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UDT-14 Memorial
in Kihei Hawai'i Located across the street from 2411 S Kihei RD, Kihei, HI, 96753-7201 on the island of Maui, USA
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UDT-14 Memorial
in Kihei Hawai'i Located across the street from 2411 S Kihei RD, Kihei, HI, 96753-7201 on the island of Maui, USA
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Underwater Demolitions Teams were developed for Pacific Warfare. Team 14, the first team trained on Maui, was also the first experimental team made ready in six weeks rather than the standard three months. In addition, it was the first team made up of all-Navy volunteers who had served overseas for more than a year, and had participated in at least one major invasion. Over half the recruits were able to complete the 12-18 hour-a-day training. Team 14, consisting of 95 men including officers, took part in the invasion of the philippines, Iwo JIma, and Okinawa.
Underwater Demolitions Teams conducted reconnaissance of tageted enemy islands. A day or more prior to the actual invasions, team members swam to the beach lines, gathering information and checking for the best landing sites. While evading enemy machine gun and mortar fire, they swam over reefs and around mines and other anti-invasion obstacles, noting topography, currents, water depth, beach shopes, and sand stability. After briefing commanders, they returned with explosives to demolish obstacles on the beaches and underwater, such as coral reefs and tetrahedons, which could impede landing craft in targeted and decoy areas.
The swimmers' full battle gear consisted only of swim trunks, masks (without snorkels or other breathing apparatus), fins, mine detonators, hunting knives, and writing slats with pencils. But they were not unprotected. During reconnaissance they received full fire support as the targetted islands were bombarded by LCI rocket craft, destroyers, outlying cruisers and battleships, and air support from farther outlying aircraft carriers.
During the Lingyen Gulf invasion, Team 14 members conducted reconnaissance, and in addition machine gunned down a suicide kamikaze as it aimed at "the Bull", the destroyer which carried the team.
At Iwo Jima, assigned team members boarded boats in order to guide the first assault waves to the assigned beaches. UDT's then helped remove damaged and broached landing craft so they could be sunk, leaving beaches clear for new waves of assault troops and armored equipment.
One thousand UDT Swimmers, including Team 14, spearheaded the invasion of Okinawa by 450,000 US troops. After Okinawa, 3,000 UDT members, along with other US forces, were in the Pacific theatre preparing for the great invasion of the Japanese homeland. US Forces braced for attacks from the air - including suicide kamikaze airplanes, from the sea - including small suicide submarines, and from the land - including massive coastal defenses.
Comments: UDT-14 was not the first UDT trained on Maui as the sign claims. Rather, they were the first soley trained on Maui; earlier teams had recieved much of their training at Fort Pierce in Florida.
For more information on UDT-14 please go here.
| The old UDT-14 training grounds | |
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Looking out west to sea. This must have been fun shore to survey in stormy weather and driving surf!! |
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Looking northwest towards the West Maui mountains. This is now one of the more popular beaches on the island. During the winter wave action is responsible for serious beach erosion and the author has seen a stairway that extends down to the sand in the summertime become high and dry as the sand level drops at least ten feet! Enough to keep any surveying UDT class busy winter-round. |
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Map showing the location of the memorial at Kamaole Beach (Beach two I believe) for those of you lucky enough to go to Maui!!! The Memorial's at the sound end of the Park. Map from Mapquest.com. |