I have heard all kinds of stories, generally they involve soldiers taking them out for exercises and them sinking. However I did head that the mating amphtracks came from some US Army men who took them out got drunk and ended up with them sinking. Id imagine somewhere out there the real information can be found.
I have done some research on this. Unfortunately, I would have to make a trip back east to the archives and go through the records of the 20 or 21 amtrak/amtank battalions that trained at Ft. Ord during WW2, in order to find the records and establish what happened (or at least what got put down in the official report).
I can give you the info that I have established. The LVT (Navy/USMC. Amtrack/Amtrak to the army) off Del Monte is very puzzling. That there's one there is not very surprising; they trained beginner amtrack and amtank (the latter cannon-armed versions made of armor plate, with enclosed tops) drivers at Del Monte Beach before moving up the coast to heavier surf nearer Ft. Ord, and floodings/sinkings were not uncommon. However, they were generally close enough to shore that the vehicles could be recovered with a couple of towing cables, while this one is well beyond the surf zone.
This one has some very unusual and contradictory features. There is a 37mm tank turret (used on the LVT(A)1 Amtank) sans gun and instruments near the aft end of what should be the cargo bay. However, further forward in the bay, indeed resting on the shelf in the driver's compartment, is a rolled-up track lying on its side. The contradictory parts are that I can find no sign of the engine, which would be situated directly behind the driver's compartment blocking the space where the spare track partly sits; a cannon-armed version would be closed-top and thus there's no way that any cargo (such as an entire rolled-up track) could be put inside; a cargo version wouldn't have a cannon turret; and cargo such as the spare track shouldn't be sitting on the shelf in the driver's compartment; there's also a metal tube containing electrical wire lying partly in the cargo compartment, which doesn't seem to have anything to do with the LVT, and looks much newer.
Taking all the above into account, I think this was a derelict which was deliberately sunk where it was, after removing any expensive re-usable/repairable bits like the engine, driver's controls and instruments, etc. They dropped a defective turret (after removing the gun and all instruments) and an old, worn-out track at opposite ends of the interior to weight it and keep it from moving around in the waves (otherwise it would be neutral or even positively buoyant even when completely filled with water, if empty) then towed it out and sank it.
What I can't say for sure is why; unlike a derelict overseas, it would have been no big deal to load the parts on a flatcar and ship it back to FMC in San Jose (where many of them were made) to repair, or else to a scrap yard to be melted down and re-used. There would seem to be little reason to just dump it, and I'd think that the coast guard wouldn't be happy about them dumping it in such shallow water in the harbor. The metal tube presumably post-dates the sinking, and is irrelevant.
One possible reason for it being dumped instead of repaired/recycled is a supply fiddle that probably dates back to Caesar's time if not earlier - clearing up deficiencies/discrepancies. Military supply officers have to sign for and are personally responsible for all their inventory, but inevitably some of it is missing due to clerical error, midnight requisitioning, un-official trades or what have you. Thus, in order to make the books balance it really helps if you can have some official reason for writing off a piece of equipment, or better yet multiple pieces of equipment.
There's an account in Robert Mason's book "Chickenhawk" of how it works: a Huey helicopter in Vietnam crashlanded and was adjudged too badly damaged to be worth recovering. The aviation battalion supply officers couldn't have been happier, and if you were to accept the 'official' inventory of what equipment was onboard that helo when it crashed, you'd have to believe that it was carrying three times its own weight in equipment, including spare rotorblades, a couple of spare engines, enough machine guns to arm several Hueys, etc. No wonder it crashed.
I've read a similar story from the Battle of Britain. At an RAF fighter base that had just been bombed, a storekeeper was busy sweeping up the broken glass from the windows of his storeroom (which had been broken by a string of bombs landing nearby), and was heard to mutter "when will they learn to aim better - 50 yards this way and I could have written off two years deficiencies."
I don't know if something similar happened in this case, but it would fit the facts and explain why the LVT off Del Monte wasn't repaired or recycled.
As to the mating amtracks, they seem a bit more straightforward, although I have no idea why they should be so far west; there are no beaches in the area big enough to make amphibious training useful. They are two different models: the bottom one is an LVT4 (same as I believe the Del Monte LVT is) with rear ramp, and the top one is an LVT2 or LVT(A)2 without one; the (A) in this case indicates that it's made out of armored steel instead of mild steel, and is otherwise identical to the LVT2. Because they're lying one partly on top of the other, it seems most likely to me that they were tied together; the LVT4 sank first and pulled the LVT2 under. Possibly the LVT4 was towing the LVT2; engine swampings or breakdowns weren't uncommon. That might explain why the bow of the LVT2 lies over the side of the LVT4, if they were towing stern to bow.
Whether the sinking was accidental or deliberate is impossible to say; the LVT4's rear ramp is dropped and thus the whole of the cargo area would be open to the sea, swamping the engine (which powered the bilge pumps. Early production vehicles lacked any manual back-up pump). Whether this happened before it sank (indeed, that would precipitate the sinking) or after it had settled on the bottom I can't say. I do know that the rear ramp was raised and lowered by a manual winch, backed up by locks on both sides to hold it closed. So, either none of the locks were engaged on the surface, or they rusted through after the sinking and the ramp dropped open under its own weight , despite all the rust that would be holding it in place. The ramp is mostly buried in sand, but on the part that's exposed you can still some of the lateral ridges molded into it for traction.
Guy (yeah, I'm a
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