MILITARY FACES COLLEGE BASKETBALL Pearl Harbor survivor ‘The Photograph’ Jalen Smith leading and USS Arizona crew evokes black romantic No. 9 Terrapins to member dies at 97 dramas of the ’90s the top of Big Ten Page 3 Page 11 Back page Taliban says peace deal with US to be signed by month’s end » Page 5 stripes.com Volume 78, No. 217 ©SS 2020 TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2020 50¢/Free to Deployed Areas Warship crash survivors say Navy struggled to treat them BY MEGAN ROSE, KENGO TSUTSUMI AND T. CHRISTIAN MILLER ProPublica Two and a half years after a massive oil tanker cleaved the side of the USS John S. McCain, leaving a gaping hole and kill- ing 10 sailors, hospital corpsman Mike Collins is still haunted by the aftermath. That morning in August 2017, awoken by the thunderous shak- ing, the 23-year-old was thrust into round-the- clock motion: ‘ Why I Tending to the wasn’t chemical burns of the sailors getting whose sleeping any help area flooded, their flesh raw was from the fuel drowning that spilled in me in with the sea- Marine Sgt. Melissa Paul water. Collect- stands at the obstacle stress. ing the heavy ’ course on Naval Weapons stack of the Mike Collins Station Yorktown in dead’s medical FIGHTING SPIRIT USS John S. Virginia on Jan. 31 . records. Stay- McCain crash ing up late try- Following a successful survivor ing to purge the wrestling career stink of diesel Marine uses wrestling past to train martial arts teachers — including being named that clung to their uniforms, so an Olympic alternate in 2012 — Paul now serves the clothes could be returned to BY BROCK VERGAKIS grieving families. as an instructor trainer in The (Norfolk, Va.) Virginian-Pilot Then came the hand. Delivered the Marine Corps Martial in a red biohazard bag and left ca- gt. Melissa Paul is a wrestler who has been fighting all her life. Arts Program. sually on the cot in the McCain’s Fighting through the pain of growing up without a father since she was 4, when hers KAITLIN MCKEOWN medical quarters for Collins to The (Norfolk, Va.) Virginian-Pilot process was what seemed to be was sent to prison in Colorado. a perfectly formed hand, except Fighting to get an education in Alaska when her drug-abusing mother wanted her to the muscles, tendons and bones quit high school and to make a living fishing instead. had been stripped out. It was a Fighting to find a safe home when her mother paid a friend to take her off her hands, glove of translucent skin. for a television. Even as the months turned S to years after the accident, that “When I was younger, I would always pray, ‘God, I She won competition after competition while she image, down to the whorls and just want a family. I just want a family.’ And I ended wasn’t sure where her mother was, where her next ridges on the dead man’s fin- up never really having a family, so then I kind of got meal would come from or where she would sleep gers, intruded into Collins’ life. angry at God,” Paul said. “I didn’t realize that I did It popped up when he saw water each night. have a family with my wrestling team.” wash over his own hand or when “I knew that if I worked hard enough in wrestling, he just leaned back on the couch The Marine based at Naval Weapons Station I could be anybody,” she said. “So wrestling became to relax. Yorktown, Va., who trains martial arts instructors like my mentor, and it became like my parent, it be- That gruesome image would has been wrestling for as long as she can remember, came everything to me. It became my foundation.” long before it was common for women to do so. spin into unanswerable questions Living in a small community near Anchorage, she about all the dead men: “How She had little control over her circumstances, but started sleeping on the couches of her high school long of the process were they when it came to wrestling, Paul found she could teammates, keeping her clothes in a trash bag. alive for?” be in complete control. She was dominant on the SEE SURVIVORS ON PAGE 6 wrestling mat. SEE WRESTLING ON PAGE 5 PAGE 2 F3HIJKLM •STARS AND STRIPES• Tuesday, February 18, 2020 BUSINESS/WEATHER EXCHANGE RATES GM to leave Australia, New Zealand and Thailand Military rates Switzerland (Franc)............................0.9815 Euro costs (Feb. 18) ............................$1.136 Thailand (Baht) ..................................... 31.17 Dollar buys (Feb. 18) ..........................€0.898 Turkey (Lira) .........................................6.0496 British pound (Feb. 18) ........................$1.34 Associated Press (Military exchange rates are those to sell its Rayong factory in Thai- GM has struggled in Asia in Japanese yen (Feb. 18) ......................107.00 available to customers at military banking South Korean won (Feb. 18) ..........1,153.00 facilities in the country of issuance land to China’s Great Wall Mo- the past year. Its International Commercial rates DETROIT — General Motors for Japan, South Korea, Germany, the tors and withdraw the Chevrolet Operations, which include China, Bahrain (Dinar) ....................................0.3770 decision to pull out of Australia, Netherlands and the United Kingdom. For British pound .....................................$1.3008 brand from Thailand by the end lost $200 million last year, includ- nonlocal currency exchange rates (i.e., New Zealand and Thailand as Canada (Dollar) ...................................1.3233 purchasing British pounds in Germany), of this year. ing $100 million in the fourth China (Yuan) ........................................6.9803 part of a strategy to exit mar- check with your local military banking Denmark (Krone) ................................6.8917 “This is a very disappointing quarter. facility. Commercial rates are interbank kets that don’t produce adequate Egypt (Pound) ....................................15.6288 rates provided for reference when buying returns on investments raised outcome,” said Karen Andrews, GM’s CEO, Mary Barra, said Euro ........................................ $1.0839/0.9226 currency. All figures are foreign currencies Australia’s minister for Indus- the company wants to focus on Hong Kong (Dollar) .............................7.7683 dismay Monday from officials to one dollar, except for the British pound, Hungary (Forint) .................................309.74 try, Science and Technology. She markets where it can drive strong which is represented in dollars-to-pound, concerned over job losses. Israel (Shekel) .....................................3.4238 and the euro, which is dollars-to-euro.) The company said in a state- said 500 workers would lose their returns, scaling back operations Japan (Yen) ...........................................109.90 ment Sunday that plans to wind jobs. in Australia, New Zealand and Kuwait (Dinar) .....................................0.3052 INTEREST RATES Norway (Krone) ...................................9.2498 down sales, engineering and de- GM has 828 employees in Thailand to selling niche spe- Philippines (Peso).................................50.57 Prime rate ................................................4.75 sign operations for its historic Australia and New Zealand and cialty vehicles. GM is making the Poland (Zloty) ..........................................3.93 Discount rate ..........................................2.25 Saudi Arabia (Riyal) ...........................3.7506 Federal funds market rate ...................1.58 Holden brand in Australia and another 1,500 in Thailand, the same moves in Japan, Russia and Singapore (Dollar) ..............................1.3887 3-month bill .............................................1.53 New Zealand in 2021. It also plans company said. Europe . South Korea (Won) ..........................1,184.33 30-year bond ...........................................2.05 WEATHER OUTLOOK TUESDAY IN THE MIDDLE EAST TUESDAY IN EUROPE WEDNESDAY IN THE PACIFIC Misawa 37/31 Kabul 52/32 Seoul 42/27 Baghdad 68/48 Kandahar 61/39 Osan Tokyo Mildenhall/ Drawsko 45/25 48/30 Lakenheath Pomorskie Busan 47/39 44/40 46/30 Iwakuni 50/38 Kuwait Bahrain Zagan Sasebo City 66/62 Brussels 45/41 Guam 68/60 47/40 Ramstein 50/37 82/78 Lajes, 45/41 Riyadh Doha Azores Stuttgart Pápa 81/60 77/57 59/55 45/39 51/43 Aviano/ Vicenza 50/39 Naples 55/46 Okinawa Morón 63/59 67/51 Sigonella Rota 59/35 The weather is provided by the Djibouti Souda Bay American Forces Network Weather Center, 81/72 63/51 55/51 2nd Weather Squadron at Offutt Air Force Base, Neb. T O D A Y IN STRIPES American Roundup ..... 10 Classified .................. 13 Comics ...................... 16 Crossword ................. 16 Faces ........................ 11 Opinion .................14-15 Sports ...................17-24 Tuesday, February 18, 2020 •STARS AND STRIPES• F3HIJKLM PAGE 3 MILITARY USS Arizona attack survivor Stratton dies BY WYATT OLSON ing Ford Island, the berthing point for the away the dead and diseased skin left from Stars and Stripes eight massive warships of Battleship Row: the burns. California, Maryland, Nevada, Oklahoma, He was medically discharged from the Donald Stratton, a sailor severely burned Pennsylvania, Tennessee, West Virginia Navy in September 1942 and returned to while aboard the doomed USS Arizona and Arizona. Red Cloud. during the Japanese surprise attack Dec. With no time to fire up the Arizona’s boil- But as the following weeks passed in his 7, 1941, died Saturday at his home in Colo- ers to steam out of port, the ship’s broad- hometown, he came to realize that “every- rado Springs, Colo. He was 97. side became an easy target. At one point, thing innocent and trusting and carefree” His passing leaves only two living survi- a bomb ignited the forward magazines, had been ripped from him with the attack, vors of the battleship, Lou Conter and Ken causing a catastrophic explosion. and he was overwhelmed with the urge to Potts. “Men stumbled around on the deck like be back in the Navy. Stratton’s wife of 69 years, Velma, and human torches, each collapsing into a flam- He was allowed to reenlist in Febru- son Randy announced his death in a Face- ing pile of flesh,” Stratton wrote.