some engagements with enemy land-based aircraft. One particularly intense air attack came on 25 October when Japanese planes were attacking the ships from almost every angle. A twin engine "Betty" bomber flew up the starboard side of the Zeal and drew the combined fire of her 3-inch and [[Oerlikon 20 mm cannon|20 mm]] batteries. A few seconds later, that intruder burst into flames and splashed into the sea. Zeal escaped the air raids with little or no damage, and her crew suffered only one casualty. On 28 October, she stood out of Leyte Gulf on her way back to Manus. The minesweeper entered Seeadler Harbor on 5 November. Overhauled in the States Nine days later, Zeal began the first leg of a voyage back to the United States. Steaming via Pearl Harbor, she arrived in Portland, Oregon, on 4 December. She was overhauled there at the Albina Shipards during December and the first two months of 1945. She completed repairs and departed Portland on 4 March, bound for refresher and minesweeping training along the coast of California. That employment occupied her for about a month. Supporting Okinawa operations On 2 April 1945, she departed the U.S. West Coast to return to the war in the western Pacific. After stops at Pearl Harbor and at Eniwetok Atoll, the minesweeper arrived at Kerama Retto in the Ryūkyūs on 21 May to join in the last campaign of World War II—the seven-week-old assault on Okinawa. During her tour of duty at Okinawa, Zeal served on the radar picket stations situated around the island and at some distance from which to provide early warning of air attack from enemy bases on Kyūshū and Formosa (now called Taiwan). Though she witnessed a number of kamikaze and conventional air attacks on other ships, she suffered only one such scrape herself. On the night of 27 May, a Japanese float plane started a run on her, but her antiaircraft batteries quickly discouraged him. End-of-war operations Zeal remained at Okinawa until the beginning of July at which time she embarked upon some large-scale minesweeping operations. The first, designated Operation Juneau, was conducted in a 60-mile rectangle in the East China Sea. She returned to Okinawa late in July to conduct an availability in preparation for a similar operation, code-named "Skagway." On 15 August, while she was still undergoing repairs, Japan capitulated. A week later, she departed Okinawa on