Nurse Describes Kamikaze Attack

Doris Gardner Howard was honored on Veterans Day 2019, when she was 99, for her service as an Army Nurse during WWII.

In World War II Japanese kamikaze planes, loaded with explosives, deliberately made  suicidal crashes on an enemy target, usually ships.

On April 28, 1945, the USS Comfort hospital ship had just loaded injured patients in Okinawa, and was at sea on the way to Guam, unarmed as all hospital ships were. At 10:41 p.m., with full illumination, and marked with red crosses in several places to clearly mark it as a hospital ship, the kamikaze pilot crashed the plane into the ship where three operating rooms were located. Though injured, Doris was able to help the wounded in the operating area, where other nurses, doctors and patients were killed and injured by the explosion.

30 persons were killed, including six army nurses, and 48 others were wounded. Though damaged severely, the ship was able to continue to Guam, to unload the patients, including the deceased hospital staff. Doris was able to remain on the Comfort as it made its way to the west coast of the U.S. for repairs.

One of many army nurses who served on hospital ships, her memories of being aboard the USS Comfort when hit by a Japanese kamikaze plane are recorded in a 2019 online website:
http://www.rallypoint.com/answers/what-question-can-you-pose-to-a-nurse-from-wwii

Doris celebrated her 100th birthday March 23, 2020, in Reno, Nevada. Dale Harper’s book, Too Close For Comfort, tells the story of the attack very well. Also see Massman, and Daly for excellent books on hospital ships.
Available from the Interlibrary loan at most libraries, these are also found for sale at Used online book dealers. My WWII nurse book collection is listed in this blog at: https://ww2nurses.wordpress.com/world-war-ii-nurse-books/