Skipper of submarine San Francisco relieved of command

Navy Times | 1/20/5 | William H. McMichael

[SmithL]

Commander Mooney has been reassigned.

[shubi]

I was in Nam a long time ago. I helped Kerry rape and pillage :-)

[RetiredArmy]

This place has really changed in 10 years. I have been here since July 92. It is growing and growing. You would not recognize it nowdays. Lots more people, and tons more traffic. But generally, nothing has changed. The mall area is much larger, up above Costco on the hill, there is a new hospital and Home Depo put a place down next to the HW 3, Wagga Way interchange. Lots of new businesses, etc. The Bremerton Navy Shipyard area has really changed. The entrance area to Bremerton there at the gate has changed with a major road remodel, and the base took over a couple of blocks there around the Kitsap Transit bus building. Huge parking garage next to the gate now. The John Stennis just pulled into town recently from San Diego when the Ronny took homeporting down there away from Stennis. Lots of changes. Not much for the better as we have this new King County Selected State Governor now.

[wyattearp]

It is not uncommon for a sailor, assigned to a specific vessel, to affectionately refer to his vessel (of any size) as 'the boat' or 'my boat'.

On the Berkeley, DDG-15, we always referred to her as "the boat", as in "heading back to the boat", etc.

God help anybody not on the Berk calling her that...

[wyattearp]

A collision at sea can ruin your entire day

Our XO backed the ship into the ammo pier after we off-loaded our ammo, prior to going into the yards. Tore a quarter-million-dollar hole in the stern. He was a full commander. He never got his bird, and he never got his own command either.

[shubi]

Being a line officer is a big responsibility. I was a Ltjg and was responsible for a division (Comm), crypto officer, OOD in combat supporting the Marines, CICWO and handled the ship during underway replenishment. It taught me a lot as a 24 yr old. I

[Sloth]

Yeah, and Bush should be impeached because, as the Jersey Terror Whores reminded us, 9/11 happened on his watch. He should have known.

< /sarcasm >

[quietolong]

I was in P-3s in the late 70s And was told that if ever a sub on patrol got detected by anyone! ( us, them or anyone else)
The Skipper of the boat was relieved of command!

[The Grammarian]

Pls answer a question - a sub is a boat and a frigate is a ship. What's the difference and why?

Classically, the difference between a ship and a boat was whether it was seaworthy (ships are, boats aren't). Obviously, submarines are seaworthy, so I have no idea why they are referred to as boats.

[Future Snake Eater]

Why was he doing 30 knots? He's not going to be very quiet going that fast. Especially in a poorly-charted area of the ocean?

You may as well get in a super-expensive sports car, get into a treacherous stretch of road with which you are unfamiliar, and floor it.

It's an accident waiting to happen.

[LibertarianInExile]

That's because he is a drunk whale, not a member of the armed forces. We can't dump animals, even party animals, from commands they ain't got. In fact, the rumor is he actually became rear admiral of the Massachussetts Navy after that escapade.

[LibertarianInExile]

I think they did the same thing for John F'in Kerry, except he had to film his own "Swift Boat 109" movie. /sarcasm

We are in agreement that JFK should have been courtmartialed for dereliction of duty. Those PT boats could run rings around 99% of the ships on the ocean. He and his crew were sleeping or drunk when they ought not have been. I always enjoyed the fact that his ghostwritten "Profiles" made him a genius scholar, too.

Old Joe's bootlegging and insider trading dough spread around right really could buy anything in those days.

[quietolong]

I was reading the updated 40th anniversary edition of PT 109 (why do you think jfk II was on Swifts) and got a great link from it.

PT Boats, Inc.- A Nonprofit Histroical/Educational Corporation
http://www.ptboats.org/

And from that sight got this link

RiverVet - Don Blankenship's site about River Boats in Vietnam
http://www.rivervet.com/

But unlike some other person who will remain un-named person. Did not run home after a few scratches. JFK I stayed when he was told he could go home. And fought on with PT-59

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/ships/PT/PT-59.html

[IonImplantGuru]

Pls answer a question - a sub is a boat and a frigate is a ship. What's the difference and why?

I'm an ex-submariner and here's the story I got:

In the beginning days of true submarines - a bit over a century ago - the subs were quite small and did not have a very big range. For example they couldn't carry enough fuel to make it across oceans.

For those reasons, subs were carried aboard larger ships to get them where they were needed. By traditional naval usage, any craft that is carried aboard a ship, and can be hoisted into and out of the water, is referred to as a 'boat.'

Well, boats is what they started out as and that term became tradition itself within the ranks of submariners, even as the 'boats' themselves got larger and gained cross-oceanic endurance. Ohio class missle boats are as big as WW II heavy cruisers, and just one of them packs more firepower than has been expended (on both sides!) in all the wars this country has fought - but, with pride, their crewmembers refer to their vessel as a 'boat'.

[CenturionM]

Why was he doing 30 knots? He's not going to be very quiet going that fast.

If the required Speed Of Advance was high enough, a Flank bell for most of the time is required to get where you need to be on time. As for the noise, rule of thumb is to go fast to get where you are going, then slow down and get sneaky when you get close.

"Poorly charted" is a relative term. The sounding minutes prior to the impact showed >1000 fathoms. The general public will probably never know all the details of the orders CDR Mooney was operating under, so our guesses and Monday-morning quarterbacking are just that. The investigation is ongoing and may well exonerate him of blame.

[IonImplantGuru]

Nuclear Subs have only been based at Guam since 2002. Relative to the North Atlantic, the GIUK gaps, North Pacific, the route has to be a very rarely traveled route as nuclear submarines go. It's certainly mapped far less well.

If Statement #1 is true, what the heck was my nuclear powered ballistic missile sub (and others) doing using Guam as a base during the 1960s and beyond? Statement #1 is false.

Statement #2 is essentially true; though the route in question is not a normal sealane or patrol route, it has been used once or twice a year for liberty calls. The previous boats taking this route were - simply put - lucky!

For the reasons stated above - this region is not a 'hot zone' for submarine activity - statement #3 is also true.

I guess 2 out of 3 ain't too bad.

- An ex-submariner with time in both the Pacific and Atlantic fleets

[CenturionM]

I was stationed there 1987 to 1990. I took my family to visit the area last year - my kids finaly got to see what I was always raving about. It still ranks as the most beautiful area I have ever lived in.

[IonImplantGuru]

Even if he doesn't face criminal negligence or recklessness charges, the fact that a man died as a result of this accident means that his career is finished. There's just no way to sugarcoat something like that on a fitness report.

Well, I guess there's no way to sugarcoat this: You (and many many others) who have stated essentially the same thing are full-of-it know-nothings!

Every single situation is different, but collisions, loss of personnel, etc. are NOT automatic career-slayers. Nobody wants to wait and see how things play out; even though no one here knows all - or for that matter any - of the facts of the case, there sure are a lot folks who want to play 'The Donald' and say: "You're fired!"

Facts: I was assigned to the USS Kitty Hawk for a 'Nam tour in 1965 - 66, and my skipper was Capt M. D. Carmody. During that cruise (not counting air wing casualties) we lost a number of shipmates, including 3 in a fire which destroyed one of the three enginerooms on the ship; we kept on the line and fighting. In Subic Bay, an F4 Phantom was dropped from flightdeck level while hoisting it aboard, destroying the aircraft and putting #4 elevator and the B&A (boat & aircraft) crane out of commission for the rest of the cruise.

At the end of the cruise he was awarded the Legion of Merit, the ship got the Navy Unit Commendation, and he went on to make Admiral and wound up as Commandant of the 12th Naval District. His bio is at

http://www.kittyhawk.navy.mil/history/co_bios/carmody.htm

Now.... you were saying...?

[IonImplantGuru]

Who sets the SUBNOTE track and the MHN depends on who owns operational command of the boat. So generally in local OPAREAS, it's the squadron or group commander. For most operations outside the local OPAREAS it's the Force commander. This ensures that SUBNOTEs don't interfere with each other, which happens quite a bit in the Atlantic. Disclaimer: I've never operated in the PAC, so I've only got LANT experience to go by.

I can't remember which SUBGRP it is (7?) that's based in Yokosuka, but knowledgeable source posted in one of the other SF threads that that's who sets the track, speed, depth, etc. - not the skipper - for trips like this. In war games (in well-charted defined playgrounds!) the skipper and his team get to play things a little more free-form.

[Doohickey]

That's typical. I think it is CSG-7 who has OPCON in EASTPAC. It's CSG-8 in the Med. Skippers never get the latitude to set their own track for a submerged transit. I did have one Captain that had the sack to send a proposed SUBNOTE once.

[CenturionM]

Well put, Ion! The submariners, like so many others in the military, do things that carry an inherent level of risk. You do everything you can to operate safely, but you will never completely remove the fact that you are doing something that is inherently unforgiving. Whether it is aviators flying nap of the earth at night, paratroopers conducting HALO ops, or any number of other high pucker-factor evolutions, you aren't guaranteed you will go home.

The BOI will sort out whether the Captain did everything he could. Meanwhile, we mourn the loss of a brother, and are thankful that the crew had a little luck and a lot of skill and were thus able to keep from joining the Thresher and Scorpion crews still on patrol.