Aboard the escort carrier USS Petrof Bay (CVE-80), a sailor costumed as a pirate scales a rope rigged over the ship's gun deck during a 'Crossing the Line' ceremony - the Navy's traditional ritual marking a sailor's first crossing of the equator. Presided over by 'King Neptune' and his shellback court, these ceremonies offered welcome levity for crews enduring the long, tense deployments of the Pacific War, where Petrof Bay supported amphibious landings at Leyte, Lingayen Gulf, and Okinawa. Project: 218431