Around the World Submerged (28 page)

As the outside water pressure was reduced, the leak correspondingly
decreased. Shellman cast me a grateful look. I beckoned to him. “Curt,” I said, “we are locking the shaft so that it can’t turn. This will let you get closer to it, at least.”

Shellman was mopping his face with a rag. “Thanks, Captain. I was about to ask if we might do that. I’m afraid to put somebody outboard of the propeller shaft because there’s not much clearance between it and the skin of the ship.”

He did not need to say more. There was perhaps a foot-and-a-half clearance between the propeller shaft and the curve of
Triton’s
pressure hull or skin. As I watched the propeller shaft come to a complete stop, there came into view a great bolted coupling by which two sections of the shaft had been joined together. The huge coupling had been rotating previously in a sort of a blur, its machined edges a lethal hazard while the shaft was turning.

With the shaft at a complete halt, Curt and Chief Engine-man Fred Rotgers climbed on top, braving the reduced spray of water, while “Rabbit” Hathaway, a compactly built Engine-man, squirmed under the shaft and into the confined space.

Several minutes later we had the answer. The spit of anger in Rotgers’ voice as he reported the basic cause of the problem was not all due to the salt-water bath he had just experienced. “The _____ nuts on the far side of the gland are so loose you can turn them by hand,” he spluttered.

“How about the locking washers, Chief?” asked Shellman.

“I sure didn’t see any. That’s why they loosened up!” Rotgers glared as he spoke. It was evident that whoever had installed these bolts would have fared badly had the powerful Rotgers been able to get his hands on him at that moment.

“There are locking wires on the inboard side of the gland,” reported Shellman, after a brief inspection.

Further investigation showed that loose bolts were not the end of the trouble. The propeller shaft water seal had been improperly installed, that is, not made tight, either because of the difficulty in reaching some of the bolts or through lack
of locking devices. Under the vibration and stress of continual high speed, complication had followed upon complication. Looseness of the bolts on the outboard side had permitted the packing gland to become partially cocked on its seat, and now, tighten the bolts as we would, it remained jammed in a cocked position and could not be straightened. We heaved on the nuts with the biggest wrenches aboard, to the point where Curt feared further pressure might distort or damage the parts even more, but there was no stemming the leak.

Not sure, in fact, whether or not some improvement might have been made, we eased
Triton
down again into the depths, and the resulting effect, with the greater pressure outside, was striking, to say the least.

We had obviously not solved the problem. The next step was to put an emergency clamp around the leak, utilizing three damage-control clamps which had been designed for small patches, not for anything as massive as this. Down we went for a test again, but the pressure of the water was so strong that it simply pushed the clamps apart.

Midnight had long given way to morning as Curt Shellman, Fred Rotgers, Clarence Hathaway, and others struggled with the leak in the confined space. The watch had changed at midnight and again at four o’clock, but Shellman, Rotgers, and company stayed on the job. Two solutions were decided on: first, we would try to reinforce the three damage-control clamps which had failed; second, we would design an entirely new clamp, sacrificing for the purpose a section of molding from the wardroom passageway, which happened to be made of corrosion-resisting steel and was, by good fortune, of sufficient size for our use.

By breakfast time the first try was in place, damage-control clamps with backing plate for reinforcement. It had been a long, back-breaking job, performed in tight quarters under the most unfavorable conditions, with water squirting in under pressure the whole time the men worked. When we unlocked
the propeller shaft for a full-fledged test, Curt Shellman’s naturally haggard face assumed an even more worried expression, the deep circles under his eyes standing out almost as though the difficulty had caused him physical suffering. But all went well; the leak did not increase beyond manageable size, the drain pump was able to take care of the water leakage without difficulty, and Shellman permitted a half-smile to wrinkle the deep bags under his eyes. At noon, Fears reported that the modified clamp would hold, for the time at least, and that our newly manufactured one would be held in reserve.

Entry from the Log dated 12 March, 1960:

0020 Our fathometer is out of commission again. This is bad news. It has been giving us trouble off and on for the past several days. Each time, however, we have brought it back into operation. This time, as our electronics technicians and sonarmen check it over, they actually record the gradually decreasing installation resistance in the head. It appears to be flooded.

Ever since the initial difficulty with the fathometer, “Whitey” Rubb and Dick Harris had been giving me daily reports as to its condition, and I was well aware of their increasing fears as to its performance. All the instruction books we had on board for the fathometer had been pored over, and in anticipation, we had checked over the stock of electronic spares on board the ship, the back-up for all the complicated electronic-control equipment with which
Triton
was fitted. All spare parts which could conceivably be used in the fathometer—tubes, resistors, crystals, power amplifiers—all, no matter what type of equipment they were originally designed for, had been located, so that we could substitute as necessary.

As the careful watch over the fathometer continued, our worries increased. The receiver crystals had again burned out, and our new transformer had gone, too. Both were abnormal casualties, and it appeared that the basic trouble was not in
the electronic hookup of the fathometer, but in the installation of the fathometer head itself. This, unfortunately, was something with which we could not cope, even were the ship on the surface. We could, and did, take resistance and capacitance readings of various components through the electrical connections inside the ship to which we had access. But so far as inspecting the head, possibly eliminating a leak or replacing a bad component with a good one, we were completely helpless.

By 0200, complete loss of the fathometer was confirmed. Another set of crystals, just replaced in the receiver, had immediately burned out, and there was no question that the fathometer head itself was the cause. Chief Sonarman George McDaniel reported that while he was measuring the resistance to ground he recorded a rapidly reducing resistance to the point where the sonar head was completely grounded out.

All submarines are plagued with inability to maintain topside wiring free of water. A great number of cables must come through the pressure hull and therefore, over some percentage of their length, must be exposed to full sea pressure. Despite great care in installation, there are always some that flood, either through an unsuspected fault in the pressure sealing of the cable itself or because of improper installation. New ships, because of their miles of cabling, always have the greatest difficulty keeping their wiring dry.

Realizing that we would have to complete the rest of our cruise without a fathometer, a serious period of self-analysis faced me. Could we safely finish the trip without danger of running aground on some uncharted shoal or damaging the ship by striking bottom in one of the restricted passages we would later be required to navigate?

It was not as though this had suddenly become a consideration at four o’clock on the morning of the twelfth of March. I had been thinking it over ever since the first difficulty with the fathometer had arisen, and had generated some experiments
with our search sonar and Mike Smalet’s “monkey in a cage”—our name for his gravity-metering gadget.

Even before it finally broke down, I had become convinced that despite the loss of the fathometer we could still proceed along our way. Our search sonar reliably detected shallow water ahead and on either side, and particularly gave us immediate warning of sudden changes in the depth of the ocean bottom. Smalet, who was as anxious as anyone that the trip proceed successfully, had advanced the theory that although unexplained anomalies in the earth’s crust had an effect on gravity, it was also true that gravity was fundamentally a function of mass and distance. A perceptible increase in gravity should therefore coincide with a reduction in the depth of the ocean, and vice versa. We had been trying out his theory whenever there was an opportunity, and to our delight found that there was indeed some such correlation.

However, a more subtle question had to be answered: should I report our trouble?

By this time, we had passed into the operational control of ComSubPac, whose headquarters were in Pearl Harbor. What would be his reaction upon receiving a message from the
Triton
stating that her fathometer was out of commission? What indeed would be the reaction in the Pentagon? It was in a sense my duty to report our problem, but would I not, in so doing, be passing on responsibility I should assume myself? How could any admiral in Pearl Harbor or Washington or New London evaluate the situation as well as I could? Unable to see the situation at first hand, might they not be obliged to adopt the cautious course?

In short, if I simply reported the loss of the fathometer without all the amplifying considerations we had so laboriously developed in the past week and a half, was there not a good chance that we should be ordered to cancel the remainder of our trip and proceed directly to Pearl Harbor for repairs?

This question, with all its nuances, was the big one. In final
analysis, I felt continuation of our expedition depended as much upon my decision at this point as on anything we had done to date. Well I knew the Navy tradition; on the Captain rests the responsibility for the right decision. And well I remembered what had happened to Father after the
Memphis
had gone aground in Santo Domingo harbor. The cause had been a tidal wave—unpredictable, therefore something against which one could not have been prepared. Pacing the deck of his ship on a warm, pleasant afternoon, at anchor with awnings rigged, gangways down, and liberty parties ashore, he had been the first to see danger. Within forty minutes, mast-high breakers swept in from the peaceful sea and
Memphis
was cast ashore on a coral reef, a total wreck. Father was exonerated of all blame for the catastrophe, except the impossible responsibility for not having anticipated a tidal wave. (Technically, “not having been ready to get underway immediately.”)

This was, in fact, the major contention upon which his court martial eventually turned. In the crux of the decision, which the court, true to Navy tradition, could not but render against him, was the statement that nothing could divest the Commanding Officer of the ultimate responsibility for the safety of his ship. A comparable responsibility now burdened me.

Breakfast was served as I wrestled with the problem. This was not something that anyone else on board the
Triton
should be concerned with, but the more I thought of it the more certain I became that here, even more surely than off Montevideo, success or failure of our voyage lay in the balance.

Much has been written about the so-called “calculated risk,” but one of the considerations or calculations which cannot be neglected is that if failure is encountered, the penalty is no less severe than if the risk had been assumed without forethought.

All the training the Navy had given me, all the background of the Naval Academy and my years at sea, could lead to only one conclusion. As in Father’s case and in every similar
case, the final responsibility is on the Commanding Officer. I had to make the crucial decision, and it had better be the right one.

I resolved not to report our difficulty. Come what might, we would carry on and complete the voyage. Furthermore, I could not permit our situation to be fully appreciated by anyone else aboard. This load, like that of our special mission, could not be shared with anyone.

At 0105 on the morning of March thirteenth, our search sonar made contact with a submerged peak. Without the fathometer or the precision-depth recorder—which received its data from the fathometer—we were unable to determine the minimum depth of water over this peak.

We could not, consequently, predict how much water we had to maneuver in. In accordance with instructions, the Officer of the Deck slowed and changed course to avoid. We did so with ease, passing the shallow area well abeam and continuing on our way. Probably our caution was excessive, but my confidence in our ability to detect and avoid shallow water was confirmed.

At five o’clock in the morning, we brought
Triton
to periscope depth. Easter Island should be dead ahead.

From the Log:

0512 Radar contact on Easter Island at bearing and range predicted.

As we approached land, to my gratification our search sonar indicated a gradual shoaling of water as we moved steadily toward the island. Because of loss of depth of water information and in deference to the three-mile limit, we had decided to stay well clear of land.

From the Log:

0706 Commenced photographic reconnaissance of northeastern coast of Easter Island. About 0930, after careful search of the
area, Thor Heyerdahl’s statue is located, right where he said it was. Several other old stone heads have been sighted, none clearly identifiable from a distance, but there is no doubt about this one. The word is passed throughout the ship that anyone wishing to see a stone statue had better come to the conning tower.

In no time at all there is a regular procession of men coming up for periscope liberty, as was the case off Cape Horn. The statue faces inland and not much can be made out of its features, but the morning sun glints in orange and crimson upon the angular granite—and many details are filled in by our imaginations, reinforced by Heyerdahl’s book.