US Navy redesigning its submarines to accommodate women

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) -- Every submarine in the U.S. fleet was designed with the height, reach and strength of men in mind, from the way valves are placed to how display screens are angled.

With women now serving aboard submarines, defense contractor Electric Boat is designing what will be the first Navy subs built specifically to accommodate female crew members.

The designers are doing the obvious things, such as adding more doors and washrooms to create separate sleeping and bathing areas for men and women and to give them more privacy. But they are also making more subtle modifications that may not have been in everyone's periscope when the Navy admitted women into the Silent Service.

For example, they are lowering some overhead valves and making them easier to turn, and installing steps in front of the triple-high bunk beds and stacked laundry machines.

The first vessel built with some of the new features is expected to be delivered to the Navy in 2021, the future USS New Jersey.

The Navy lifted its ban on women on submarines in 2010, starting with officers. About 80 female officers and roughly 50 enlisted women are now serving on subs, and their numbers are expected to climb into the hundreds over the next few years.

For now, the Navy is retrofitting existing subs with extra doors and designated washrooms to accommodate women. But Electric Boat in Groton, Connecticut, is at work on a redesign of the Navy's Virginia-class fast-attack subs and is also developing a brand-new class of ballistic-missile submarines, relying on body measurements for both men and women.

I’ll be upfront: I’m only going to reply to this thread once, but ComradeBork emailed me about it and I wanted to throw in my two cents.

I have the following things to say:

Some of you are acting like children. Yes, there are tampons on submarines now. We throw them in the garbage when we’re done with them, like women everywhere, but we use non-plastic ones since environmental regulations prohibit us shooting plastic waste overboard. If that disturbs you, I recommend moving out of your parents basement and into the real world. Also, yes, I am capable of making you a sammich. One would hope that you are an adult and fully capable of making your own g*****n sammich, but apparently that’s a stretch here.

There are currently more officers than enlisted women on submarines because there are more boats available to officers. The Navy used a phased approach and integrated officers onto 11 boats prior to integrating enlisted women. I believe there are currently 2-3 boats with enlisted female sailors. Mine is about to undergo the necessary berthing conversions and is slated to get our enlisted sailors late this year or early next. The goal is to have 3-4 female officers and 15-20 female enlisted sailors on the 11 boats.

I have had the honor and the privilege to work with outstanding people. They are bright and talented and hardworking and they sacrifice on a daily basis. The quality of sailors is one of the things I truly love about the submarine force. Most of those sailors happened to be male. Some are female. I have worked with a few spectacular screwups. Most happened to be male. Some were female. I’ve had male sailors who could not adult their way out of a brown paper bag. I’ve been to some Captains masts. One was for a married Chief who slept with a female officer. It takes two to tango and both are on their way out of the Navy. If you can’t be adult and professional enough to respect your boundaries and do your job, regardless of gender, then you don’t belong here. I expect you to be mature enough to control yourself. End of story.

We have humevac’d male sailors for family issues. On a prior deployment, we had a male junior officer develop diabetes. We waited until we were in the right spot to do so, and then we medevac’d him off the boat. The wait for us to be in the right spot nearly cost him his life, by the way. This is a dangerous job and we all know that prior to signing up. We have never medevac’d a female sailor (that I have seen), for any reason including pregnancy (which checks, statistically speaking), but it would involve the same policies and procedures as any other sailor. Turns out the watchbill suffers just as much for losing a male sailor as a female one. It takes just as long to replace the male sailor who had a nervous breakdown or broke his neck in a motorcycle accident as it would to replace a female sailor who got pregnant.

And lastly, what I chose to do with my life, whether it’s during my “precious reproductive years” or not, is none of your business. When and if I choose to have children with my husband (and which of us takes care of them afterwards) is neither your business nor the nation’s. I chose to serve. I think most submariners, current and former, will agree that it’s a tough road. There are sacrifices and dark moments. There are also times when I come down from the bridge after driving the boat when I can’t imagine doing anything else with my life. The moment when I received my dolphins was the proudest moment of my life...and I worked just as hard for and deserved them just as much as anyone else, male or female. You can sit there from the safety of your computer screen and judge my choices all you want, but until you show me your fish, you are less qualified to comment.

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