Gulf Mishap Kills 8 Sailors : Saddam Tells His Generals to Brace for War

Scalding steam spewed from a ruptured boiler pipe on the helicopter carrier Iwo Jima in the Persian Gulf today, killing eight sailors and critically injuring two others.

That accident and the death of a Marine when his jeep overturned in Saudi Arabia boosted the number of U.S. military deaths to 41 during the nearly three-month-old Operation Desert Shield without a shot being fired.

In another development today, Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein said he expects an attack in the next few days by the United States and its allies.

In a meeting of his military commanders, Hussein discussed final “preparations for urban warfare and necessary measures to be taken in the event of combat in (Kuwait),” the Iraqi News Agency reported.

The agency did not explain why Saddam believed an attack was imminent.

There was some speculation that the warning may be a propaganda ploy by Iraq to drive a wedge between the United States and those of its allies who seek to avoid hostilities.

The Iwo Jima accident was the worst for the Navy in the U.S.-led air, land and sea mobilization that followed Iraq’s Aug. 2 invasion of Kuwait. In the only other Navy fatality during the operation, a sailor was electrocuted in August aboard the cruiser Antietam.

The Iwo Jima, part of the amphibious task force and U.S. naval armada supporting Operation Desert Shield, had left Bahrain an hour before the 8:15 a.m. accident.

“It was only a couple of miles from the pier when the accident occurred,” said Lt. Kevin Wensing, a spokesman for Command Naval Forces, Central Command.

Wensing, who visited the ship after it returned to port, spoke of the “heroism” of a well-trained crew, which quickly “secured the (ship’s) two boilers, anchored the ship, evacuated the injured after their condition was stabilized and collected the remains of the dead.”

He said because the boilers were shut off--and despite the fact that the vessel had emergency diesel generators for backup--it was towed to port with the help of Bahraini tugs.

He described the mood of the rest of the 685-member crew and 1,100 Marines aboard as “somber but very determined.”

The names of the dead and injured men were withheld until their relatives could be notified. The Iwo Jima is based in Norfolk, Va.