A Miracle at Attu: The Rescue of CG-1600 by Captain Bill Peterson, USCG (Ret.), and Captain Mike Wallace, USCG (Ret.) (First Edition Design Publishing, Sarasota, FL, 2016, 177pp, illus, 978-1-506-902876; $18.95pb) Captain Peterson proves through this work that sometimes the best way to tell a story is to just give the details, as gory as they may be, and move from fact to fact. CG-1600, a Coast Guard HC-130H plane on a logistics mission in remote Alaska, crashed while approaching its final destination in July 1982. Peterson, a Coast Guard helicopter pilot, performed the rescue mission in collaboration with fellow Coast Guardsmen and Air Force personnel. Everything conspired against them, from the terrain at the wreck site to the weather, to the odds of there being survivors in a crash that had torn their plane to pieces. Although the story happened more than 35 years ago, Peterson tells the story with minute-to-minute detail, from the moment word arrived on the Coast Guard cutter Mellon (WHEC 717) that contact with CG-1600 had been lost, to the search for the missing crewmen. It was clearly an experience that never left him. Remarkably, numerous survivors lived to tell the story as well, and three decades later agreed to share their memories for the book. From the outset, the author indoctrinates us in Coast Guard speak, explaining acronyms and abbreviations that Coast Guardsmen need to know on a daily basis, including those used only in the world of search and rescue (or “SAR”) helicopter crews. The technicality of the language requires, at first, re-reading of specific lines to get the hang of it, but by the end of the book readers have become so engrossed that they could don headsets and jump into Peterson’s HH-52 and fly along with him. The story is one of humanity, primarily, a tale of Coast Guard personnel giving their all to find, stabilize, comfort, and rescue their own, but it’s also a demonstration of the tribulations of such a rescue, including the problems impenetrable fog poses to planes and helicopters alike, refueling mid-mission, weight and cabin space restrictions and more. John Galluzzo Hanover, Massachusetts
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