What sank the USS Scorpion?

[Subnuts]

I recently read Stephen Johnson's recent book Silent Steel about the mysterious sinking of the USS Scorpion. While he pretty much ruled out a torpedo explosion (internal or external), the author raised a lot of interesting points.

Consider some of these points:
-On the wreck, two of the antennaes and one of the periscopes is in the raised position, and the starboard running light is in the deployed position.
-Scorpion's sister ship Scamp suffered a near-catastrophic loss of her propeller shaft in 1961.
-The stern planes are at a five-degree up angle, and the rudder is shifted 15 degrees left.
-The Scorpion's bow section is unaffected by implosion damage.
-An internal torpedo explosion would not have blown off the bow and stern escape hatches.
-The Scorpion was a maintanence nightmare in 1968, and leaked large quantaties of hydraulic and lubricating oil, along with freon, on her last deployment.

It doesn't add up, and I'm still befuddled. What do you think sank the Scorpion?

[SubSerpent]

The communist Russian's sank it I thought. Or that was the strongest theory. The Scorpion was playing cat and mouse games with a Soviet sub and somehow they collided or torps were fired. US thinks that Russia may have also lost a sub in the incident but no proof has ever surfaced. Shame that even today the families of those lost on the sub have yet to get a definant answer as to the exact cause. Perhaps America did something wrong and provoked the Russians and this would have and still would be bad for America if it got out into widespread media? Of course hard-nosed American's would never admit fault for anything.

[PeriscopeDepth]

The communist Russian's sank it I thought. Or that was the strongest theory.

Are you being serious? That's certainly not the strongest theory.

PD

[Subnuts]

The communist Russian's sank it I thought. Or that was the strongest theory.

Not unless the Russians had a torpedo that could sink a 3,500 ton submarine without visably damaging it's pressure hull.

[SubSerpent]

Not by a Russian torp, but by a Russian sub colliding with it while playing cat and mouse. I don't support or believe any of the nonsense that something happened within the submarine. Crews are on watch 24/7 and always manning their compartments. Surely someone would have noticed something amist and the Captain would have surfaced and called for help. I agree with the theory that a few months before a Russian sub was sunk and the Russians wanted payback and the Scorpion was it. Also, I believe that John Walker (the notorious Navy spy) who gave the code to Russia, allowed them to track Scorpions movements with precision. Perhaps, when Scorpion was in Rota, Spain dropping off 2 crewmen a Russian spy somehow planted a small bomb on the submarine? They were getting some work done according to an eye-witness who saw men welding something onto the starboard bow of the submarine while it was in port in Rota. A few days later is just sinks? Give me a break. Russia had something to do with its sinking.

[August]

Russia may have also lost a sub in the incident but no proof has ever surfaced.

Interesting choice of words.

[Subnuts]

Not by a Russian torp, but by a Russian sub colliding with it while playing cat and mouse. I don't support or believe any of the nonsense that something happened within the submarine. Crews are on watch 24/7 and always manning their compartments. Surely someone would have noticed something amist and the Captain would have surfaced and called for help. I agree with the theory that a few months before a Russian sub was sunk and the Russians wanted payback and the Scorpion was it. Also, I believe that John Walker (the notorious Navy spy) who gave the code to Russia, allowed them to track Scorpions movements with precision. Perhaps, when Scorpion was in Rota, Spain dropping off 2 crewmen a Russian spy somehow planted a small bomb on the submarine? They were getting some work done according to an eye-witness who saw men welding something onto the starboard bow of the submarine while it was in port in Rota. A few days later is just sinks? Give me a break. Russia had something to do with its sinking.

So submarines are never sunk by catastrophic failures? There's a million things that could go wrong on a nuclear submarine. A lot more likely than "perhaps" a Russian spy "maybe" welding "something" on the Scorpion's hull, and the Scorpion blundering into a Russian submarine which disappears without a trace, and the whole time the Russians never fess up to it.

[UglyMowgli]

This is the Italian accordeonist who was a East german spy who make a sabotage of one of the Mk-37 because one of the crew dance with his girlfriend (this happen aboard the sub at Napoli).

[PeriscopeDepth]

I don't support or believe any of the nonsense that something happened within the submarine. Crews are on watch 24/7 and always manning their compartments.
Please :roll:. Many, many brave and skilled crewmen (from several nations) on eternal patrol would beg to differ with you. That's like saying an attentive driver has never been in a car accident. **** happens. And it can be catastrophic as Subnuts mentioned, especially on one of (if not THE) most complex machines ever dreamed up by man.

PD

[Kapitan]

USS Scorpion probably victim to a circle running torpedo, manafacturers of the torpedo did release a warning and craven who investigated and found scorpion believes this a strong possibility.

At the time of scorpions dissapearence the russians only had a few submarines capible of sneaking up on an american submarine without being noticed, i doubt it would have been a russian submarine.

[UglyMowgli]

there is 'protection on mk37 to avoid circular run detonation
Craven theory was demolished by a lot of people (read silent steel)

[Kapitan]

There was saftey mesures in place to avoid on board explosions still sank the kursk though didnt it, it couldnt have been russian even though there was a russian fleet some hundred or so miles away i cannot believe for one moment a soviet submarine captain firing on an american.

[SubSerpent]

Oh I don't know. Some of you all act like you know the exact answer and yet several different nations TOP leaders with more inside info still don't and never will find the exact answer. Perhaps something did happen within the submarine, but I still think that is extremely unlikely considering they had been out to sea for 97 days already and only had a few days to go to get home. It is proven now that the Russian's for some time did know our exact location, were able to intercept and decypher our incoming/outgoing communications. That and it only being two months after the Russians had lost one of their own subs, (and blaming the US for colliding with it), makes me think that it was an act of aggression that Russia did for what they believed to be payback for their lost submarine. I do believe that top US officials and top Russian officials "talked" and decided to keep the incident quiet to prevent hostile relations from escalating any higher than they already were. Let's think about this...99 men on a submarine perhish vs. a nuclear war between the Soviet Union and the US with millions of deaths. I think I would take the offer to stay hush hush on the matter and forget about the 99 sailors that died.

I'd also like to think that those 99 men didn't die without a great cause if the above theory is correct. If it is correct, I'd say those 99 men died saving the world from nuclear winter between our two nations. Their lives were the "BILL" that Russia wanted to keep from going to nuclear war. I think tensions in the Soviet Union were very high that THEY had lost a submarine and that everyone in the world believed that we (the US) were the cause of it. The Soviet government needed to act to prevent and show their own people that Russia would play this game as an eye for an eye scenerio.

[Kapitan]

I dont know the exact answer but could you even believe that a soviet submarine or warship fired on the US Submarine Scorpion and dont forget the scorpion is fully equiped to sink any vessel that threatens it, not to mention the possibility that she might be carrying nuclear weapons also.

this is the thing that stoped each side from opening the outer doors id hesitate to think a soviet commander fired at scorpion, simply because of the repocussions it would cause.

[SubSerpent]

Maybe it was this....


http://www.hash.com/imagecontest/MayGallery/Images/gsquid.jpg

[SubSerpent]

I dont know the exact answer but could you even believe that a soviet submarine or warship fired on the US Submarine Scorpion and dont forget the scorpion is fully equiped to sink any vessel that threatens it, not to mention the possibility that she might be carrying nuclear weapons also.

this is the thing that stoped each side from opening the outer doors id hesitate to think a soviet commander fired at scorpion, simply because of the repocussions it would cause.

I think she was rammed not fired upon by a torpedo. That or I think she had a bomb placed on her hull or even within her hull just a few days prior in Rota, Spain.
If Russia knew the Scorpion was heading to that port (via intercepted) radio comms, then they could have sent a spy there with a bomb. Who Knows?

[UglyMowgli]

with all problem that the submarine suffer, a russian torpedo wasn't nedded to sink it:
- highest oil consumption in the USN
- freon leak
- vibration @ 24 knots
- radio antenna problems
- electronics failure
- hot run
- ......

adding fatigue from the transit and all the fix & reparis, bad morale, torpedo group not a the top

Shake all of this facts and you may have a catastroph.

[Kapitan]

I could agree to the ramming theory, but we must take into consideration sabotage by the crew, as they had spent over 100 days at sea, and letters indicated that they were not happy people.

Failing that they did say also scorpion was suffering mechanical faults maybe it was a fault like the thresher again who knows.

[UglyMowgli]

for the magnetic bomb on the hull, there is scan by diuvers in every stop of subs generally and since the Scorpion had a problem of vibration diving to inspect the hull occured more often that other sub in the fleet.

[Oberon]

We had a huge conversation and pretty detailed investigation about this on the old Sub Command forums a looooong time ago, one guy even said he was going to write a book about it.
I forget what our conclusions were...if anyone fancies braving the search function in the archives then it should be in there. :D

[Type941]

Something else: i.e. human error. I dont believe it was the russians. They are not stupid to start a war, that was never their doctrine anyway, contrary to the american hollywood movies. Probably someone just screwed up, either on design level or during the patrol. But anyone will believe in whatever they want. The US military is very secretive anyway, so you will never know what really happened. but I will try to catch and read that book though.

[tycho102]

Comrade Lenin sunk the Scorpion.

However, I read a couple decent articles that pointed toward the torpedo fuel breeching the actual submarine hull. One discussed a fuel explosion/fire, and yet another discussed some kind of inter-tube malfunction that resulted in some serious flooding that couldn't be controlled (i.e. warhead explosion).

[Skybird]

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0451400399/sr=8-1/qid=1156196215/ref=sr_1_1/002-5890444-5393641?ie=UTF8

Mutual nuclear kill, says that novel, that obviously draws some parallels to the Scorpion-affair.

[SubSerpent]

Maybe it was Bernard? He seems to screw up everyones U-boat in SHIII? How did he manage to survive the war? :hmm: