Posted on 01/08/2005 3:19:47 AM PST by Jet Jaguar
HONOLULU (AP) - A nuclear submarine ran aground about 350 miles south of Guam, injuring several sailors, one of them critically, the Navy said.
There were no reports of damage to the USS San Francisco's reactor plant, which was operating normally, the Navy said.
Jon Yoshishige, a spokesman for the U.S. Pacific Fleet based at Pearl Harbor, said the Friday afternoon incident is under investigation and the 360-foot submarine was headed back to its home port in Guam.
Details on the sailors' injuries were not immediately available. The sub has a crew of 137, officials said.
Military and Coast Guard aircraft from Guam were en route to monitor the submarine and assist if needed, the Navy said.
Guam is a U.S. territory about 3,700 miles southwest of Hawaii.
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On the Net:
U.S. Pacific Fleet: http://www.cpf.navy.mil
AP-ES-01-08-05 0343EST
http://www.npt.nuwc.navy.mil/Seneca/hlc/graphics/heavy.jpg
You pinging something? 8<)
Funny, to see a picture of a USN sonar sphere submerged off of Guam, you can look at an image of a crane advertisement!
Roger that. I get the feeling that the removal of tactical nukes by Bush 41 was a relief to many fast boat sailors. They would prefer to let the "boomer fags" deal with that headache.
He's an American, one who's spent years in service of this country. You gonna tear him up?
Go figure, right?
Weird seeing it like that.....
I'm not trying to give you a hard time. I just thought you were making a joke and I was appreciating your subtle humor.
A submerged sub would hardly notice it aside from a slight change in pressure. In the open ocean the amplitude of the wave is miniscule and the frequency is huge.
You bet I will.
Bump to read replies later
And prayers up bump.
People, people, people: subs in general don't use active sonar while underway. In peace time we don't want to give out free info to 'the other guys' on what frequencies and sound profiles our acttive sonar uses, lest they find counter-measures. In war time, the only time one would go active is to acquire final targetting info for torpedoes or missles. If you go active, 'they' can get a fix on where you are.
Subs DO use a fathometer while underway, but in the deep ocean it doesn't tell you a lot. It's mainly used for shallow water (less than a few thousand feet) operation. However! No one knows where every single sea-mount or underwater pinnacle is. Many are uncharted. At high speed, the suckers can sneak up on you.
One of my boats (USS Scamp) hit an uncharted seamount at speed in the late 60s - not that far from this region! - causeing severe damage (screw trashed, lower rudder gone, big gash in bottom of ballast tank, etc.) and had to be towed into Guam for repairs. I don't think the skipper was canned; what can he do if the hazard is unknown and he has orders to get from point A to point B at all possible speed?
As many true sub vets have noted, it's way too early to cast any judgement yet. As an aside, the skipper of the San Francisco is LCDR Kevin Mooney, a terrific officer that I've communicated with accasionally on submarine BBS's, prior to his assuming command. Sometimes bad juju happens to good people.
- Just another sub vet; SSN 588, SSBN 629B, SSN 669
No. In a pressurized water reactor the seawater does not come in contact with the reactor. No China Syndrome here. If they are steaming back to Guam the reactor is okay. Godspeed them on their way.
When a sub runs aground with a water-cooled nuclear reactor, doesn't the reactor's cooling system start sucking mud into the reactor instead of sea water? I'm pretty sure mud doesn't have the same heat transfer and flow characteristics as sea water. I suspect there is a downplay of the threat to the reactor in this article.
Not the way the system works at all. Seawater and reactor plant completely isolated from each other. Can't go into details, but I will say have been nuc submariner the last 28 years.
Prayers to all aboard and families ashore
Driving a bathtub is no easy task, either on the high seas empty or a curvy enemy infested river.
That picture, I have many like it.
First thing out the ramp was the bbq pits and beer.
Sorry to blow my stack.
CDR Kevin Mooney is a really good submarine officer. They dont make them much better.
I've seen his posts on Submarine BBS's as well.
Submarines are basically a dangerous business. Things can happen that will hurt you. These guys deserve every bit of support that we can give them.
Certainly! I'm spent enough time on SPECOP with an augmented 'Q-4 to get to be friends with quite a few spooks.
Yes. And no.
See - If you run aground .. And you hit a flat, muddy bottom. And you stay there. For more than a few seconds. You probably will suck muddy water up into the SEAWATER system. Then that water "might" stay in the seawater side of the seawater-engineroom fresh water heat exchanger and a few other secondary coolers in the auxiliary seawater system - which, if left there for a long time, might reduce (not eliminate!) "some" of the engineroom fresh water heat exchange capability. (And those smaller heat exchangers can be flushed out to get rid of the mud, or even isolated, opened up, and cleaned out by hand if it's really, really badly clogged up.)
Now, IF you stayed on this muddy bottom for long, long time, you probably would suck muddy water into the main engine heat exchanger - but THAT won't affect the reactor since the main engine condenser is used only to cool stream going to the propeller turbine: But if you're stuck on the bottom, you're NOT running the propeller, so you don't have lots of water flowing at high speed though the ME condensor anyway.
(It's kind of a self-eliminating problem. If you're running the main engine, you not stuck on the bottom and aren't in danger of getting muddy water in the seawater system. If you stuck on the bottom, you're not running the main engine for long periods of time at high speed.)
BUT ...
The reactor itself ISN'T cooled by any of these systems (Directly, at least.) So, no matter what happened to the outside of the submarine, and to the seawater heat exchangers inside the submarine, the reactor can keep running without incidents. (Without drawing classified drawings of the reactor support systems - that's about as far as I want to explain things.)
Please add me to your ping list. 28 years of riding boats and still not tired of them!
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