Our Hollywood "Heroes"
Something bumps up against the outer hull at a critical time of combat. Suddenly the entire Control Room erupts in sparks gushing from every panel as the the boat takes an immediate 30 degree down-angle as it immediately rushes towards Crush Depth out of control. Everyone runs madly about in frightened confusion shouting, "A fuse blew! Oh, God! We're all gonna DIE!!! I want my Mommy!!!" Did you ever plug something into a wall socket and blow a fuse? Did your entire house blow up? Do you have ANY idea of how deeply embarrassing this undisciplined confusion and cowardice depicted on the screen truly is to any real submariner?
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We'd
occasionally open up the boats and conduct guided tours for the interested,
and usually excited, general public. NO thanks to this popular television
series, we would constantly have to explain to disappointed faces that
combat submarines do NOT have picture windows in order to look at all
the pretty fishies. While explaining the WHY of that, we'd
usually point to the ventilation ducts and ask if any one of them could
crawl through that from one compartment to the next like those
actors on television and movies always do. I had to work real hard
at doing this smiling, and without sarcasm. It wasn't their fault,
people are misinformed because they were only exposed to the Hollywood
Mindset that has only profit as a goal. |
Most boat sailor's watch submarine movie and television presentations either cringing and grimacing or laughing in derision and sarcasm. Wearing dolphins means that you've been trained and drilled in emergency situations to handle, within reason, anybody's job. Period. You've been trained to the point that when something bad happens, you simply take care of it. Calmly. Those piping systems that are open to the sea all have backup valves to shut them down. All systems have built-in redundancies. If something doesn't work, you shift to the back-up. We're professionals, and do NOT run around screaming in panic because a fuse blew, which of course means (in Hollywood) that ALL systems arc, spark and melt down almost causing everyone to die. It just doesn't happen. We've all been trained in Damage Control to stop flooding if it's at all humanly possible. Nukes are constantly reading the RPM's (Reactor Plant Manual), drilling and being tested on procedures. Ship's Quals, Divisional Quals, up on the bridge out at sea killing waves with a rifle or .45 caliber pistol - the training never lets up. When there's a job to do, we do it. No matter what. On one of the "old boats" I knew this ENC(SS). He was quite a character. Tattoo's everywhere. He had a large gear tattooed to the top of his head, and twin screws (ship's propellers) tattooed on either side where he sits. On the beach (which is our way of saying going ashore on liberty for fun and relaxation), he always celebrated very heavily. Back onboard again, and getting underway that first day after liberty was something else! As Chief Of The Watch, in the Control Room, he would eventually receive the order from the Officer Of The Deck (OOD) "Open the Forward Group" then "Open the After Group". The chief would hover over the Vent Manifold and hesitate for only a moment before plunging shaking hands through a multitude of poisonous spiders (only he could see) and then operated the levers that hydraulically controlled the Main Ballast Tank Vents. The point is, he did what was necessary to submerge the boat, even though he was inwardly scared to death. A good submariner does his job calmly and efficiently - no matter what. That story would shake-up, no doubt, many Rickover-trained "O divvers" (slang for Officers and their nonexistent division that we humorously allude to). But I'll tell you something. I'd follow that chief into ANY real-time war situation! In twenty years of my personal experience there were only two officers that I felt the same about. Kenny Carr and Willie Warhead. The rest of the O divvers were okay and did their jobs efficiently, but I could always trust that those two made correct decisions and actions like artists, and they both "went to bat" for their crews when the chips were down. There are
only two kinds of vessels on the high seas:
That tattooed Chief Engineer existed at a time before the old boat Wardrooms began filling with Rickover Rejects (Officer's that Admiral Heiman J. Rickover didn't think worthy of being part of his personal Nuclear Navy). It's my personal opinion that it was then the boats went downhill from there. Before that happened, we never really considered ourselves as part of the Navy. These characters were now out to prove themselves, and I certainly can't blame them for that. However, they wanted everything done by the book. Just like the Skimmers (Surface Navy!) We were elite, and stuck together as a real team before all of that came about. Even if we didn't exactly get along with a shipmate entirely, we'd still back him to the hilt against all others. As the Nukes started up, the diesels lost most of their funding. We'd have to cumshaw (trade and deal) or downright steal parts to keep the boat running and ready to meet her commitments. That often took a team effort to accomplish. Once everything was fully running "by the book", self-confidence, bravado, and inspired initiative went straight down the Trash Disposal Unit. You couldn't turn a valve without following some official procedure witnessed by somebody who hadn't the vaguest notion of what you were doing to begin with. Today, I run into that word, team, in many companies and corporations, and with that same distrust in everyone - especially all around Washington D.C.'s Beltway. It's a very hollow word today, in any country, and meaningless in comparison to the lifestyle of the old boats. DBF, man....dbf...... If you are a DBFer reading this, do you remember polishing all that brightwork? Cans of metal polish, Neverdull, spirits and jeweler's rouge (done in port, of course - sure). All brass was turned into a mirror. It made the boat look sharp! Especially torpedo tube breach doors. Then some Pentagon whiz-kid discovered that polishing wears away metal. So no more brightwork. After all, it just may have worn the metal to a dangerous level. Two or three hundred years from now... <grin> If there's anything that I have learned in life, it's that everything runs in cycles. The submarine force that I retired from was most definitely not the one that first volunteered for twenty years earlier. I have every hope that things will cycle back up again - in or out of the boats. It's just the way human nature goes. Or, as we sometimes say, "That's how the mop flops." |
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EM2 to ET2
I guess I felt it was only right
to become an After returning on Sabalo to the Philippines at Subic Bay from the War Zone, it was time for me to return to Japan and my own boat tied up at Yokosuka. The first order of business (right after taking a REAL shower or course), was to get a haircut on base. Now that's something else! Sitting in a barber's chair with a lady barber clipping away, another applying a mudpack, and yet another doing my nails. Haircut finished, the barber massages your head, neck and shoulders. Being pampered like that is selfish, sure. So? Go check out what I put here about Boot Camp haircuts. So now lookin' & smellin' like a human being again, it's time to go trooping over to Disbursing and pick up my re-enlistment bonus. There were a BUNCH of us sailor types standing there leaning on the counters for the very same purpose. The entire place came to All Stop and stared as a mountain of money was counted out for us in ONLY TWENTY DOLLAR BILLS! I asked for something in larger denominations and was met silently with Steely-eyed Look Number Three. So here I go back to the boat with twenties stuffed in every pocket, in my skivvies, inside my shirt, stuffed in my socks - everywhere. PI is full of crooks, if you didn't know that. That was one nervous trek. Shipmates helped to exchange all that into something more portable and discreet. Time to go back. I was issued my orders, and told to pick up a bus ride to Clark Air force Base at the old WWII POW Compound there at Subic. Once there, I report in and ask when the next bus is leaving. Suddenly, I'm handed paperwork, bedding and assigned a locker then pointed to the barracks. I tossed my sea bag into the locker as some guy laughed and pointed out how I'll be standing watches for awhile as he pointed to that paperwork. Sure enough, that's what it said. I looked at him, shook my head, "Nope. Be right back." I trooped back down to that sign-in place, reared up and shouted, "Where's the Head Huck in charge of this dump?" Filipinos hate being called Huck, as it's derogatory - that got some immediate attention. Sure enough, a Filippino First Class Petty Officer came running out to one enraged Chainfall glaring at him with Steely-eyed-killer Look Number Fourteen. At about seventeen decibels over excruciating pain, I shouted how I was NOT there to stand stupid watches and barracks cleanup for some dumb Hucks, and if he couldn't get me on that bus to Clark, then tell me how to get to the nearest airport so I could fly myself back to my submarine, and pay for it myself. The guy sort of wilted under that barrage. Guys who know me personally, know that's the way it really went down. Retrieving my sea bag, I grinned at a now-astonished laughing boy. An example of someone experienced, and one not. Within fifteen minutes, I was on that Kamikaze bus ride sitting on a wooden bench with the chickens bouncing along to Clark Air force Base knowing full-well this guy's driving us off a cliff at any moment. Long after returning from Westpac, I left Pomodon (SS-486) which was home ported in San Diego, for San Francisco's Treasure Island, and ET "A" School by way of shore duty in Orange, Texas.
Re-enlisting once again, was not in the plan. While at INACSHIPFAC ORTEX (translated, Inactive Ships Facility, Orange, Texas - The Mothball Fleet), one of my fellow inspectors was a Chief Electronics Technician who told me about the SCORE program. This is me doing it again, but under that program to change rates. Many interesting
things happened while there at Treasure Island - At any rate, after
going through ET "A" School and about a kazillion Class "C"
schools between San Francisco and Hawaii, I reported aboard the USS
Guitarro (SSN-665) as EM1(SS) ET LPO waiting for the rate change.
That was good for laughs! Here I am reporting in a brand-new
rate, and guess who is the most senior Electronics Technician
of a division filled with other First Class Petty Officers? The Leading
Petty Officer is the boss, and I'm wearing an Electricians Mate insignia
on my uniform. Think about that for awhile... I was fortunate
that the gang was pretty much a bunch of good guys. It helped
that I was a AN/WLR-6 Maintenance Tech (Top Secret Stuff having to do
with Electronics Intelligence).
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The Ghost of AMR2LL
In a perfect world, there exists no social division between nuclear and non-nuclear personnel aboard nuclear-powered submarines. In the real world, it's simply a human factor, and it's a part of our way of life. I don't believe in promoting that behavior. On the Guitarro (as was also the case on Lapon), I would often go back of "Frame 52" which is the Line Of Demarcation where the reactor lives and visit with the nukes. I really believe in "one ship one crew". While doing this one day, I happened to drop down to Auxiliary Machinery Room 2 Lower Level (AMR2LL). There is always one man on watch down there by himself. I was just coming down the ladder when I caught another shipmate wearing dungarees out of the corner of my eye, then proceeded to say hello to the watch stander on duty. AMR2LL is relatively large packed with pumps and equipment clustered at the center with minimal walk space all around - much like an island of machinery. The watch stander has a small workbench and stool at it's after end. I said hello, and asked if someone was doing "quals" up there. He just looked at me strangely. "You see him too?" I said sure, but I didn't get a good look at him, and asked who it was. "There isn't anyone there..." he said quietly, "I've been going round and round. Nothing." I laughed, of course, then went round and round myself. Nobody there. Only one easy way in or out - the ladder that I used which was in plain sight. This wasn't the first time that our visitor had been seen by the watch stander apparently. I went back many times after that incident, but never saw it again myself. After my experience
on the Flasher, I don't laugh too loudly at this sort of thing much anymore...
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