Fate
From mid-December 1944 until late February 1945, Thornton was at Pearl Harbor. On the 22d, she got underway for operations to prepare for the assault on Okinawa. She stopped at Eniwetok early in March, and then moved on to Ulithi, the staging area for Okinawa. On 5 April 1945, while operating in the Ryūkyūs as part of the Search and Reconnaissance Group of the Southern Attack Force, Thornton collided with Ashtabula (AO-51) and Escalante (AO-70). Her starboard side was severely damaged and open to the sea. On 14 April, she was towed into Kerama Retto. On the 29th, a board of inspection and survey recommended that Thornton be decommissioned, beached, stripped of all useful materiel as needed, and then abandoned. She was beached and decommissioned on 2 May 1945. Her name was struck from the Navy List on 13 August 1945. In July 1957, Thornton's hulk was abandoned and donated to the government of the Ryukyu Islands.
Read more about this topic: USS Thornton (DD-270)
Famous quotes containing the word fate:
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—Gus Van Sant, U.S. screenwriter and director, and Dan Yost. Father Tom Murphy (William S. Burroughs)
“Good-by, my book! Like mortal eyes, imagined ones must close some day. Onegin from his knees will rise—but his creator strolls away. And yet the ear cannot right now part with the music and allow the tale to fade; the chords of fate itself continue to vibrate; and no obstruction for the sage exists where I have put The End: the shadows of my world extend beyond the skyline of the page, blue as tomorrow’s morning haze—nor does this terminate the phrase.”
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)