Scorpion in the Sea (3 page)
Read Scorpion in the Sea Online
Authors: P.T. Deutermann
USS Goldsborough, at sea, Mayport Fleet operating areas, 10 April
The officers all stood up as the Captain came into the wardroom. He nodded to the Exec, and took his chair at the head of the wardroom table. The Exec remained standing. The ship was rolling slowly as she made her way out across the continental shelf. The view through the porthole at the other end of the table alternated between gray sea and light blue sky. The Exec began the briefing.
The officers all stood up as the Captain came into the wardroom. He nodded to the Exec, and took his chair at the head of the wardroom table. The Exec remained standing. The ship was rolling slowly as she made her way out across the continental shelf. The view through the porthole at the other end of the table alternated between gray sea and light blue sky. The Exec began the briefing.
“OK, gents, believe it or not, we’re headed for a datum, a last known position of an unidentified submarine; courtesy of a commercial fishing boat’s report at 0600 yesterday morning.”
There was some murmuring around the table. More than twenty four hours was indeed a cold trail. The officers knew that the likelihood of finding anything was close to zero.
“Yeah, I know,” said the Exec. “This is probably a drill. But. The message from Group Twelve was fairly clear: go
out there, investigate, report. So we’re going out there, and we’ll set up ASW teams blue and gold, four hour watches, starting at 1600. Weps has made some changes in the watchbill, so check it out after this meeting. Ops, over to you.”
out there, investigate, report. So we’re going out there, and we’ll set up ASW teams blue and gold, four hour watches, starting at 1600. Weps has made some changes in the watchbill, so check it out after this meeting. Ops, over to you.”
The Exec sat down in his chair next to the Captain, and Lieutenant Wayne Foster, the operations officer, stood up. He walked over to a portable briefing easel at the end of the table, and flipped the first sheet into view.
“Captain, XO, I propose we execute an expanding square search around datum upon arrival, using plan four alfa, as shown here. The XO has said we have all night, so I recommend that we open the square to five mile legs, collapse it again, and then depart the area around 1000 tomorrow morning in order to get back into Mayport at around 1500. Captain, I have a movement change report ready for your signature.”
He flipped to the next sheet, which displayed a matrix of status settings for the ship’s principal sensors.
“I recommend that we make the initial approach with sonar passive, on the remote chance that there is a submarine still there or somewhere around there. We’ve been doing a cued electronic warfare listening sweep for the past hour, and we’re looking, of course, for submarine band search radars, just in case he pokes something up to take a sweep, which, as we know, isn’t likely.”
Ensign Benson, the First Lieutenant, raised his hand. “Wayne, as I understand it, our 23 sonar doesn’t have much of a passive capability. What’s the point of being passive?”
Foster acknowledged the question. “Because if we started pinging now, and we’re still about fifty miles away from datum, any submarine out there would hear it and know there’s a tin can coming. If he’s still around that position, it’s better for us to drive in quietly, and then light off the sonar, when there’s a chance of getting contact. This assumes that there is an unidentified submarine operating out here in the first place.” He looked at the Captain.
“Good point, Ops,” interjected the Captain. “What we have here, Guys, is a report from a commercial fishing boat
skipper that he saw a submarine, or, a U-boat to be precise about it. At a position that he thinks he knew. Now, we all know that these guys know generally where Mayport is, but never precisely where they are, so this datum posit we’ve got is suspect to begin with, as well as being very cold.” The Captain leaned back in his chair. “My opinion is that this is a wild goose chase. On the other hand, I’d hate to go out there, look around in a perfunctory, half-ass fashion, and then come into port, only to have another sighting report in the message traffic the next day. So we go out there, and we do it right, OK?”
skipper that he saw a submarine, or, a U-boat to be precise about it. At a position that he thinks he knew. Now, we all know that these guys know generally where Mayport is, but never precisely where they are, so this datum posit we’ve got is suspect to begin with, as well as being very cold.” The Captain leaned back in his chair. “My opinion is that this is a wild goose chase. On the other hand, I’d hate to go out there, look around in a perfunctory, half-ass fashion, and then come into port, only to have another sighting report in the message traffic the next day. So we go out there, and we do it right, OK?”
The officers nodded their understanding around the table. The Captain indicated to the operations officer to continue. He then tried to put an interested expression on his face. He hated wardroom briefings; the chairs were too small, for one thing.
“Yes, Sir,” said the Operations officer. “That’s why I picked the expanding square, because the initial data is probably pretty loose. Captain, I was going to ask: has anybody checked to see if this was or is one of ours?”
“No, and our masters ashore won’t until we or another Navy unit actually makes a contact report. If we don’t come up with a sniff, then the whole thing goes into the burn bag and that’s it.”
“Yes, Sir. So, basically, we go into the datum area configured as I’ve shown here, with sonar passive, surface search radar active, air search radar passive, TACAN off, torpedo decoys streamed at short stay, and off, fathometer off, and operating on both screws. Once at datum, we’ll go active and ping around for the rest of the night.”
The Exec spoke up. “What kind of water conditions we have here, Ops?”
“Medium shitty, XO,” replied Foster. “We’re right on the edge of the Gulf Stream, so we have a huge thermal interface between the 70 degree water inshore of the Stream, and the 82 degree water in the Stream itself. That’s like a glass wall to the active sonar. Lots of mixing, boundary layer stuff, and tons of background acoustics from sea life. If a sub wanted to hide out, this is a beautiful area to
do it in, except when the North Wall conditions form. Then things get pretty lively out here.”
do it in, except when the North Wall conditions form. Then things get pretty lively out here.”
The Captain mentally nodded his head. Ops was understating the danger of the North Wall. The Gulf Stream, that magnificent, 60 mile wide channel of warm, tropical seawater which swept up the east coast of the United States until it reached the Hatteras area of the Carolinas, and then surged out across the Atlantic to make life possible in the northern Atlantic islands of Iceland and England, was a potent obstacle to any anti-submarine warfare problem, even when weather conditions were good. When certain atmospheric conditions prevailed over the continental United States, the north wall of the Gulf Stream became the ship-killing maelstrom which had given Cape Hatteras the sobriquet of Graveyard of the Atlantic.
Foster flipped to the next chart, which showed a variety of sonar ray diagrams.
“Linc Howard put these together for me this morning. They show the likely raypaths of ensonification in the environment we’re going to see out there. This one shows the outside of the Stream conditions, this one shows the inside, and these two show what the boundary looks like, which you can see is dogmeat. And you have to remember that the boundary area can be five miles wide.
“Anyway,” Foster continued, “there’s not much else to brief. We don’t know what kind of submarine this might be, or even if there has been one anywhere near this datum. And because we’re searching along the side of the Stream, the water conditions are going to produce lots of false contacts and a great deal of background noise. The continental shelf begins to drop off there, too. The water depth starts to go from the 300 to 400 foot range on the shelf down to ten thousand feet in the Atlantic abyss, so we’ll get reverberation in the active mode. About the best we can do is maybe spook the guy into running away, and pick up something when he moves. I wish we had a helo for this.”
“There was no mention of any air support, Ops,” said the Captain. “I think maybe if we got a contact which we could truthfully classify as something above ridiculous, they might
bang a chopper out, but I wouldn’t hold my breath, especially on a Friday morning. Nobody has been put on standby, that I know of.”
bang a chopper out, but I wouldn’t hold my breath, especially on a Friday morning. Nobody has been put on standby, that I know of.”
He turned to the Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) officer, Lieutenant (junior grade) Lincoln Howard, the only black officer in the ship. “Link, you told me you were going to build a program on that desktop we bought for CIC that allows continuous recomputation of the sonar environment. Is that done yet?”
“Yes, Sir, it is. This will give us a good test, too,” said Howard.
“Very good. Make sure we record the entire session, so we can show the Commodore. He was interested in what you were doing.”
“Aye, aye, Sir. That’s no problem.”
Lieutenant Foster had nothing more to present. “Well, we’ll at least get some ASW exercise time out of this,” he said. “Captain, XO, anything else to put out?”
The Captain decided to preempt any further discussion from the XO, and stood up, followed by everyone else.
“These kinds of missions are just part of the job, Guys,” he announced. “Let’s just do it, take a good look, and get back in for the weekend. Try not to run into any fish nets or boats. Thank you, that’s all.”
The officers stood until the Captain and the Exec had left. Outside, in the wardroom vestibule, the Captain signalled the Exec to follow him up to the Captain’s Cabin on the next level. He walked in to his cabin, pitched his Goldsborough baseball cap onto the bunkbed, and thumped down in a chair, motioning for the XO to sit down as well.
“Well, what do you think, XO. We getting picked on again, or what?”
The Exec grinned. They had had this discussion many times. The Captain was convinced that the Group staff, and, in particular, the Chief of Staff, Captain J. W. Martinson, III, had it in for Montgomery, and thereby Goldsborough. Mike was not an innocent bystander in the matter of his relationship with the Group headquarters. He had a penchant for writing messages that were openly critical of
the local maintenance and supply organizations when they did less than good work, reflecting his conviction that the shore establishment existed solely to support the ships. Since coming to command, he had gained the distinct impression that some elements of the shore establishment found the ships to be a needless pain in the stern. Mike was also somewhat notorious on the waterfront for his rule that any staff officer who came on board his ship had to see him first. The staff officers were charged by their bosses to keep themselves informed about the material, administrative, and operational readiness of the ships in the Group. When staffies come aboard most ships, they were accustomed to dealing with their department head counterparts. In Goldsborough, they had to deal with a Commanding Officer, who always made it clear that he felt they were meddling. Which they usually were.
the local maintenance and supply organizations when they did less than good work, reflecting his conviction that the shore establishment existed solely to support the ships. Since coming to command, he had gained the distinct impression that some elements of the shore establishment found the ships to be a needless pain in the stern. Mike was also somewhat notorious on the waterfront for his rule that any staff officer who came on board his ship had to see him first. The staff officers were charged by their bosses to keep themselves informed about the material, administrative, and operational readiness of the ships in the Group. When staffies come aboard most ships, they were accustomed to dealing with their department head counterparts. In Goldsborough, they had to deal with a Commanding Officer, who always made it clear that he felt they were meddling. Which they usually were.
“You’re getting paranoid, Captain.”
“Shit, Ben, even paranoids have enemies.” They both laughed at the old joke.
“But what bothers me,” continued Mike, “is that Captain J. Walker Martinson, the turd, knows that I really want to keep Goldy in this upcoming Fleetex. It’s our one chance this summer to get out of Mayport, and the crew is really up for that. It would be just like that prick to find some screwy thing like this to use as an excuse for us not to go.”
The Exec took off his own ballcap, and ran his fingers through his thinning hair. He was a senior Lieutenant Commander and nearly the same age as the Captain, courtesy of several years of enlisted time before he had won his commission. Ben Farmer was a no-nonsense, very experienced seagoing officer; he also had excellent political instincts for how things worked in the Navy. He had accumulated his twenty years, and thereby the rough confidence that the worst they could do to him was make him retire. He tended to speak his mind, but privately.
“I don’t know, Skipper,” he said. “I should think that the Group Chief of Staff has too many things on his plate to have time to hatch a plot like this, even if you do poke a sharp stick in his eye once in a while.”
“No more than once a day, XO.”
“Yes, Sir,” grinned Farmer. “I know. But, actually, this caper has only cost us a day, and the plant will take a few days to cool down anyway. We never really expected to be able to work those main steam valves over the weekend, so we’re not in any jeopardy, schedule wise.”
The Captain sighed. “I guess you’re right, unless some other frigging fishing boat skipper starts seeing things.”
The Exec grinned again. “You live next door to those guys, see them all the time. Why not put the word out to cool it?”
The Captain nodded. “I plan to do just that. I’ll see Chris Mayfield—he’s the daddy-rabbit skipper in the commercial fishing crowd. Tell him to change to a better brand of bourbon, stop these hallucinations.”
Mike’s choice of a home was another thing that somewhat disturbed the senior staff officers at the Group headquarters. Mike lived on an elderly, refurbished houseboat down at the Mayport Marina. He was reputed to cut a reasonably wide swath through the nightspots along the Jacksonville beaches, whereas a proper Commanding Officer lived with his wife and children in quarters on the naval station. A proper Commanding officer was not a freewheeling bachelor who drove a sports car and went on liberty like a sailor. No one amongst his contemporaries or on the staffs had ever come right out and said such things, but the expressions of prim disapproval were there if one cared to look, disapproval given impetus by some of the wives’ appraising glances.
“Unless, of course,” said the Exec, “somebody really did see a submarine out there.” He looked serious for a moment.
“Not a chance, XO, not a chance,” snorted Mike. “This whole thing is bullshit, and Martinson knows it. Group’s still mad about that message I sent in on the shipyard’s main steam system valve work. It must really piss ’em off now when I report that they still leak. You watch—he’s just pulling my chain.”
The Exec had some opinions on the fine art of chain
pulling in the Navy, but diplomatically kept them to himself whenever his CO got on to the subject of the Cruiser-Destroyer Group Staff.
pulling in the Navy, but diplomatically kept them to himself whenever his CO got on to the subject of the Cruiser-Destroyer Group Staff.
“Yes, Sir, I reckon so. We’ll give it a good run, and then get back to serious business.”
“Right you are, XO. Whether or not this is Martinson and company, what we really need to be doing is working on the main plant and getting those steam leaks fixed. Let’s go through the motions, send in a sincere message, and get back in.”
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