Sea Stories.. Lets hear some.

[Bubblehead Nuke]

I'll start with this one, I should have sent it to the Almanac.

Timex: It takes a licking and keeps on ticking.

A Certain A-ganger was in the sail on a 688 performing maintenance and his wrist watch fell off. They looked for a while and could not find it. The presumed that it had slid out one of the limber holes (they let water into the bottom of the sail during a dive) and gone over the side. They closed up the sail and thought nothing more of it for a few weeks.

Then we get underway and dive.

It took a few hours but someone in sonar noticed that on the was a quick beep being made from time to time. It was not too loud and they were not sure what it was.

At 5:30 the next morning, the beeping went on for quite a while and they realized that they were listening to the alarm function on a digital watch. They also finally figure out that the other beeps are the 'hourly chime' function.

The questions start being asked:

Where is the noise coming from?

Can we be counter detected by the noise?

The truth comes out. The A-Ganger comes forward and explains to the CO what has happened and the presumtion that were made. He has lost his Timex G-Force watch in the sail and it has not gone over the side as they have hoped.

There is a call made on the 1MC. If anyone has a G-Force on them they need to bring it to control IMMEDIATELY. This watch was new on the market and there was ONE other of the same make on the boat at the time.

The question is asked: What is the rated depth on the watch? They read the other persons watch and a decision is made. They are going to crush the watch.

We rig for deep submergance and down we go. We are deeper than the watch is rated for and we wait.

BEEP goes the watch.....

.....an hour later it BEEPS again

.....another hour, and the chime is still working.

The captain decides that we are going to stay deep till the next broadcast.

Hours go by, and the watch refuses to stop working. By this time the CO is PISSED. The A-ganger is being glared at by his chief. We go, clear broadcast, and go down again. Maybe the quick cycling of pressure will brake the dang thing.

5:30 and the alarm goes off. Yep, it takes a licking and keeps on ticking.

The CO waits another few hours and then decides that we HAVE to go in and find the &^%$ watch.

We go back to Norfolk and the a-ganger (who is NOT a small guy btw) it told to get his butt in the sail and not come out till that watch is found. It took him HOURS to find it but he does. It is in perfect condition and he retrieves it.

He gets the watchband fixed and was going to write a letter to Timex. Remember when they used to have those commercials about the abuses that their watches took and kept on going? I think he would have had the best.

The problem was, back then they navy would only say that they go deeper then 400 feet and faster than 20 knots.

The timex was rated for 650 feet and if you know a 688, we exceed that by a good amount. He was not allowed to send it. I think it would have been a great commercial.

As for the watch, I think he still had it when he got out a few years later. I know he was proud of it.

---------------------------------------------

There you go, something funny. Anyone else have one to share?

[Frame57]

That was good! I am going to have to put my memory banks to work for some of these. This one was not funny but was an event that I will always remember.

We were on patrol in the Med. back in the early 80's, snooping and pooping as our crusty goats used to call it. Minding our own business at 400 feet or so. I climb into my rack for some shut eye and decided to read a book about the Thrersher disaster. After a couple of chapters I shut of my light and all of a sudden a noise like none other i ever heard before awoke me. It sounded like someone was using a can opener on the side of the boat. Simultaneously the boat started to list to starboard severely throwing me out of my comfy rack. No collision alarm sounded, just dead quiet. My heart was pumping because I knew something was up and ran to the bow compartment to my damage control/battle station in the emergency diesel compartment. Finally the collision alarm sounds and all compartments reported no flooding.

After we stabilized the CO surfaced the boat and directly on our starboard beam was an uncharted oil rig. We ran smack dab into it scraping our hull and actually bending our stabilizer fin. We lucked out in that nothing more serious happened, but when we started to steam toward LaMaddalina for repair the whole boat would shake becaus of that bent stabilizer fin. I decided never to read a book about Submarine disasters ever again while we were underway. So as not to hog the thread, later i will share one about the time I bought a goat in Italy and what i did with that goat.:D

[Dr.Sid]

Great idea this thread.

I hope Neal won't think this can run his Almanac business, because now I want it even more ! :hmm:

Uncharted oil rig you say ? Good idea for mission design :arrgh!:

[Bill Nichols]

Frame57's story reminde me of an experience I had as OOD one night in the Atlantic...

Our atmosphere control equipment wasn't the best, so to freshen the air we usually came to periscope depth, raised the snorkel mast and ventilated the ship using the low pressure blower.

That night we were ventilating and I was on the 'scope to ensure we didn't run into anyone. The Captain wanted to stay at PD until tne next submarine broadcast, so we were going to be up for a while.

I had a ship off the starboard bow that sonar ID'd as a merchant. I had another visual contact off the port bow, lit up like a christmas tree, that I couldn't identify, and wasn't held on sonar.

While I was scratching my head trying to figure out what the mystery ship was, it occurred to me there was something strange about the merchant to starboard. Taking a closer look, I noticed she was showing three white lights on her masthead. Having just recently qualified for OOD, I realized that I was looking at an ocean-going tug, and putting two-and-two together, realized that the mystery contact to port was her tow. :o

I immediately ordered a 90-degree course change to port! If I hadn't, we would have most likely run into the tow cable between the tug and what, later, I discovered was the oil platform she was towing.

:ping:

[Frame57]

Wow! If something is in the water and it ain't making noise.... Now I finally have it figured out why we needed lookouts on a nuclear powered sub. :up:

[Frame57]

Great idea this thread.

I hope Neal won't think this can run his Almanac business, because now I want it even more ! :hmm:

Uncharted oil rig you say ? Good idea for mission design :arrgh!: That Almanac is great. I am still chuckling over the story of the fellow who got into a lot of trouble and the COB placed him on lookout watch pierside in port while there a lot of fog. he falls asleep on the fwd capstain while it rotated slowly and thought the sail of his boat was another ship in the fog, so he calls out a collision imminent. I have always heard that submariners had to be in the top one or two percent in the intelligance category to go to Sub School. It sure does not explain me, that is for sure. But it makes for good stories I guess. I am definitely looking forward to the next Almanac. Bill's story reminds me of a Junior officer we had on the A-Fish. This guy was OOD, when we were surfaced and on two seperste occaisions he reprted a visual contact in the GIUK. Sonar could not confirm it, neither did the lookouts. So the CO ordered the radar mast to be raised and....nothing! Then on another occaision this poor fellow almost surfaced us with a fishing boat right above us. I never heard our CO use foul language before until that day. The fellow was no longer a submariner after we returned home. We called him "Casper" because of the "Ghost ships", he saw. I fought long and hard to remain a helmsman/planesman because it was tooo fun! But then I had to qualify as O2 genny operator which was dull as watching the paint dry. But those days, I would not trade for a million bucks. I guess that is why i am here, kinda of reliving some of it and enjoying the comraderie once more:D

[Kpt. Lehmann]

Awesome thread. Keep 'em coming.:up: :up: :up:

[Janus]

Very interesting thread.
Yet I'd appreciate if you would explain abbreviations and expressions not everyone might know, for example:
a-ganger
OOD
COB

Thanks in advance.

[OneShot]

OOD = Officer of the Deck
COB = Chief of the boat (Senior NCO onboard)

[Bill Nichols]

a-ganger - enlisted sailor who belongs to the Auxilliary division (responsible for auxilliary, non-propulsion mechanical equipment such as the air conditioning system, etc.)

[Janus]

Thank you :up:
Now keep the stories coming :D

[Frame57]

a-ganger - enlisted sailor who belongs to the Auxilliary division (responsible for auxilliary, non-propulsion mechanical equipment such as the air conditioning system, etc.)Yes! AKA "Knuckle draggers"

[Frame57]

There are many ways to get into trouble on a Submarine some of them are worth it and this is one of them. I have to use a fictitious name for what was to be bestowed upon this poor fellow, but the story goes as follows...

I remember working on our ever troublesome high pressure air compressor. (HPAC, we had three of them on the Archerfish. Two up front and one aft of frame 57 in "Nooky land". The below decks watch ran into auxilary machinery one all excited to fetch me because I had to see what was going on up topside. The topside watch was checking in a Newby. The newby was not in uniform and was dressed in bright green checkered bellbottoms and had a spiked hairdo. He must have weighed 120 pounds soaking wet. His name was close to "Weasley" I looked at the below decks watch and said "Were gonna have fun with this one!"

I think we were once again headed on one of our "Northern runs". Which usually meant it was time once again to play with our Soviet counterparts. Seaman Weasley had to sleep in the Torpedo room on a spare rack. This is not the best way to get shut eye because the lights stay on all the time and usually this was the other place where off duty crew would shoot the breeze. Well one night the TM of the watch was cracking up and drew our attention to Seaman Weasley who was dreaming of something that was causing him to "Stand and salute". (The best term i could fing to keep the thread clean guys-sorry). I had a brilliant Idea and that was to go to AMR-1 and get something called "Prussian Blue". This was a gel formed dye we used to check sealing surfaces on various types of equipment. The fun part of this dye is that if you get it on you, it will not wash off. It will wear of over time. Great stuff! With the team work of the TMOW I decided to give Seaman Weasley's flag pole a paint job with this dye. He was deep sleeper and when he awoke i do not think he knew anything was out of sorts until he went to the head to do his business. We waited for him to return to the Torpedo room just to see his reaction, but who showed up was the "Doc". The Doc was wearing a mile wide smile and told us that he did not know if he could keep this from the XO. But he wanted to know who did it, and I had to confess.

Weasley went right to the XO with his new "blue flag pole". The XO actually chewed him out for "ratting on his crew mates". Our XO did not like Weasley because of when he reported to the boat in civilain attire. Weasley eventually never worked out he was always on the "Dink" list and was off the boat before our next long run. Maybe it was the devil or just premonition about this fellow, but one thing is for sure, never trust a bubblehead who has access to Prussian Blue.:D

[JREX53]

I was on the Abraham Lincoln, a boomer. We had a Boot Ensign who thought he was God's gift to the world. Those in the service know what I am talking about. Well now to the story.

We were out on patrol and I was standing the throttleman watch, when all of a sudden we heard on the "4MC", "Flooding in the Auxiliary Machinery Space!", from our EWS (Engineering Watch Supervisor).

Well, there are 4 main steps that are suppose to happen when that message is passed. They are: 1. Full rise on planes, 2. Emergency blow the ballast tanks, 3. Shift reactor plant for full power operation, and 4. Answer All Ahead Flank on the throttles. Well parts 1, 3, and 4 were answered right away, but the OOD did not give the order to do an Emergency Blow.

The CO came storming out of his stateroom, yelling why we weren't blowing our ballast tanks. Needless to say the CO dressed down the OOD in front to the Control Room watch and made him requalify the watch station.

We didn't see much of him for the next week or so. Oh, the flooding turned out to be a flange leaking on one of the seawater lines used for cooling on an A/C Plant.
The EWS just panic when he saw the leak, but the watch stander in the space knew all about it.

[Bubblehead Nuke]

Here is a mental excercise for those of you who never served on a boat.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

Image...

It is dark...

... you are sound asleep.....

and someone rips back the curtain on your rack, and you are violently shaken awake. The first thing you see standing there are 2 crewmen in full canary suits (radcon suits for you non-quals), EAB's and berthing lights full on (they are ALWAYS off underway).

The very next thing you here is a LOUD say "Oh SH*T, this one is still alive, quick, get him in a mask".

----------------------------------------------------------------------

What is your FIRST reaction? Really, think about it, what would you think or do?

We did this to a dink nub sonar guy at the behest of his LPO. This guy crapped his pants right there. Screamed like a girlie man as well. Banged his head so hard on the rack light he required stitches.

The reason lights were on? It was field day (friday about 8:30am) and this guy thought that he deserved sleep more than anyone else. His own divmates also let it be known that he had been watching the midnight movie rather than sleep or work on quals.

He learned a few lessons that day. The biggest one is that there is NO SYMPATHY for you if you are dink. None. The Doc told him that had he been awake, he would not been able to bang his head. The COB wanted know why he was in his rack 30 minutes after field day started.

The Eng wanted to know why we were not in the bilge cleaning :-?

[Frame57]

Did you guys use "Bug Juice" to clean stuff with? That stuff could clean just about anything? I wonder where that term originated from? I never could understand field days. Back in my "newby" days as messenger of the watch. The Chiefs in particular would get pissed off if I cleaned out their coffee mugs. I asked the COB once why e had to field day every friday, especially the "Goat Locker" seeing as they do like to even have their coffee cups cleaned out. Well, once again my big mouth earned me extra field day training.....Sheeez! The good old days!:D

[Bubblehead Nuke]

The whole thing about washing the coffee cups. Geesh does that bring back memories.

They called it 'seasoning'. You only swished water around and dumped it out. You NEVER EVER used soap. Said it changed the way it tasted, heck one guy said he could add water to his cup and get a half way decent cup of joe just from the residue left inside.

We had a Master Chief Electriction who claimed that the same scum had been on the inside of his coffee cup from some 10 years. The only reason it was not there longer was that his wife 'accidently' cleaned it. As I remember, he was soon divorced from her. I don't think it was the cause, but it probably created a LOT of friction.

I have no idea WHY it is called bug juice, but it fit the perfect mentality of subs. Thre are almost NO single purpose items onboard. My question is what did it start life out as. Was it a drink mix that someone figured out was a GREAT cleaner for the stainless steel commodes, or was it a cleaner that someone got a taste of (hows THAT for a mental image!) and decided that you could use it for a tasty beverage?

[sonar732]

Did you guys use "Bug Juice" to clean stuff with? That stuff could clean just about anything? I wonder where that term originated from? I never could understand field days. Back in my "newby" days as messenger of the watch. The Chiefs in particular would get pissed off if I cleaned out their coffee mugs. I asked the COB once why e had to field day every friday, especially the "Goat Locker" seeing as they do like to even have their coffee cups cleaned out. Well, once again my big mouth earned me extra field day training.....Sheeez! The good old days!:D
Everytime that I see the 'bug juice' kids drink at the convience store it makes me wonder if the creator was an ex-submariner...not to mention the kids laughing when I tell them if they don't drink it all that they need to clean the head with it.

[Frame57]

The whole thing about washing the coffee cups. Geesh does that bring back memories.

They called it 'seasoning'. You only swished water around and dumped it out. You NEVER EVER used soap. Said it changed the way it tasted, heck one guy said he could add water to his cup and get a half way decent cup of joe just from the residue left inside.

We had a Master Chief Electriction who claimed that the same scum had been on the inside of his coffee cup from some 10 years. The only reason it was not there longer was that his wife 'accidently' cleaned it. As I remember, he was soon divorced from her. I don't think it was the cause, but it probably created a LOT of friction.

I have no idea WHY it is called bug juice, but it fit the perfect mentality of subs. Thre are almost NO single purpose items onboard. My question is what did it start life out as. Was it a drink mix that someone figured out was a GREAT cleaner for the stainless steel commodes, or was it a cleaner that someone got a taste of (hows THAT for a mental image!) and decided that you could use it for a tasty beverage?I hear ya brother! LOL:rotfl:

[Frame57]

Did you guys use "Bug Juice" to clean stuff with? That stuff could clean just about anything? I wonder where that term originated from? I never could understand field days. Back in my "newby" days as messenger of the watch. The Chiefs in particular would get pissed off if I cleaned out their coffee mugs. I asked the COB once why e had to field day every friday, especially the "Goat Locker" seeing as they do like to even have their coffee cups cleaned out. Well, once again my big mouth earned me extra field day training.....Sheeez! The good old days!:D
Everytime that I see the 'bug juice' kids drink at the convience store it makes me wonder if the creator was an ex-submariner...not to mention the kids laughing when I tell them if they don't drink it all that they need to clean the head with it.I am gonna buy some just for memory sake.:lol:

[Frame57]

After our repair job in LaMaddelina the Archerish steamed toward Toronto Italy. i guess we were going to play some "Hide and Seek" with some combined NATO forces. Boring yes, but part of the job. We had about three days to spend in Toronto. I was banned from going to the bars because the XO did not enjoy getting me out of the local fuzz stations for this or that when I was drunk as a skunk. The COB had already made his S*H*I*T house mouse. So I decided to hike the country side, get a little of the local culture in. The area was a bit like a desert, in fact if you saw any of the Spaghetti westerns, this is what it looked like. I was walking through a village and an elderly man waved me over. He was selling goats. I guess people buy them to keep weeds down around their homes and probably make for good garbage disposals. Well, I did what any normal bubblehead should do and I bought the goat.

After having a Calamari dinner at a side walk cafe. (Gave the veggies to the goat), I proceded back to the boat. I never got challenged by anyone and our topside watch was taking draft reading near the stern so there we went, me an my goat across the brow. The goat was not to happy about being carried doen the fwd escape trunk hatch and started to make a lot of goat noises in the process. I tied the goat to the Towed array hydraulic spool and went about to execute my devious plan. The "Goat Locker" (Chief's quarters is on the port side of the bow compartment). Luck was with me, no goats present in the locker! So, I went to get the real goat and put him in the Chief's shower stall and shut the stall door. Being the good host that I am, I then went to the fridge and got our new shipmate some lettuce and carrots. I worked on a few qualification and then hit the rack. We were to have a morning muster topside at O seven hundred.

Muster time came and most of the crew was topside, exept the COB and most of the Chief's. Then all hell broke loose. I heard the COB cussing up a storm and a braying goat being pulled and shoved up through the hatch. The crew was now fully engaged in the spectacle before them. The goat got away from the COB and dashed across the brow and down the pier. The crew was now in hysterics of laughter, myself included. The COB's nickname was "Red", because of his hair, but his face was really red now. He ordered us to shut up with choice vocabulary, in between his threats and rantings, the goat would stop and bray, which made us laugh even more and even more made the COB's blood pressure raise. Well, he threatened the entire crew with all sorts of COB witchcraft, so I had to come forward and confess. He just pointed his finger at me and said, "Below decks NOW!, you will never see daylight again...." I knew deep down the COB liked me and after a couple of weeks of constant cleaning of the goat locker, I guess we were buds again. But after that it seemed as though the Chief's had a new found respect for me. I am sure they nor I will ever forget this prank. :D

[Molon Labe]

I got a good laugh outta that one, thanks.:rotfl:

[Dr.Sid]

In Czech we have a phrase 'submarine disease' which does not seem to have equivalent in English. It is used for the state when several people has to live together in small space and due to lack of privacy they tend to dislike and hate each other. The way someone sneeze, the way someone throws his towel on the floor .. and you find yourself wanting to kill the other guy.

Some say this will be serious trouble for interplanetary flights. Now back to topic.

It's perfectly clear now after Frame57's stories where this term come from, right !? :rotfl:

PS: funny enough, we don't have sea or navy, much less submarine force :o

[Molon Labe]

In Czech we have a phrase 'submarine disease' which does not seem to have equivalent in English.

Some say this will be serious trouble for interplanetary flights. Now back to topic.


SPACE MADNESS!!!!!

http://kelevcat.vox.com/library/video/6a00c2251ceea68fdb00d4141df26b3c7f.html

They think I'm crazy, but I know better. It is not I who am crazy, IT IS I WHO AM MAD!!!!!

[Bubblehead Nuke]

In Czech we have a phrase 'submarine disease' which does not seem to have equivalent in English. It is used for the state when several people has to live together in small space and due to lack of privacy they tend to dislike and hate each other. The way someone sneeze, the way someone throws his towel on the floor .. and you find yourself wanting to kill the other guy.

Some say this will be serious trouble for interplanetary flights. Now back to topic.

It's perfectly clear now after Frame57's stories where this term come from, right !? :rotfl:

PS: funny enough, we don't have sea or navy, much less submarine force :o

I actually found that confines of a submarine created an increased sense of tolerance. There are things that would drive you start raving MAD if you had the ability to leave a situation. When you are stuck in the 'sewer pipe', you had to learn to deal with problems. Coping skills became a highly developed thing.

You knew more about someone than their spouse did. They told you things, and you told them things that you would NEVER talk about to anyone else. EVER.

I became great friends of people, that had I met in other circumstances, I would have either ignored or is some cases walked across the street to avoid. It is the exposure to the varieties of life and lifestyles that tends to make you more tolerant. It gave you a forced introspective look at what YOU did and how others percieved you. This gave you a better ability to look at things from someone elses perspective and maybe lead to a little more understanding.

Was there friction? You betcha. Was there fights?? Oh yes. I had my share of throw down/drag out bare knuckle fights. You know what? After we got done beating the crap out of each other we would realize that what we arged over was damn petty and feel stupid. Then we would go out for a beer and/or a lapdance.

That same person who you fought with three weeks ago had your back when things went down somewhere else. You NEVER left a shipnmate in a fight unless he was a total dumbass and ignored all the warnings you gave him. Then you just let him get stomped on a little and break it up before any real harm is done.

Later in life, I find that very little bothers me. I seemed to have developed my own 'bubble' I guess. Unless you FORCE me to attempt participation in something I dislike, I can pretty much tune it out. It drives my wife LOONEY.

Back to what you called a space problem? I do not think it will be as much a problem as people think. The dynamics of a small crew are well understood and there are tests that can be adminstered to determine compatibility of crew members.

[Frame57]

On extended patrols, what I have found is that we get goofy. I honestly do not recall short tempers ever being a problem. Maybe the cooks put something in our chow (Kidding). Silly goofy things were done to break the monotony that would never draw a laugh in port, but would be crazy funny after a month or so at sea. The only time I remember threatening to punch someone out was during a Royal Bluenose ceremony. They do some weird stuff and make you eat some weird stuff, but it is a tradition. They made some concoction consisting of a variety of hot peppers and I refused it, because I am allergic, they did not believe me, so I almost had to do some punching out. but the doc Intervened and confirmed my food allergy. That is the only time I ever had to physically threaten a shipmate. I was not about to suffer an allergic reaction to appease the Royal order of the bluenose.

All in all, I believe that we became more like family in a way. So I think if there are Sub sailors out there who snap from being at sea, it may be that there are issues at hand regarding the overall morale of the crew. :cool:

[Frame57]

In Czech we have a phrase 'submarine disease' which does not seem to have equivalent in English. It is used for the state when several people has to live together in small space and due to lack of privacy they tend to dislike and hate each other. The way someone sneeze, the way someone throws his towel on the floor .. and you find yourself wanting to kill the other guy.

Some say this will be serious trouble for interplanetary flights. Now back to topic.

It's perfectly clear now after Frame57's stories where this term come from, right !? :rotfl:

PS: funny enough, we don't have sea or navy, much less submarine force :oWell, Doc it is about time we start one for ya!:D

[TopTorp '92]

Maybe I too can make a contribution . . .
I was speaking with the off-going COW so I could be ready for my watch. Ship at PD, sun up, sea state 1 (really light), some stuff goin on back aft (for all I remember it could’ve been steam generator blow-downs) and we were in the process of completing sanitaries (Sans.) Since I was also in Fire Control division, I checked message traffic on OTH (over-the-horizon) contacts, since engineering evolutions were going to keep the ship at PD for several hours; I just wanted an idea of who was in the area. I noticed there was a fishing fleet in the area.
Moments before I assume the watch, AOW reports secure from pumping Sans. This report normally means that the hull valve PL-49 (688 sailors will know this valve) has been shut along with its back up-valve. Sweet, I thought. Just the stuff going on in the engine room to be concerned about.
I also looked to the ship’s control panel to observe the trim angle and it was pointing up. I looked to see who the DOOW was and it was a chief I knew and worked well with. He had been a DOOW for a few months while I had been a COW for considerably longer. However, ever since I knew him as DOOW, I noticed that he liked to fidget with the ship’s trim as if he were never satisfied with its condition.
Then about 20 minutes pass. Dive asks to move some water aft. Now it begins, I thought. He’s already fidgeting with the trim. I move some water to aft trim. I check the trim angle and it is just as it was when I assumed the watch.
Another 15 min or so and Dive asks if I’m moving water. “No,” I say. “Has the sea state picked up?”
He says no but confesses that it may have been the problem. “Move more water aft”.
So I move more water. And wait another 10 min or so. Still getting heavier up forward. What’s going on? Now we’ve moved probably 8-15 Klbs of water from FWD trim to AFT trim.
I call for the AOW. This isn’t the same AOW from before the watch, it’s a different guy. I tell him to go check the valve line-up. Make sure the hull and back-up valves are shut. Also, check the level in all the sanitary tanks. Make sure they’re not rising.
10 minutes or so later, AOW returns and confesses that the off-going AOW failed to secure the line-up. San 1 filled up again and we need to pump.
How inconvenient.
Sonar reports closing contacts. Probably fishermen.
Later, periscope operator reports contacts held visually. Yup, fishermen.
Begin pumping san 1.
Sonar reports noisy ops from fisherman, probably dropping nets.
Years as FTOW led me to ask the periscope operator whether there were sea birds over the ship. There were. Lots of them.
I then told the OOD that pumping sans probably attracted fish, which attract birds, which attract fishermen. Thankfully, he got the idea and decided to clear datum. I guess engineering could wait.
Not 1 but about 3 fishermen dragged their nets nearby and all because the AOW forgot to secure the valve line-up after pumping sans.
DOOW never knew what hit him.

[Frame57]

I like it Torp! You see, we even invent new ways to go fishing!:yep:

[Bubblehead Nuke]

Long time no see TopTorp.

I have been wondering how long till you drop in here.

How you been doing?

[Frame57]

"Tacking on your dolphins". Well here is a practice that I think the new navy might have forsaken. When a squid earned his dolphins it was customary to place the pins over the left upper chest area and then the qualified crew lined up and literally punched the exposed pins into the chest of the newly submarine qualified sailor. I had purple and yellow bruising on my chest for a long time after I got mine. If the boat was in port then sometime a stein or other large glass was filled with beer and the dolphins were dropped in the glass and you had to chug the brew and retrieve your dolphins with your teeth. Saw a couple of light weights pass out doing that one. Funny though, for some reason I never witnessed an officer going through this. Hmmmm!:hmm: Okay Bill, what is the scoop with the officers? Also, I simply cannot tell you what was done with a sailor if he earned them and we were in a port that had "ladies of the night". The material is far to graphic, but I will leave it to your Imagination....:arrgh!:

[JREX53]

When we had to "Drink our Dolphins", they would put almost anything in the mug. Barbeque sauce, tobassco sauce, salsa, beans, corn, etc. Almost everybody ended up puking all over the place. This was in the 70's.

[Frame57]

Back to the Mediterranean Sea... We used to call othe Med. our front yard and the Barents Sea our backyard, I guess because those were our homes away from home. Well, I guess we received Comms. to go check out a Soviet Sub tender parked right smack dap in the middle of the Med. This was interesting to me because the U.S. Tenders usually are parked pierside somewhere. Not the Soviets! They take em and do their thing in open seas. We struck Gold. Tied up to the tender if memory serves me right was a Victor and a Charlie class. It was broad daylight and we had our #2 scope set up with a video feed and a monitor placed above our fire control and one in the crews mess out of all places. We ran a few passes under the subs doing "underhull surveys". One Chief commented and said, "This is more fun than looking up a gals skirt..." It was impressive to be able to see what the CO was seeing and recording through #2 scope. The Skipper raised the elevation of the scope to check out the tender and we saw a bunch of Soviet sailors near the stern frantically making obscene gestures at us. This was astonishing because we could see them from about 95 to 100 feet under the water. That is how good the resolution was and how clear the waters of the Med are. They could see us clear as a bell. The next thing to happen was a lot of active Sonar and a surface craft of some sort was steaming our way fast, so deep we went and hid several miles away. We did this again a day later, only this time one of the Subs had deployed by then. I actually tried making a single mission like this. but dang if I know how to get a sub to just sit still. Anyway, I hope they felt violated by us American Sub voyeur's:yep:

[TopTorp '92]

Long time no see TopTorp.

I have been wondering how long till you drop in here.

How you been doing?

Staying busy. I drop by once and a while to see what's happening. I like the forum. It keeps me in touch with the community.

TT

[Kurulham]

Yeah, "tacking on" is gone. We still pin crows good and proper, though. (Giving the new petty officer insignia of a guy who just made rate a good hard sock.)

Was talking to a couple guys off the Hawk - apparently they used to do the tacking on without the frogs for the wings. Called it blood wings, for obvious reasons.

Makes me kind of glad to be a tin can sailor, actually, though also glad to be getting out before ADM Mullen's notions destroy all of the Navy I joined... when you can have an FCCS who genuinely thinks a working fuse is an open, there's a problem.

[Dr.Sid]

Yeah, "tacking on" is gone. We still pin crows good and proper, though. (Giving the new petty officer insignia of a guy who just made rate a good hard sock.)

Was talking to a couple guys off the Hawk - apparently they used to do the tacking on without the frogs for the wings. Called it blood wings, for obvious reasons.

Makes me kind of glad to be a tin can sailor, actually, though also glad to be getting out before ADM Mullen's notions destroy all of the Navy I joined... when you can have an FCCS who genuinely thinks a working fuse is an open, there's a problem.

This really calls for word by word translation .. :D

[OneShot]

Yeah ... he kinda lost me after "Good Morning" ... LOL
I do kinda get the gist of what he is trying to say but I'd be hard pressed to explain any details.

[Frame57]

OK Ping Jockey and neptune let hear some....:D

[Neptunus Rex]

Okay, I'll throw one in here.

There we were, at 300 fathoms....

This concerns a middy cruise. (For those who don't know, middy would be Midshipman. Midshipman are assigned to ships between there junior and senior years. These guys do UI watches. (UI-Under Instruction of a qualified watch stander).

Well, we had this one who thought he was just hot s---, so it was decided to bring him back to reality. This guy was the on-coming DOW UI. (The COB was the actual DOW and was in on this. So was the Capt.) We found the smallest qualified crew member aboard, gave him a squirk bottle with water and had him climb up behind the SCP and into the overhead above the SCP.

The middy comes up and relieves the DOW (UI). The Capt decides to make this fun, so he assumes the CONN and orders the DOW to take the boat to test depth. (middy had not been to test depth yet)

The usual orders are given and we start down to test depth. About half way down, our guy on the overhead squirts the middy. He looks around and says nothing. Again he gets squirted, looks around and no else notices so he says nothing. (remember, everyone in Control knows and sees whats going on.)

Again, our accomplice squirts the middy and the middy looks around and up but does nothing.

Finally getting tired of this, our guy in the overhead removes the squirt top from the bottle and dumps the water right on the middys head. Without any though, the middy stands up, screams "Flooding in the Control Room" and runs out of Control. Everyone busts a gut, including the CAPT.

When the middy didn't here the 1MC call, he knew he'd been had and sheepishly returns to Control where the CAPT preceeded to rip him up one side and down the other for leaving his post during a casualty.

(He did return to boats after receiving his commision, but not to us.)

[Frame57]

:rotfl: Pride goes before a fall....:arrgh!:

[Bubblehead Nuke]

Ahhh.. the middies.

Fun time to be had by all.

We had one. He was CONVINCED that you had to be gay to ever go to sea on a sub. WHY he came on a middie cruise on a sub I will never know.

Anyway, here he was on the mess decks going on about how you must be gay to serve on one of these things due to the lack of women when all of the sudden a buddy of mine reaches across the table and feeds me some of his food. You know, the 'here dear try this' thing.

This guys sees it and stops DEAD in the middle of his speech. I return the favor to my buddy and continue eating....

It was like blood in the water folks. This guy was shaken and the rest of the guys saw it.

Soon after, people make a SHOW of holding hands when around this guy. The snickering was GREAT. This guy was a SCREAMING homophobe and here the crew is 'showing its feelings' after a week or two at sea.

He went to his sea daddy who happened to be the MPA and told him what was going on. The feedback we got put us in tears. The MPA just shot us a sour look and told us he didn't like the guy anyway. He told the MPA that he felt that the enlisted guys were basically stupid scum for not going to college when he first came onboard.

We wanted to correct his misunderstandings. We actually sat around and PLANNNED things to do to this guy. Someone once said that the most dangerous thng in the Navy is a bored nuke. Well, we planned to prove it.

We made sure to do things only when the more 'responsible' folks were not around. We set out to send this guy over the edge however I remember that two of the torpedomen put on one hell of a show (they were brother in laws btw) that REALLY sent this guy over the edge.

When we pulled into port and this guy was off the boat like a cannon shot. I can only imagine what his buddies thought when he tried to relay what he did for the summer.

[Frame57]

This is the real world of life on a boat. These guys will learn a valuable lesson on proper submarine 'etiquette'. :up:

[Dr.Sid]

Now I appreciate the difference between reality and game even more ! :arrgh!:

[Rip]

In Czech we have a phrase 'submarine disease' which does not seem to have equivalent in English. It is used for the state when several people has to live together in small space and due to lack of privacy they tend to dislike and hate each other. The way someone sneeze, the way someone throws his towel on the floor .. and you find yourself wanting to kill the other guy.

Some say this will be serious trouble for interplanetary flights. Now back to topic.

It's perfectly clear now after Frame57's stories where this term come from, right !? :rotfl:

PS: funny enough, we don't have sea or navy, much less submarine force :o
I actually found that confines of a submarine created an increased sense of tolerance. There are things that would drive you start raving MAD if you had the ability to leave a situation. When you are stuck in the 'sewer pipe', you had to learn to deal with problems. Coping skills became a highly developed thing.

You knew more about someone than their spouse did. They told you things, and you told them things that you would NEVER talk about to anyone else. EVER.

I became great friends of people, that had I met in other circumstances, I would have either ignored or is some cases walked across the street to avoid. It is the exposure to the varieties of life and lifestyles that tends to make you more tolerant. It gave you a forced introspective look at what YOU did and how others percieved you. This gave you a better ability to look at things from someone elses perspective and maybe lead to a little more understanding.

Was there friction? You betcha. Was there fights?? Oh yes. I had my share of throw down/drag out bare knuckle fights. You know what? After we got done beating the crap out of each other we would realize that what we arged over was damn petty and feel stupid. Then we would go out for a beer and/or a lapdance.

That same person who you fought with three weeks ago had your back when things went down somewhere else. You NEVER left a shipnmate in a fight unless he was a total dumbass and ignored all the warnings you gave him. Then you just let him get stomped on a little and break it up before any real harm is done.

Later in life, I find that very little bothers me. I seemed to have developed my own 'bubble' I guess. Unless you FORCE me to attempt participation in something I dislike, I can pretty much tune it out. It drives my wife LOONEY.

Back to what you called a space problem? I do not think it will be as much a problem as people think. The dynamics of a small crew are well understood and there are tests that can be adminstered to determine compatibility of crew members.

I agree with this, well except the lapdance part. I would never give a shipmate a lapdance but I guess your boat was different.:lol:

[Rip]

deleted - DP

[Rip]

Back to the Mediterranean Sea... We used to call othe Med. our front yard and the Barents Sea our backyard, I guess because those were our homes away from home. Well, I guess we received Comms. to go check out a Soviet Sub tender parked right smack dap in the middle of the Med. This was interesting to me because the U.S. Tenders usually are parked pierside somewhere. Not the Soviets! They take em and do their thing in open seas. We struck Gold. Tied up to the tender if memory serves me right was a Victor and a Charlie class. It was broad daylight and we had our #2 scope set up with a video feed and a monitor placed above our fire control and one in the crews mess out of all places. We ran a few passes under the subs doing "underhull surveys". One Chief commented and said, "This is more fun than looking up a gals skirt..." It was impressive to be able to see what the CO was seeing and recording through #2 scope. The Skipper raised the elevation of the scope to check out the tender and we saw a bunch of Soviet sailors near the stern frantically making obscene gestures at us. This was astonishing because we could see them from about 95 to 100 feet under the water. That is how good the resolution was and how clear the waters of the Med are. They could see us clear as a bell. The next thing to happen was a lot of active Sonar and a surface craft of some sort was steaming our way fast, so deep we went and hid several miles away. We did this again a day later, only this time one of the Subs had deployed by then. I actually tried making a single mission like this. but dang if I know how to get a sub to just sit still. Anyway, I hope they felt violated by us American Sub voyeur's:yep:

I recall those underhull surveys being about as tense as it ever got for the "tracking party". There is no room for error during such activities, particularly when deal with the soviets. They can be very aggressive when they feel like they have been slighted.

[Frame57]

Hi RIP, yeah they were fun too. We were "plotting dots" with a grease pencil as bearing were called out. i had way more fun doing this stuff than being the "OX- of the watch". Ahhh, the good old days...:up:

[Pingjockey]

Alright here is a good one for you 688 types.

While on westpac back in the mid 90's my sonar shack would come up with ways to kill time. This would be anything from taping the on-coming watch sections coffee mugs to the overhead to messing with headphones or any number of other things.

Then a good friend of mine comes up with the idea of a Dit-dot bomb. He sat up in CSES(Combat systems Electronic space) with a three hole bunch and a ream of paper.

He spent hours collecting all the dit-dots from the 3 hole punch and putting them in bags. A few days later he started filling empty toliet paper rolls with these dit-dots and started to hide them in various parts of the boat. He would wrap them with black eb-green tape and put a thin sheet of toliet paper over one end and attach a thread or some shot line to the paper so that when you yanked the string the dit dots would fall all over the place.

Well it got brutal with these things and my chief told us to stop with these damn bombs. He made the off-going watch sonar watch section field day the shack and such to pick all these dit-dots. He had thought he got them all but he was wrong.

If anyone remembers how a 688 control room looked they would recall that there was a ventalation duct right above the Dive's head. Well it seems my pal decided to hide a dit-dot bomb in the over head right above the vent.

It was 3 days away from our return from deployment and our chief was sitting dive. Well, he looked up and saw this string hanging out in front of the duct. Well being curious he pulled it and the next you know it's looking like a blizzard because the dit-dots fell out of the over head and were blown all over control, the BCP and the SCP.

Needless to say that the entire sonar division was out cleaning up dit-dots for weeks.

Ahh the strange things bubbleheads do...

I got a few more stories if anyone wants me to post them.

[Janus]

Nice stories, but wth is a dit-dot?

[Dr.Sid]

Anyone wants you to post them. ? Hell yes ! :rock:

[Pingjockey]

Ahh dit-dots are the little paper circles you get when you use a three hole punch.

[TopTorp '92]

I started out on a CCS-MK 1 fire control system that used the older main frame computers (UYK-7.) After a couple of years on my first boat, I took up a second C-school and was trained on the newer AN/BSY-1 fire control system that used the newer UYK-43 mainframe computer along with several enhancements. One feature was a training mode where the sonar system could simulate targets much more effectively than the older CCS MK-1.
So our CO thinks this is pretty neat stuff until one day our WEPS schedules training, forgetting to communicate the simulation exercise to the CO.
You can imagine the sequence of events:
Sonar reports a contact, probably submerged.
Weps is OOD, so he naturally wants to station the Fire Control Tracking Party, a collection of off-watch FTs, and junior officers.
This goes on for an hour or so. Sonar reports add detail and confidence to the submerged identity of the contact.
Fire Control gets multiple legs of range information.
The Torpedo Room has the weapons simulator hooked up with the tube flooded.
Now the skipper enters the Control Room and wants to know WTF. He doesn’t need to speak to the OOD since he can see what’s happening. He then orders battle stations and the crew is up and running about. Naturally the COB looks puzzled when he arrives but doesn’t say a word. Of course, the XO is just as clueless as the CO.
Next come firing point procedures. Oh baby, I’m thinking to myself, skipper’s gonna be pissed when that water slug fails to clear the wire.
Before giving the order to fire the tube, the skipper wants to know who gave the order to load the tube. Only then does he realize the last hour and a half have been a simulation.
We all stood down from battle stations and WEPS/OOD had to get a relief and see the CO in the Wardroom. It wasn’t pretty after that.

[Molon Labe]

I started out on a CCS-MK 1 fire control system that used the older main frame computers (UYK-7.) After a couple of years on my first boat, I took up a second C-school and was trained on the newer AN/BSY-1 fire control system that used the newer UYK-43 mainframe computer along with several enhancements. One feature was a training mode where the sonar system could simulate targets much more effectively than the older CCS MK-1.
So our CO thinks this is pretty neat stuff until one day our WEPS schedules training, forgetting to communicate the simulation exercise to the CO.
You can imagine the sequence of events:
Sonar reports a contact, probably submerged.
Weps is OOD, so he naturally wants to station the Fire Control Tracking Party, a collection of off-watch FTs, and junior officers.
This goes on for an hour or so. Sonar reports add detail and confidence to the submerged identity of the contact.
Fire Control gets multiple legs of range information.
The Torpedo Room has the weapons simulator hooked up with the tube flooded.
Now the skipper enters the Control Room and wants to know WTF. He doesn’t need to speak to the OOD since he can see what’s happening. He then orders battle stations and the crew is up and running about. Naturally the COB looks puzzled when he arrives but doesn’t say a word. Of course, the XO is just as clueless as the CO.
Next come firing point procedures. Oh baby, I’m thinking to myself, skipper’s gonna be pissed when that water slug fails to clear the wire.
Before giving the order to fire the tube, the skipper wants to know who gave the order to load the tube. Only then does he realize the last hour and a half have been a simulation.
We all stood down from battle stations and WEPS/OOD had to get a relief and see the CO in the Wardroom. It wasn’t pretty after that.

What was the simulated contact doing that the CO wanted to shoot a warshot at it?

[Bubblehead Nuke]

Bored nukes. You have to love them.

On a deployement we were doing our 'push the dome' routine. No drills, no maintenance, no nothing. It was get up, stand watch, go to sleep. We were doing our best to make NO noise (ok, we were in trail and were REALLY doing our job but that is beyond the scope of this post).

Boredom sets in and we start chatting at the ladders between watch stations. You know, the 'what if' discussions.

We found one that REALLY intrigued us and we latched onto it as it would require a LOT of thought and planning.

We were going to steal the boat.


Thats right. We wanted to steal the boat. No only that, we wanted to make money with it. We decided we would run make a few drug runs and be set for life. I mean who is gonna catch a sub WANTING to stay hidden. If you found us, we were armed to the TEETH and could defend ourselves.

A discussion was started. Who would we need? How would we get rid of the others?? Were would we hide the boat? You can imagine all the sorrid details.

We started a watchbill for the whole boat. We did pro's and con's. Came up with ideas and detailed plans.

Mind you, we would NEVER do this in real life. This was a mental exercise for us. The ULTIMATE game to us who were bored out of our minds. I mean, these were incredibly detailed plans but these were also our shipmates. We figured they would get a laugh out of it. It got to be a matter of pride to be on the 'survivor list'. Is was an on and off topic for the enlisted guys for a while. To us it was something to occupy our minds and keep us from going mad with boredom.

After about 5 weeks, the log book that was kept in ERUL was found by the eng. He actually got a kick out of it and chuckled at some of the entries and ideas. He was amazed at how much thinking had gone into it. He pointed out some of the errors we had, made a few suggestions, and just shook his head and the went on about his inspections.

All was well, till a week or so later he told the XO in the wardroom about 'the log'

The XO FREAKED. I mean he FREAKED OUT BIG time. Oh man, he got the log and reviewed it. The first thing he had a major issue with was the detailed procedures to kill all the officers. No matter how outlandish (we had the craziest weird ideas) he thought we were SERIOUS. The log was locked up for a day or two till he could talk about it with the CO.

By this time, the ENG and the chiefs had come back (after the XO went off on them up about the topic) and informed us how serious this is and how it could look like something far worse than it was.

The CO.. well, he did not take it too well at first. Then he read the log. Then he came aft (the first time in a month or so) and actually talked to us about it. By this time, we were SURE that we were going to prison. The look on his face when he was walking the engine room was ugly at first. Hell, I thought he was gonna shoot us on general pricipal. By the time he left, he was laughing with us. He actually understood our boredom (at least I think he did). He did give one piece of advce. Next time, keep it in words and don't write it down. What we did was just a LITTLE illegal and a less understanding skipper might have taken it wrong.

How did it stay on the boat?? Well, lucky for us the XO was an idiot. Seriously. The guy actually made the annoucement 'Liberty is secured till moral improves' over the 1MC once. One time he pissed off the CO so mad he made him man the sump watch for over an hour (this is a bullseye sightglass to watch for water coming down the snorkel induction mast while running the diesel when submerged) WHILE RUNNING ON THE SURFACE. AKA, this watch is not manned while surfaced. The CO refused to let him be relieved. That is the only reason the 'list' incident' did not leave the boat. Nobody would listen to him. I do believe that he never screened for command either. Sometimes the Navy does things right.

[sonar732]

Alright here is a good one for you 688 types.

While on westpac back in the mid 90's my sonar shack would come up with ways to kill time. This would be anything from taping the on-coming watch sections coffee mugs to the overhead to messing with headphones or any number of other things.

Then a good friend of mine comes up with the idea of a Dit-dot bomb. He sat up in CSES(Combat systems Electronic space) with a three hole bunch and a ream of paper.

He spent hours collecting all the dit-dots from the 3 hole punch and putting them in bags. A few days later he started filling empty toliet paper rolls with these dit-dots and started to hide them in various parts of the boat. He would wrap them with black eb-green tape and put a thin sheet of toliet paper over one end and attach a thread or some shot line to the paper so that when you yanked the string the dit dots would fall all over the place.

Well it got brutal with these things and my chief told us to stop with these damn bombs. He made the off-going watch sonar watch section field day the shack and such to pick all these dit-dots. He had thought he got them all but he was wrong.

If anyone remembers how a 688 control room looked they would recall that there was a ventalation duct right above the Dive's head. Well it seems my pal decided to hide a dit-dot bomb in the over head right above the vent.

It was 3 days away from our return from deployment and our chief was sitting dive. Well, he looked up and saw this string hanging out in front of the duct. Well being curious he pulled it and the next you know it's looking like a blizzard because the dit-dots fell out of the over head and were blown all over control, the BCP and the SCP.

Needless to say that the entire sonar division was out cleaning up dit-dots for weeks.

Ahh the strange things bubbleheads do...

I got a few more stories if anyone wants me to post them.

I bet $$$ that your chief had a completely different view of his division after that.

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

[Pisces]

Ahh dit-dots are the little paper circles you get when you use a three hole punch.Hmm, look what I found (bottom of blog):

http://lubbers-line.blogspot.com/2006/05/video-bunch-of-boomer-yo-yos.html

[GrayOwl]

;) True nightmare.

Sub life is dangerous.

But we - remain upper. To live:lurk: ...

[Frame57]

Alright here is a good one for you 688 types.

While on westpac back in the mid 90's my sonar shack would come up with ways to kill time. This would be anything from taping the on-coming watch sections coffee mugs to the overhead to messing with headphones or any number of other things.

Then a good friend of mine comes up with the idea of a Dit-dot bomb. He sat up in CSES(Combat systems Electronic space) with a three hole bunch and a ream of paper.

He spent hours collecting all the dit-dots from the 3 hole punch and putting them in bags. A few days later he started filling empty toliet paper rolls with these dit-dots and started to hide them in various parts of the boat. He would wrap them with black eb-green tape and put a thin sheet of toliet paper over one end and attach a thread or some shot line to the paper so that when you yanked the string the dit dots would fall all over the place.

Well it got brutal with these things and my chief told us to stop with these damn bombs. He made the off-going watch sonar watch section field day the shack and such to pick all these dit-dots. He had thought he got them all but he was wrong.

If anyone remembers how a 688 control room looked they would recall that there was a ventalation duct right above the Dive's head. Well it seems my pal decided to hide a dit-dot bomb in the over head right above the vent.

It was 3 days away from our return from deployment and our chief was sitting dive. Well, he looked up and saw this string hanging out in front of the duct. Well being curious he pulled it and the next you know it's looking like a blizzard because the dit-dots fell out of the over head and were blown all over control, the BCP and the SCP.

Needless to say that the entire sonar division was out cleaning up dit-dots for weeks.

Ahh the strange things bubbleheads do...

I got a few more stories if anyone wants me to post them.:rotfl: Yes! keep em coming, this is the sort of stuff we remember at reunions. Thanks...

[Pingjockey]

Bored nukes. You have to love them.

On a deployement we were doing our 'push the dome' routine. No drills, no maintenance, no nothing. It was get up, stand watch, go to sleep. We were doing our best to make NO noise (ok, we were in trail and were REALLY doing our job but that is beyond the scope of this post).

Boredom sets in and we start chatting at the ladders between watch stations. You know, the 'what if' discussions.

We found one that REALLY intrigued us and we latched onto it as it would require a LOT of thought and planning.

We were going to steal the boat.


Thats right. We wanted to steal the boat. No only that, we wanted to make money with it. We decided we would run make a few drug runs and be set for life. I mean who is gonna catch a sub WANTING to stay hidden. If you found us, we were armed to the TEETH and could defend ourselves.

A discussion was started. Who would we need? How would we get rid of the others?? Were would we hide the boat? You can imagine all the sorrid details.

We started a watchbill for the whole boat. We did pro's and con's. Came up with ideas and detailed plans.

Mind you, we would NEVER do this in real life. This was a mental exercise for us. The ULTIMATE game to us who were bored out of our minds. I mean, these were incredibly detailed plans but these were also our shipmates. We figured they would get a laugh out of it. It got to be a matter of pride to be on the 'survivor list'. Is was an on and off topic for the enlisted guys for a while. To us it was something to occupy our minds and keep us from going mad with boredom.

After about 5 weeks, the log book that was kept in ERUL was found by the eng. He actually got a kick out of it and chuckled at some of the entries and ideas. He was amazed at how much thinking had gone into it. He pointed out some of the errors we had, made a few suggestions, and just shook his head and the went on about his inspections.

All was well, till a week or so later he told the XO in the wardroom about 'the log'

The XO FREAKED. I mean he FREAKED OUT BIG time. Oh man, he got the log and reviewed it. The first thing he had a major issue with was the detailed procedures to kill all the officers. No matter how outlandish (we had the craziest weird ideas) he thought we were SERIOUS. The log was locked up for a day or two till he could talk about it with the CO.

By this time, the ENG and the chiefs had come back (after the XO went off on them up about the topic) and informed us how serious this is and how it could look like something far worse than it was.

The CO.. well, he did not take it too well at first. Then he read the log. Then he came aft (the first time in a month or so) and actually talked to us about it. By this time, we were SURE that we were going to prison. The look on his face when he was walking the engine room was ugly at first. Hell, I thought he was gonna shoot us on general pricipal. By the time he left, he was laughing with us. He actually understood our boredom (at least I think he did). He did give one piece of advce. Next time, keep it in words and don't write it down. What we did was just a LITTLE illegal and a less understanding skipper might have taken it wrong.

How did it stay on the boat?? Well, lucky for us the XO was an idiot. Seriously. The guy actually made the annoucement 'Liberty is secured till moral improves' over the 1MC once. One time he pissed off the CO so mad he made him man the sump watch for over an hour (this is a bullseye sightglass to watch for water coming down the snorkel induction mast while running the diesel when submerged) WHILE RUNNING ON THE SURFACE. AKA, this watch is not manned while surfaced. The CO refused to let him be relieved. That is the only reason the 'list' incident' did not leave the boat. Nobody would listen to him. I do believe that he never screened for command either. Sometimes the Navy does things right.


I can't tell you how many times us coners have discussed this. Although I have never seen it in a log before. I have seen the quote book make it's rounds through the cone and through the engine room. And I must say bubbleheads can come up with some pretty funny crap.

[Bubblehead Nuke]

I can't tell you how many times us coners have discussed this. Although I have never seen it in a log before. I have seen the quote book make it's rounds through the cone and through the engine room. And I must say bubbleheads can come up with some pretty funny crap.

You know, I am glad that coner thought the same thing. And here I was thinking it was just us crazy nukes.

[Frame57]

Rickover would be rolling over in his grave...:rotfl:

[Bubblehead Nuke]

Rickover would be rolling over in his grave...:rotfl:

I actually think quite the opposite.

I think Rickover would applaused the thoughts and creativity we had. While he might have been a HUGE S.O.B., he liked people who THINK. He hated blind following of orders and above all the 'herd' mentality. He wanted hard thinkers would would not be afraid to question authority. He wanted people who could think outside of the box. That is why he was always at odds with the rest of the naval leadership. He did not want statified ranks and blind obedience to orders and rules due to rank or position. I knew quite a few enlisted 'old timers' who did not have a problem telling the Eng, CO, or anyone else to get over their case of rectumitis. ESPECIALLY when they knew they were right. It made for REAL interesting arguments at times.

I think in the end, this is what got us off the hook with our CO. He was a Rickover graduate. He saw that while what we were doing might have been illegal to the Naval Brass, it was thinking outside the box and being creative. In the end he KNEW we would not do it, but the fact that we came up with it and actually got as detailed as we did means we were being active thinkers and not passive followers.

[Terror_666]

My "step-father" was in the Dutch Navy in his youth and for a while he served in the "onderzeedienst" literally the undersea service, on the "Hr. Ms. Zeeleeuw" (sealion) a balboa class sub the Dutch had loaned from the US.
During the final tour of the Zeeleeuw they did the most ridicules thing I have ever heard of (also the most Dutch thing I have ever heard of), they sailed close to there sister-ship the Walrus and had a potato fight. Seriously the two crews started throwing potato's at each other.
It is or was apparently some Dutch Naval tradition for ships that are going out of service.

[Lure_Angler]

Having read the whole thread, I have to say that it gives great insight to submariner life to the many who would never set sail in a sub.

Even for a 'landlubber', I had a good laugh. :up:

keep it comin...

[Frame57]

I used to love being a helmsman/planesman on the boats. Even though it is a junior watch station and has its "ups and downs", it was fun. Nothing like driving a billion dollar piece of machinery at the ripe old age of 18. On one of our exercises in the Bermuda triangle we were getting ready to raise some hell in Andros Island. Before a submarine surfaces a visual sweep is done to hopefully ensure that nothing is above you. I think our Engineer was OD at this time and he reported a surface contact to our starboard. The CO raised the #2 scope to confirm this and put it on video. The monitor showed a large raft with about 20 people on it just sitting still in the calm waters about 30nmi south of Andros Island. The skipper decided to surface the boat and ordered the mess cooks to get some food and water for these people. As we surfaced I could see some of the people on the raft begin to act frantically and began jumping in the water. I guess they did not know what a submarine looked like or thought that our intentions were going to be injurious to them, so they opted for the Ocean. The CO managed to calm them down using his bullhorn from the bridge. Turns out they were Cuban refugees hoping to landfall Florida and were entirely out of food and water and were drifting due east and not toward the north. We radioed the Bahamian authorities about it and it seems they gave them a free ride back to Cuba. They did not seem to be to thankful for their experience with the Archerfish, as they ended up back in Cuba to meet whatever fate awaited them.

[solitear]

lol. this thread brings back memories. My boat had the idea for the pirate submarine too but we never wrote it down......

The best story I have I wasn't actually there for. it was recorded in the engineering green book (a secret book in manuvering that only a mnanvering qual could read tht wasn't supposed to exist...it contained entries from watchstanders commemorating events and quotes......I have a few of those in there :-P)

the boat was in the gulf(before my time) and where transiting out. they had a skipper nicknamed "insane" dwayne (for bad reasons).....I was told later they never left port without a squadron chpperone for this guy.

well they where in about 200 ft of water on the surface transiting out.

they "rigged for dive"(more on that ;-)) and prepared to dive......well when they started to dive the bow went down but the stern stayed up.......it turns out some (moron) had failed to properly rig the dive so the stern planes weren't flooding.....but the captain misinterprets and orders an ahead full?

(at this point the down angle is getting severe)...the captain wants to add speed so the planes will help level the boat...but the sea botton is only 200 feet from the surface........the math from people who where there estimate the bow about 6 feet from the bottom.......the throttleman answered all stop instead of the bell the con ordered...
the cow blew the ballast tanks at this point putting the boat back on the surface.
this story sounded unbelievable to me as fr as the actions of the co but eyewitness accounts told me the captian was furiose at the throttleman for not answering the ordered bell. he's a hero to the crew who remember him though.
lol...

the only other one I have is my first boat had a SA on it who never qualified ships...or any watchstation?!? this leach was bad tempered and slept way too much but I guess they kept him around to shoot the trash(they would wake himup anytime for this and I heard the cooks would let it build up so he had to do as much as possible)....well he finnally blew it one day......his bunk was in MCLL(missle compartment lower level) and he was caught peeing in the bilge.....mayby not a capital offense to be sure but in this particular bilge we kept our eggs and potatoes(even modern subs get creative with food storage for you non-bubbleheads).....I feel sorriest for the cooks...they couldn't make french fries for the rest of the underwy without hearing it from the crew...that guy was gone the next time we came into port....but thanks to him I never had to shoot trash while doing my kitchen duty :p


(all the food was triple wrapped and sealed in garbage bags but it is still not appetising)

[Frame57]

Insane Duane almost bottomed his boat. What a nut!:D In 200 feet of water i would say PD is the about the safest bet. Fun story though.:up:

[Neptunus Rex]

Before I delve into this one I'll have to explain some things for the "non-quals" of our fellow SUBSIMers.

When a submarine does an initial dive, the boats trim has to be established.

The Diving Officer of the Watch (DOW) has the ships control party submerge the boat to about 150 feet. Once the boat reaches depth, a 2/3 bell is rung up and the DOW zeros the bubble and planes and he watches how the boat handles. Increasing depth, pump to sea. Shallowing, flood depth control tanks. He'll do this until the boats depth remains constant without control surfaces. He then watches the bubble (Ships pitch angle) to determine where to pump to, forward or aft trim tanks. once these are complete, 1/3 bell is rung up. If no adjustments are required, the DOW reports to the OOD, "One Third Trim" and the OOD responds "Very Well". All this takes place in a matter of minutes and all at the same time. (A good dive can get it done in a few minutes.)

All perspective DOW MUST do several of these evolutions as part of their DOW watch station qual, and always under the eye of the Captain. OOD's and DOW's are qualified personaly by the CO.

One of the fun things to do when a DOW UI is performing their first initial dive is a trim party. This is where some interprising crew member gets everyone not on watch that's awake to meet in the crews mess. When they feel the boat leveling off, they all march quietly to the forward end of the forward compartment. After about a minute, eveyone quickly runs through the boat to shaft alley all the way in the aft end of the engine room.

After about a minute, you guessed it. everyone runs up forward again. This usually goes on for several minutes. During this time, the Capt is demanding from the DOW UI when he'll get a trimmed #*&$^ boat (but knowing full well what's going on below decks:up: )

Now understand, except for middies, the DOW is for junior officers but mostly the senior NCO's, who have been around the block (on subs that is). You would be surprised how long it would take for the DOW UI to realize whats going on.

:rotfl:

[Frame57]

Good memory jog Neptune!:up: When I was a nub on my first patrol we did this running back and forth fore and aft. I did not know what in the world we were doing that for. Funny how the qualifying DOW's forget about that one....:D

[Frame57]

Time for another story...The "Deck Gang" as we were callled were the "FNG's". Pretty much when you are a nub you belong to the COB and become a member of the Deck Gang. It was a great time for me then. Sure, it was dirty as we cleaned the head and stocked them. We cleaned bilges and painted the boat, at least the parts that are above water. We always set up the "skid" when performing weapons loadouts. The COB seemd to enjoy the company of his deck gang, maybe because we were young and impressionable and he could mold us a bit more. Often if we finished whatever task the COB required of us in port, he would take us to the "Mar-bar" on lower base Groton Conn. The COB always bought the beer, heck, I think a pitcher of Carling Black label was a buck and and a half then (1979). We used to enjoy the sea stories the COB told us. Then a lot of the senior NCO's were former diesel boat sailors. Our COB served on the Wahoo in the 50's and always reminded of how good we had it on our 637 fast attack. He used to laugh when he told us of "Clappy Jack" apparantly the XO of the Wahoo had that nickname because everytime they visited a port of call, the XO managed to get some form of venereal disease...I thought this only happened to enlisted men, oh well...

One day we were chipping and painting and had to paint the line lockers. We had a new guy who was not a team player and worked harder to get out of work, so we assigned him the duty of crawling in the aft line locker to start chipping and wire brushing. A couple of hours went by and we noticed it was pretty quiet in that line locker and we found this "no-load" sawing logs. Well, we did what any respectful submariner would do and shut and dogged the line locker with trhe blissfully sleeping no-load in it, and then we went to the Mar-bar for more liquid sustinence.
In walks the COB and not looking too happy. He ask the bartender for two pitchers of beer and walked over to the table with both pitchers. "Hi COB, how's it going..." we asked as we knew the jig was up. "Oh, pretty good boys, but I just got my ass chewed by the XO because one of my deck monkeys managed to get himself locked in the aft line locker and was screaming bloody murder to get out. I guess we tried to look astonished and inoccent but it did not fool the COB as he proceeded to bath us with the Carling Black label while spewing nautical obscenities at us. I think we all got restricted to the boat for a week and the no-load decided to make more of an effort in his duties. Heck, a week or so later we were at the mar-bar listening to dear old COBS stories as though nothing ever happened...Those were the good old days:up:

[Bubblehead Nuke]

More boredom.

For a while, we got into waterfights. This is before the day of 'super soakers'. I remember is started with a simple squirtgun. Someone got someone wet.

Before you know it, people are bringing on 'personnal protection'. We are carrying hand squirtguns and the little black battery powered 'water-uzi's'. You did not travel back into the engineroom unless you were armed and ready.

Then we get underway. Turns out that the AEA (an e-div'r) has a secret weapon. He brought a hand pressurized chemical despensor. You know, the one that is a gun with a hose attached to a pressurized 1 (or 2) gallon container. Thing shoots water a great distance. This guy is roving the engineroom BLASTING people with water from 20+ feet away. Half the time you can not even see him and this goes on for a few days with laughs all around but it starts to get old and we can not find the weapon to sabotage it.

The M-divers decide to get revenge. We rigged a line off a test port on the outlet side of the main feed pump header and used about 40 feet of hose to give us a good amount of flexibility. The e-div may have a rifle, we have a flamethrower.

We stalked our prey and he knew something was up. After a while he had to come down to engineroom forward to 'troubleshoot' a problem we manufacted and we turned it on. This thing was a firehose and there was water EVERYWHERE. We had him trapped for half a minute or so and he got away with us chasing him into ERLL and as far as the hose and water would reach.

We were sitting there (I was the ERLL watch) chatting at the ERF/ERLL boundary laughing at what had just happened when the ENG shows up and decides to inspect the engineroom. First thing we see are his trademark shoes hit the ladder as he starts down into the ERF watchstaion. Needless to say, we started to get that sinking feeling and just waited for the shoe to drop.

He greets us and starts his inspection. Now you have to understand, there is water dripping out of the overhead. There is water on EVERY panel and control in sight. There is water on the deckplates. There is water in the bilge. We pumped about 100 gallons in that 30 seconds and it showed.

So he walks around a bit and then he asks if there is a water leak. The ERF just tells him that he is doing a mini-field day and wanted to clean everything so he used a little bit of water. He just nodded and told him to make sure he had it cleaned up by watch turnover.

The waterfights stopped that day and all the weapons vanished without another word. We knew we had pushed our luck. We never did hear anymore about it.

[Bubblehead Nuke]

Being in a sewer pipe for days on end make for strange people.

You might not know it, but bubbleheads have this strange thing for bodily gases. Even the most straight laced prim and proper person will lift a cheek and RIP one off at any time. He will gloat about his accomplishment. He will take praise for his efforts. We would rate it on sound level, duration, bouquet, hangtime, and all other possiblities

It matters not if you are in your rack or on the mess decks. If you have to fart, if you think you can, you let it go.

We did this because it made for a NEW complaint or conversation. It was different. It was unpredictable. Even better, it was GROSS and thus manly.

Gross you might think? Yes, it was. But I DARE a bubblehead to disagree with me on our favorite pasttime.

Anyway, the height of this artform was known as the SBD. The Silent But Deadly. Now, on a submarine, there are air breathing appartaus all over the place. the most common being the EAB (Emergency Air Breathing). You were considered a master if you could drive someone into wearing one of these things rather than breathing the same air as you. I have seen an ENTIRE control room in EAB's with the CO standing there at the periscope station, a HUGE grin on his face.

Just another insight into the lives of us crazy bubbleheads

[Dr.Sid]

:rotfl:

[Frame57]

No disagreement about that one BN...I think I used to hide in the emergency diesel room when chili was served:D

[Bubblehead Nuke]

One of my fondest memories was walking into manevering to give the SRO a report and I left him a SBD. I'll NEVER forget the how he sounded, sucking rubber and getting on the 2MC, inhaling in that mask, and start to curse me out. That sound of forced inhalation, the muted tone, and yet the anger came right though. The things that bring a smile to your face some 20 years later.

That was one of those times they HATED having the motor controller for the manuevering ventelation fan to be OUTSIDE of manuevering. I had tripped it out on the way aft. He could not reach it without leaving his watchstation.

He got even weeks later, but that is another sea story.

[Frame57]

One of my fondest memories was walking into manevering to give the SRO a report and I left him a SBD. I'll NEVER forget the how he sounded, sucking rubber and getting on the 2MC, inhaling in that mask, and start to curse me out. That sound of forced inhalation, the muted tone, and yet the anger came right though. The things that bring a smile to your face some 20 years later.

That was one of those times they HATED having the motor controller for the manuevering ventelation fan to be OUTSIDE of manuevering. I had tripped it out on the way aft. He could not reach it without leaving his watchstation.

He got even weeks later, but that is another sea story.These are fun and put some light on what life was like then...One of the reasons I go to the reunions is because we jaw about this stuff, and some it I forgot, but I do love memories and would not trade my dolphins my a million bucks...:up: