitalized for 4 months. He told me of a Lt. that stopped by his battle station to try to get Colin to move just a few feet so that he would be safer and Colin said that he could not because this was his battle station. The Lt. left and as he left a piece of shrapnel took his head off and according to Colin if the Lt. had just went on his business and not tried to help Colin, the Lt would not have been in the spot where he got hit. This has bothered Colin for 68 yrs.

BattleShip Row – as seen from a Japense Bomber

Another story that was shared was as he was shooting at the Japanese they were so close that he could see them laughing at him because they were flying too close and his guns could not be aimed at them well. He also told me of watching the Battleship Oklahoma which is the ship that we see whenever we see pictures of the attack on Pearl Harbor that went over with her keel up in the air, seeing the sailors trying to crawl up on her keel and because of the oil on her they would slide into the burning water and die. He shared many more stories with me that I have on DVD. If anyone has any questions about Colin or any of the 35 other interviews I have just contact this blog or e-mail me at batt.chief@yahoo.com.

Larry