Memories. Ahhh Yes, Memories of My Life

More 'Sea Stories

Sea Stories

         @Kåre เลียม Enga and ForeverDreamer , thank you for your comments about starting a reactor. Life in the Navy was 180 degrees out from the life I live now. Kåre เลียม Enga we were young, yes. Were we more mature? I don't think so. I would say we were better trained than the average sailor, and being so, we understood the risks associated with operating the reactor plant. Plus, it had been drilled into us from day 1 in the Nuclear Power Program that risky behavior wasn't tolerated. Add to it that Nuclear Trained Personnal also received extra pay, pay that a lot of us either couldn't afford to lose, or didn't want to lose, and you have yourself the 'well trained nuke'.

         That doesn't mean we didn't have a sense of humor about things. Far from it. But it was always at someone else's expense, we never fooled around with the plant. Like the time we had to get underway on a moment's notice (okay, a couple of days notice) so we could be at sea when Typhoon Pamela pummeled Guam. (We operated in and out of Apra Harbor, Guam). The Engineer came aft and saw the mess that was the Engineroom during refit and said, "Stow the Engineroom for sea!"

         We had a young Ensign on board who was just as Dorky as could be. Sorry, I don't mean to belittle him, but he was quite the character. Well, here was the Engineroom with that Ensign just kinda hanging around as was his custom. There were 2-3 Machinist Mates nearby when the Engineer said to stow the Engineroom for sea, so after the Engineer left, they grabbed the Ensign and held him against the Evaporator while one of their shipmates taped him to it, with Duct Tape! He was spread-eagle against the side of the evaporator, and couldn't move at all. They also taped his mouth shut. Later on, the Engineer came aft again and saw the Ensign taped to the Evaporator, sighed and said, "Get him free so we can get this thing started up!" It was acts like this that really allowed us to keep our sanity for the most part.

         Another 'game' we played was seeing how fast we could make someone mad. We called it 'Spinning them up', a reference to spinning up missiles before launch, or simulated launch. Some were 'easy' to spin up, others not so much. I was 'easy' on my first patrol, I know that. Once I learned what the game was all about though, it didn't happen, and someone else became the target. If you want to see our humorous side, look no farther than "Playing With Hot Dogs" . This small incident occurred on my second boat, the USS Sargo, SSN 583. True story though, no names mentioned because I don't remember them.





Jim Dorrell