Posted on 11/13/2021 5:58:31 AM PST by Roman_War_Criminal
A metallurgist in the US state of Washington has pleaded guilty to fraud after she spent decades faking the results of strength tests on steel that was being used to make Navy submarines.
Prosecutors say Elaine Marie Thomas, 67, gave false positive readings for strength and toughness tests in at least 240 cases between 1985 and 2017.
Authorities did not disclose which vessels were affected.
But there was no indication that any submarine hulls had failed.
Ms Thomas, of Auburn, Washington, was the director of metallurgy at a foundry in Tacoma that supplied steel castings used by Navy contractors to make submarine hulls, the US Attorney's Office for the Western District of Washington said in a statement.
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.com ...
She wasn’t chief metallurgist in 1985 which may mean that fudging the test certifications was SOP where she worked.
Flying? Apparently the coldest temps anywhere in the ocean are around 28 degrees F.
For a submarine to reach an environment with a temp of 100 below zero, it would have to fly over 250,000 feet above the surface of the earth, higher than an SR71 could fly.
“There is No Way these batches were not re-tested by the shipyards”
Perhaps, but I doubt it. Raw materials purchased for the Navy are more likely to be source inspected — and that would involve inspecting the paperwork that accompanies the batch lots for the material. If the paperwork looks good, it’s pretty much assumed to be good when delivered to the shipyard — unless they ‘catch’ a curious fault cutting & fitting the steel there is little reason to go back & re-test.
When the wokies get hired in these areas.....
Most likely. There were only a few State certified testing facilities back then. This gal is the same age as me, and the article says, she’s been at this since the 80’s. I’m sure she is well known in the industry.
Testing at conditions not normally perform at are to simulate use at normal conditions over an extended period of time often called “accelerated testing”.
Falsify test results and certificates occur more often than anyone wants to admit. Determination of whether to charge and go to trial is largely based on if the company has large financial resources for the government to gain from and if the project is to big to fail or not. Think of the Challenger; you heard about only after a public failure. The movie “the Challenger disaster” is a good movie.
Exactly. Sure, the outer hull may not be subjected to water below 28 degrees. But they do occasionally surface in arctic conditions. Outside air temps can get much colder.
Also, these were castings. No idea if it has anything to do with external running gear, or some internal equipment. Maybe there are things inside that need cryogenic level cooling... If that cooling fails, the equipment is offline/unavailable, potential mission kill.
Subs are not always submerged.
The temperatures of -100F are certainly possible to be experienced during operations in the Arctic and Antarctic.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.