When we were in Bizerte in November 1975 . This was a Muslin country with no
bars; a boring place. One cold afternoon several on my friends and I found a place that rented mo-peds. We had a great time
as we rode those things all over the countryside. It got dark and disaster struck. My mo-ped's headlight was very
dim and I hit a deep pothole, flipped over the handle bars, and wrecked. The mo-ped got a busted out headlight and stratched
up. I got a good case of road rash and hurt my right wrist. I got it restarted and rode it back to town. I was riding without
a headlight and my wrist was very painful twisting the throttle.
When we got near the rental place I let
another guy ride my moped and he parked it in the back of the other ones hoping the shop owner wouldnt see the damage until
we got away from there. He saw my bleeding face and then he spotted the damage. We scrounged up enough Dinars to satisfy him
for the damages.
When I got back to the ship my wrist was killing me and I
went to the corpsman about it. Of course the Hart did not have an x-ray machine. He gave me some pain killers and wrapped
it with an ace bandage. The carrier, or any other large ship with better sick bay was nowhere around. They told me my
wrist was only sprained. I finally got doc to put a cast on it - still no xray.
I finished the cruise with a sore wrist and it wasnt until I got back to Norfolk that I went to sick call on base and then
finally a x-ray. My wrist was broken and I wore a cast for the next eight months. I dont know how many casts I
went through. Being a snipe in the fire room was rough on them. I would get chewed out but, the Dr. at Portsmouth hospital
would threaten to put me on report but I'd get a new cast plus every six weeks another
x-ray. Every time they say my wrist was not healed yet. Come see us again in another six weeks. This went on and on
for 8 months. I got married to Marilyn wearing the cast. While on leave for the wedding I went to a local army hospital and
talked them into giving me a new cast for wedding.
Finally after talk of fusing
my wrist and medical discharge the thing finally healed just in time for the Unitas cruise. I emailed some photos of
mo-peds and casts.
Tommy
