Rick's Story Of The Week

[reevesr1]

So ya'll may have noticed a gambling, fighting, fishing theme in my previous stories. After reading about some of my ancestors, you might think "that Rick must be one fightin', gamblin' and fishin' dude". Not so much. If you fish as often as I do, you are bound to luck into a few. I really have almost no fishing instincts at all. As for fighting, unless you count leading with your face a "style", I am pretty useless. My lack of ability to gamble led directly to my quitting university the first time. I gambled a lot, sucked at it, and ran out of money. No easy task as I had been saving for school for several years while working for my dad. (Now that I think about it, maybe MissinTheBow and I were switched at birth. He gambles, used to box and can catch a fish or two, or so I'm told. I haven't seen it yet, but I believe him. He could be my fathers son, if he were only taller, and better lookin').

 

Anyway, running out of money caused me to start looking for a job. Looking for a job led me to the Navy, and the Navy led me to this story (try to follow the logic, I know it's convoluted).

 

I spent 8 yrs in the US Navy as a Nuclear Reactor Operator (save the Homer or radiation makes you bald jokes, odds are I've heard 'em all) and then Supervisor. The last three years were on the USS Birmingham, SSN-695 protecting the free world. While on the Birmingham, we were steaming towards a date with Thailand after a long operation in the North Pacific (which is another story in itself). After being cooped up in a sub for 70 days or so, Thailand certainly had it's attractions. Unfortunately, while running drills, we ran into a bit of a problem.

 

The drill in question caused us to shut down the reactor. Without the reactor for propulsion, we need some method of running the ship. So we take the boat up to periscope depth, raise the mast which includes a 14" air line and crank up the diesel generator. 20 pistons of loud, hot power. My job during any emergency was to take over Reactor Ops. (Homers job would have been to run away) In this particular drill, I was sound asleep when the alarm went off. I jumped out of bed, into my coveralls and hauled ass back aft. When I hit the water tight door that separated the forward and aft section of the ship, I disturbingly find myself in a waterfall of very cold water. I stick out my tongue and was even more disturbed to discover it is saltwater. I start screaming FLOODING! at the top of my lungs. Words cannot describe the horror of being in a 300' tube with water coming in. Not a great feeling (my bet is much like the feeling of a grizzly bear breathing in your ear!). As I was standing next to the watertight door, I did what I had been trained to do, which is CLOSE IT!! Which I did, rapidly. Once the door was closed, another chilling realization hit me. I'm on the wrong side of the @#$@$@% door. So now, I can't go take over the reactor because I'm not supposed to reopen the door, and I'm on the side of the boat with water coming in. Just fantastic. But as I look around, I see that water is coming out of every single vent duct I can see, and I hear people yelling FLOODING! everywhere. Then I realize what has happened.

 

Picture this, we are at 60' of depth with a mast sticking out of the water to supply air to the diesel. Now the mast is a radar target, and submarines don't like to be found so we don't raise the mast very often. Like almost never. So at the same time we use the air for the diesel, we take advantage of fresh air and let it ventilate the ship. A nuclear sub makes its own air, water, basically everything you need to live but food (or sex), and because it is a closed enviornment, can get a bit rancid. Not that we would notice, because we live in it. But any chance to ventilate the ship is very welcome.

 

Now what happened was our helmsman lost control of depth and the boat went to 70' and the mast went under water. Shouldn't be a problem as there are two sensors on the mast to rapidly shut the flapper valve in the 14" air line if the mast goes under. Unfortunately, one must have been broken during our deployment and the other had just been fixed in a shipyard, but was installed backwards (and the shipyard signed off on a retest that was never done. A couple of people went to jail over that.) Now instead of a 14" air line, we have a 14" water line. Directly to a running diesel engine. And every ventillation duct in the ship. Anyway, we blow ballast tanks and are on surface in 30 seconds or so. But we have an unbeliveable mess with water everywhere and all the insulation on the ship soaking wet, along with some Reactor Control electronics. And one truly broken diesel engine. And worse yet, no Thailand. See, now we have no diesel (backup power) and a compromised control system for the reactor. So off we go for repairs. To Guam. Instead of Thailand. Did I mention that we haven't seen girls except for 2 days in Tokyo in 70 some odd days. And Guam is pretty much all guys because it was a big US military base at the time. Hoo freaking ray. Took us 2 months to repair the boat, then back to Hawaii (ok, living there didn't suck much). No Thailand, no Hong Kong, no Australia. Our deployments were called WestPacs (for Western Pacific). We called that one WastePac '85.

[birchy]

That's a great story rickr! Holy crap that'd be scary though!!

 

The closest I've ever been to a submarine is watching the Hunt for Red October and Crimson Tide.. oh, and Das Boot. I can't imagine. I bet alot of people discover they have claustrophobia when they least expect it eh?

[reevesr1]

That's a great story rickr! Holy crap that'd be scary though!!

 

The closest I've ever been to a submarine is watching the Hunt for Red October and Crimson Tide.. oh, and Das Boot. I can't imagine. I bet alot of people discover they have claustrophobia when they least expect it eh?

 

We used to have movies every night. Once we had seen it 10 times or so we would say it was "Qualified Birmingham". Das Boot was "Qualified Birmingham". I'm sure Hunt for Red October was as well, but it was out after I left the boat.

 

After seening Das Boot a number of times we started to call everything on the boat das something, like das screwdriver, das wrench, das main engine, das torpedo, you get the point. Told people it meant "submarine screwdriver, submarine wrench, etc. We knew das meant "the", but you would be suprised the number of people who asked "das is German for Submarine?"

[j5ep00]

your storys are awsome!!

i think you should tell them twice a week lol

or maybe we need to fish toghter sometime

[reevesr1]

your storys are awsome!!

i think you should tell them twice a week lol

or maybe we need to fish toghter sometime

 

Sorry BBB, (the Brown, not Brent variety) but I only fish with people who are better at it than I am. Wait a minute, that's everyone.

 

OK, you're on!

 

Twice a week? Uh, no thanks. At that frequency, by the end of the year you'll be hearing about my 6th grade talent contest. I think I was 3rd. Not quite as exciting as Flooding on a Nuclear Submarine!!

[toolman]

Terrific story Rick. Keep them coming.

[hydropsyche]

Excellent read. Wrong side of the door and orders not to reopen it. I'm sure you were thinking "Court martial ain't so bad.".

 

Have you ever met our old friend The Russian Fish Killer from the Fly Fish Alberta board? He had a helicopter and a lot of friends in espionage places. I wonder who's poisoned pill found him.

[OneMoreLastCast]

Why did they bother repairing the sub? They could have just sold it to us up here in Canada.

That's what Britain would have done.

 

Cool story though....Oh, and Poker isn't gambling.

[reevesr1]

Excellent read. Wrong side of the door and orders not to reopen it. I'm sure you were thinking "Court martial ain't so bad.".

 

Have you ever met our old friend The Russian Fish Killer from the Fly Fish Alberta board? He had a helicopter and a lot of friends in espionage places. I wonder who's poisoned pill found him.

I did have thoughts of opening the door and stepping to the other side. As it turned out, lucky thing I didn't. One of my shipmates came at the door from the other side to close it. He saw that someone else, me, had beat him to the punch. Said that one of the vents was dumping on the Pressurizer Heater Panel which was a bank of 50 AMP fuses. Said pretty lights were shooting out of the panel and it would have been a BAD place to be standing. Lucky me, but dumb luck.

 

What has always been interesting to me is how your training kicks in, without any hesitation, in the midst of abject terror. There were some things about the military I truly did not like. But baby, they sure know how to train.

[Pipestoneflyguy]

Another amazing story Rick ! - geez man, I can't stay in a closed meeting room for more than an hour without getting loopy let alone being locked up in a sub for 70 days - thats wild, I think I'd risk becoming a "Tim Treadwell" sandwich before ever signing up to get in one of those things.