The screw ups that I know about after just a few months on my first ship:
- Hull Technicians left (forgot) an Oxy-Acetylene rig on the pallet conveyor and when the mess decks people energized the conveyor, the rig dropped into the well at the bottom of the very greasy pit and somehow the next pallet in the chain didn't strike off the head of the O2 bottle so there was no huge explosion and fire.
- The Chief Electrician used a metal comb to bypass the interlocks on the 16,000 pound weapons and cargo elevator while it was being used to strike down stores during an underway replenishment in the North Arabian Sea. The Elevator over-traveled the top deck (Damage Control Deck on an LPD) which broke the suspension cables or snapped the 19 inch steel eyebolts holding them to the car and the car dropped about 8 feet before the diamond knurl elevator safeties tripped and locked it in place for the next 8 months I was onboard. Next stop on the way down was the bottom 6 decks below and the stuffed Landing Force Magazine which actually was full of 5 inch ammo for the Middle East Force but not for us.
- A Gunner's Mate was conducting preventive maintenance on a Super Rabid Blooming Overhead Chaff system inport Dahran, Saudi Arabia. I'm pretty sure the maintenance card dictates the physical unloading of all SRBOC rounds prior to conducting fire circuit testing because weren't we all surprised when a 5" chaff round blew up on top of a warehouse next to the ship.
- A very unusual crew of HM-14 pilots towed their acoustic mine sweeping cable over what was probably the only actual reef in the Red Sea and then had the nerve to complain that the coxswain had "run over it with the propeller" which caused those 30 foot long straight as a ruler gouged tears in the casing.
- A supply clerk from the same squadron decided to end the problem of a sweaty pipe that was getting some of his cardboard boxes wet by closing the pesky valve. I'm not sure if he ever knew that the valve he closed was the one that lined up firemain cooling to the #2 Emergency Diesel Generator which surely burned up the next time it went into auto-start and run during a power outage.
I went to the Guided Missile School at Dam Neck, VA where they really wanted us to know and take to heart that under no circumstances should you or anyone else conduct missile firing checks with the high voltage ignition cables connected between the Harpoon Guided Missile Control panel and the missiles. I mean they told us about a missile that wandered into a Belgian village one day and caused havoc and about another that was last seen heading in the direction of St. Croix. In fact, they told us that only an idiot would leave the key lying around or have those cables anywhere but in the Weapons Department Safe. I was therefore somewhat surprised that the Gulf of Sidra Harpoon employments were actually as successful as they were although I did hear they had to chase down the off-watch Tactical Action Officer and shake the key out of him before they could fire.
- I think we have all seen the pictures of the sad looking torpedo in the dumpster on the pier next to the Frigate that was just "firing air slugs in port" when it turns out there was a torpedo sleeping in the tube that nobody knew about or remembered and those stories were a dime a dozen. I heard one frigate was going to paint both a dumpster and a staff car on their bridge wing to signify their torpedomen's successful engagement of targets of opportunity.
- There was also a positive slew of accidental discharges of the 76mm guns on our guided missile frigates. It seems that sometimes when the weapons were fired properly and then returned to a proper centerline stow position pointing dead aft, the gun would cause its own self to load and fire just one more round right through the ship's smokestack and unoffending little Phalanx Close in Weapon System which made a hole in the one and blew apart the other. I recall walking down the pier to the Main Brace at 32nd Street one fine evening and an FFG was coming in to moor alongside another of that class that had painted a giant smiley face target on their stack as a sort of doink in the eye for the newly arriving ship that had just blown its stack and CIWS off. Gunner's Mates can be pretty brutal.
As I look back it is a wonder that we did so well and confined most of the real damage to the enemy. I could however tell dozens more tales of patrol boats and night patrols and floodings and accidental didn't really happen because nobody saw it kind of collisions but there really are so many and my fingers are so tired. Maybe another day.
11 comments:
Oy... And I thought I was careful demanding the keys to the boat before I dove to untangle dock lines from the prop. Good money at the time, cheap compared to a haul out.
Only had one episode that I didn't and when that prop started, I dove to the harbors mucky bottom asap.
Other than small arms episodes my 20+ years were pretty boring unless you ask about that M60 that rolled off the train heading to Grafenwoehr training center.
Mike,is that M60 perhaps for sale,asking for a friend.
M60A2 tank. I doubt it's for sale.
Eh,thought it was a more of a soda can target toy,though........,was said unit loaded perchance with shells,this still may work!
I think one Coast Guard Port Security Unit lost at least machine guns that 'fell off the pintle in the boat' as it hit a wave. This happened 3 times to the same unit that I know of. OTOH, they tied balloons to grenades they threw in the water for anti-swimmer training and that's a real no no. Can't you see the guy in the boat swinging arms wildly trying to fling off a live grenade that snagged a button on his uniform as it was heading overboard? It seems EOD was tired of going to the bottom to search for 'dud' grenades that 'failed to explode'.
I only had 21 years as a Commo tech and 30 years in telephone switch/ fiber/ router experience, What is a a metal comb?
Google "Lake Erie CG70 shoots into Aiea " happened inport Pearl Harbor , FC3 doing maintenance on sea whiz , let er rip . Another great duty day , surprisingly no one on the populated hillside was hurt or killed .
Had a dumbass 4-striper TRY to connect a cable to the first stage of a Minuteman missile WITHOUT doing a Hazardous Voltage check. I kicked him in the ass and told him to follow tech procedure. He outranked me by a stripe, and proceeded to inform me that he would Courts-Martial me. I pointed out that the Court would find he violated a BASIC safety procedure and they would most likely kick his ass as well. I watched him like a hawk after that... because you just don't screw around with safety when Nuclear-tipped missiles are concerned.
His Shop Chief had a quiet talk with him when we got off of dispatch to that site.
1950 interlocks bypassed using a standard metal hair comb that were fairly common in the late 70s and early 80s. He just dropped into the relays box so the relays could not "indicate an open hatch door on any deck" if the interlocks detect an undogged watertight door, the elevator will not move.
The torpedo on the pier was courtesy of the USS Jack Williams, the harpoon in St. Croix courtesy of the USS Coontz. Don't forget the USS Saratoga accidentally fired 2 Sea Sparrows into a Turkish destroyer in 1992.
They hit the ship in the bridge with some RIM7s so it made me wonder if it was an accident. On the other hand a frigate is pretty big relative to a normal RIM 7 target. :)
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