I was only 20 years old in World War II, a line officer in the Navy, serving onboard a landing ship carrying equipment from Tokyo to Pearl Harbor. On a nearly moonless, cloudy evening, my duty was the late shift, standing watch on the bridge, looking out for hazards in the inky black water ahead.

Just before dawn I was scanning the waves when I started to feel funny. Not seasickness… It felt like I’d been punched in the gut. And suddenly the bridge didn’t feel like the right place to be. Go down and look on the port side, a voice inside my head urged me.

I can’t, I thought. I’ve got to stand watch on the bridge. The bridge had the best view. But the feeling wouldn’t go away. In fact, the pain in my stomach only grew worse.

Against my better judgment, I gave in. “I’m going down to take a look on the port side,” I told the helmsman. I instructed an enlisted man on the bridge to keep watch.

I could barely see the stairs in front of me as I descended to the port bow. Out in the water the waves and the current seemed to be picking up. We were steaming along at about eight knots, as fast as our ship could go.

I picked up the binoculars. In the water, about 100 yards off the port bow, was a dark object. I tracked it as the boat moved closer. Was my imagination playing tricks on me? We were on a collision course!

“Mine twenty degrees off the port bow!” I yelled to the bridge. Acting quickly, I shouted out the order to turn. “Hard right rudder!”

“Did you inform the captain?” the helmsman argued.

“Hard right rudder, now!”

The helmsman turned the ship, and at that moment dawn broke over the horizon. The crew gathered along the rail on the port side, in time to see one of the largest mines we’d ever seen miss us by a matter of feet.

I went back up to the bridge. “Did you see that mine?” I asked the enlisted man.

“No, sir,” he said, shaking his head. “Couldn’t see a thing until just now. Lucky thing you went down below.”

Lucky? No, I don’t think so.