A Look Back: 1960-- Foggy day leads to destruction at sea

Eleven men died seven miles off Newport Beach on July 19, 1960, when two U.S. Navy destroyers collided in dense fog.

The USS Collett, a World War II-era, 2,200-ton Navy destroyer was conducting sea trials the foggy day it smashed into the side of the USS Ammen, another Navy destroyer. The Collett had just undergone an extensive overhaul to modernize the ship while the aging Ammen was on its way to San Diego to be decommissioned.

Ammen Commander Zaven Mukhalian told reporters at a press conference after the disaster that the Collett suddenly appeared out of the dense fog that day.

“All I can say is that it was a collision at sea between two naval ships in the fog,” Mukhalian said.

Both of the ships were equipped with radar and had sounded fog warnings that day, Navy officials said.

The first signs of danger were spotted by 19-year-old Patrick Medeiros of Honolulu, who was acting as bow lookout that day aboard the Collett.

“Ship dead ahead,” Medeiros called into his microphone that day, the Los Angeles Times reported.

By then, it was too late to maneuver the Collett away from the fast-approaching USS Ammen.

“The USS Collett ripped into the port side of the USS Ammen at a near 90-degree angle, laying open her rear engine and fire room,” the Los Angeles Times reported July 20, 1960.

The impact of the collision crumpled Collett’s bow like an aluminum can, embedding its anchor into the side of the Ammen, according to historical news accounts.

Most of the men who died in the accident were aboard the Ammen in the ship’s supply office and an electronics repair room.

“The entire section, just rear of amidships, was a jumble of twisted iron and smashed electronics equipment,” the Los Angeles Times reported. “A gun control tower was uprooted and lay on its side on the deck.”

The Ammen was towed to Long Beach after the accident, and later sold to the National Metal and Steel Corporation for scrap metal.

The Colette managed to make it back to port on its own power, although its bow was badly damaged. The ship underwent extensive repairs at a naval shipyard in Long Beach an continued its operations up and down the California coast for the rest of 1960.

The Collett was sold to Argentina in 1974 and commissioned by the Argentine navy as the ARA Piedra Buena, where it remained in service until 1985.

The Argentine navy eventually sank the vessel during a naval exercise in 1988.