Posted on 01/28/2005 9:31:00 AM PST by Bean Counter
Edited on 01/28/2005 9:39:14 AM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
These are additional Official Navy Photos that have been released publically and further document the damage done to the sub.
This is what the front of SSN-711 should look like in drydock.
This is a pic of SSN-711 returning to Guam after the collision. Note the bow-down attitude that results form the partially flooded forward ballast tanks.
This is a pic taken shortly after docking. Notice the disturbance in the water that results form the constant air supply to the ruptured forward ballast tanks, and is preventing the sub from sinking by the bow. Also not the buckling in the hull on the Starboard side, where it appears that the whole front of the sub has been bent to the right.
Finally, this is the remains of the sonar dome that normally encases the entire bow. Reflect onthe force required to shatter fiberglass that is this thick and heavy.
Fiberglass.
Sorry but that is the way my spell checker spells it although I prefer your spelling. :-)
The bottom is Mare Island Red, mostly because the folks working on the hull while waterborne find it easier to see.
Actually, they probably won't decom her. She is one of 3 subs forward deployed to Guam (Houston and City of Corpus Christi being the others). The Navy wants to maintain a strong forward presence in the Far East region, and subs based out of Guam are vital to that effort. If I hear right, they will take one of her allready decommed sister ships, the Atlanta, and chop the forward ends off both boats and pretty much switch them around. That makes sense if you look at it logically, because the Atlanta (sitting in the boneyard in Washington) was allready like other decommed nuclear boats, she was due to be cut up for scrap anyhow. It would be a huge expense to do the alternative... decomm her, cut her up for scrap too, and then move another boat with its crew and their families out to Guam. Think of the force realignment problems from that.
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