Submarines:A boat or a Ship

[Linton]

Is a submarine a boat or a ship?Answers with some kind of explanation would be appreciated.(This topic is currently running in Submariners.co.uk in the members section)

[STEED]

boat.
a. A relatively small, usually open craft of a size that might be carried aboard a ship.
b. An inland vessel of any size.
c. A ship or submarine.

ship
a. A vessel of considerable size for deep-water navigation.
b. A sailing vessel having three or more square-rigged masts.


Well that's an interesting question, just like which came first the chicken or the egg. :hmm:

[Drebbel]

In Holland subs are boats, But afaik the scyscrapers of the USN are ships.

[TteFAboB]

Myself, I call them Iron Coffins.

[Perilscope]

I am not sure of the origin of the word "boat". However, I am pretty sure it derives from something that means "buoyant", or something like that :hmm:

However, for me, one thing is for sure, anything that does not drop like a rock and can remain buoyant, is a boat. I just say "U" before the word "Boat" to designate an old sub, for me the U stands for "Underwater".

U-boat = old subs
Boat = ships, sailboats…
Submarine = submarines, ROVs…

Anyway, I refer to it like that, but I will never call a modern submarine a U-boat, because nowadays, submarines are really sub-marines, in the past the sub was simply a boat designed to submerge for a short while. Now subs are designed to stay underwater as long as it can.:p

[bradclark1]

Subs are boats. Even the U.S. skyscrapers.

[sonar732]

As any true submariner would say...

Ships are targets!

[Drebbel]

Originally Posted by bradclark1

Subs are boats. Even the U.S. skyscrapers.

There is/was a USN sub skipper on these boards who always named his sub a ship. But do not recall his name. Was it Bill ?

I remember us having a similar discussion several years ago.

[Neptunus Rex]

They were and are "ships".

Sailors of the submarine community "bubbleheads " called them boats. This is a tradition from the early 20th century when submarines were first being developed (and the doctrine that goes with them) and were rather small (i.e. the size of a "boat"). The term was also used in a derisive manner by top Navy brass at the time who were a little shortsighted in the tacital benefits of submarines.

Any surface puke who used the term "boat" to describe a submarine (and if you weren't wear'n dolphins, you were a surface puke) in the prescense of a self respecting submariner got his nose rearranged by said submariner.

[SmokinTep]

I work on Subs for a living and they are refered to by everyone as boats. Also, the surface fleet calls the Engineer the Chief Engineer (CHENG). Subs call him Engineer (ENG). Surface calls the Supply Officer SUPPO, Subs call him the CHOP.

I was once told by a Sub CO that his sub was not a ship but a boat.

[SmokinTep]

Something I found..........

Why are our submarines called boats?

Historical Highlights
A series by LEUT Tom Lewis

July 24, 2000

Submarines and submariners seem to attract a variety of interesting names. Perhaps some of that stems from being a "service apart".

Why is a submarine called a "boat"?

One reason might be that because the submarine was known as a boat from the earliest conception of something that could travel beneath the surface. A German poem of around 1200 - Salman and Morolf - mentions a diving boat built of leather with a long tube supplying air, and an Englishman, William Bourne, in a 1578 treatise entitled Inventions and Devices describes: "It is possible to make a shippe or boate that may goe under the water unto the bottome".

Bourne's boat solved the problem of achieving negative buoyancy - that is, making the submarine sink - by allowing water valves to fill leather bags. A mast let in air and when the boat needed to ascend the operator squeezed out the bags, thus expelling the water.

Cornelius van Drebbel, a Dutch physician, amazed London in 1620 by submerging to 12 feet in an "oar-powered boat" and rowing it across the Thames. He did not know of Bourne's technique, however, and had problems making the boat stay down. Despite this he managed to persuade King James VI to come for a ride.

The Turtle, a US vessel used in an underwater attack against the British during the American War of Independence, was described as a boat in letters of the time. She was shaped rather like a pineapple and her designer, David Bushnell, equipped her with a snorkel, a depth gauge and a detachable explosive with a fuse. A valiant attempt was made by her commander Ezra Lee to manoeuver her underneath a British ship. This failed due to propulsion difficulties and Lee was detected. In his escape he cut loose the explosive and it went off causing the British fleet to take some alarm at the first attempt at submarine warfare.
Perhaps, therefore, the first submarines were called boats because they were small. Some descriptions say that a boat is a vessel that is routinely removed from the water. A ship is one that usually stays in the water, except for unusual occasions: dry-docking, careening, running up on a sandbar etc. Another interpretation is that a boat is any vessel that can be placed on another vessel.

Like ship's boats early submarines and diving bells were often stowed ashore or on the deck of a ship and they were indeed very small. The Turtle, for example, was a single-man craft. Fulton's submersibles of the Napoleonic era were no larger than a ship's launch. The Hunley, a submarine of the US Civil War, and the first to sink another ship - the Housatonic - carried a crew of nine. All were boats but not ships.

Although many designs were tried and tested in the following years by various navies the designs of John Holland proved the most successful. Working alone and supported by Irish Fenian money Holland designed and built a small submarine powered by a steam engine. His idea was successful largely because it solved the problems of buoyancy and stability which had plagued other designers. Known as a "wrecking boat" the first was followed by another but then the backers lost interest and Holland faded from the scene, although his memory lives on in the organisation that bought him out - the Electric Boat Company.

By the start of WWI subs were quite big - AE1 and AE2, the Australian WWI boats, were 181 feet long - but many were smaller and therefore about the same size as small warships, most of which were also called boats - torpedo boats and gun boats, for example.

The submarine service of WWI was a new branch of navies and it sought to develop its own traditions much as the air forces of WWI did. One of these may have been the term "boat", a difference to be jealously guarded, along with submariners' slang, jokes and customs - such as flying the Jolly Roger, the skull and crossbones, when returning from a patrol that had seen a "kill". This custom might have arisen from the condemnation submarines had received when they first became conceived of as weapons of war. Leonardo da Vinci, who had once claimed to have developed an idea for a submarine, is said to have left no notes on the subject - as he did for other inventions such as the aeroplane - because he thought "I do not publish or divulge on account of the evil nature of men who practise assassination at the bottom of the sea". Interestingly, the Hague Convention of 1899 which had set up some rules of warfare had not included submarines and the ensuing conflict certainly saw submarines carry forward new ideas of "total war" by ambushing merchantmen.

Submarines were known during WWI and beyond also as "pig boats". Perhaps a reference to the dolphin sometimes known as a sea-pig. This may well have been because a submarine needed to surface often in the type's early days, partly for air and partly for a periscope sighting. Some more unkind references give the origins of "pig boat" as relating to the smell of submarines: a combination of diesel, battery fumes, sweat, cooking and more - all in unventilated compartments.

By WWII submarines had increased in size to several hundred feet and after the war with the development of nuclear power submarines became even bigger. Many modern submarines have been designed to the extent where their tonnage can now dwarf that of destroyers and even aircraft carriers - the American Ohio-class, for example, has a displacement of 18, 750 imperial tons.

It has been argued that the term "ship" has replaced "boat", especially given the size and destructive power of many modern submarines, especially the "boomers" - the Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile submarine. However, it seems that in the world of submariners the old term is still the preferred one.

[tycho102]

If it's got a name, it's a ship. I'm not certain that the name has to actually be painted on it, though. It might have to be. Everything else is a boat. And in slang, everything is referred to as a boat, even if it's actually a ship. Canoe, liferaft, steel buoy. There's quite a few terms in active use.

For me, a designation isn't a name. So, U-85 ain't a ship. If you call it the "Flying Brautwurst", then it's a ship.

As for sail ships, if the mast is fixed (that is, it cannot be stowed), then it's a ship. If the mast can be stowed, it's a boat.

[Neptunus Rex]

Wow!

Drebbel was causing trouble back in 1620 too!

Boy, he certainly gets around.

Sailing Ship Terminology:

Ship: has two or more gun decks

Frigate: Has one gun deck, but can carry guns on the weather deck

Brig: Carries guns on the weather deck, but has raised fore-and-after castles, also with guns

Sloop: Carries guns only on the weather deck

Boat: has no weather deck, in fact no decks at all



What they taught me when I was in the navy: a boat is anything small enough to be carried on board a ship


I like Tycho's answer about the names. Makes sense to me.

[Onkel Neal]

Diesel subs are boats, nukes are ships. My definition as seen in practice.