“The Russian Alpha is moving away, sir. Apparently too much action for her.”
“Where’s the Hawaii?”
“She seems to be moving in to fill the gap, but still some sixty thousand yards out of position.”
“Good. At least somebody’s got some balls around here.”
Pinnnnnnng.
“Where did that come from?” Buffalo asked incredulously.
“Near the Hawaii, sir.”
“Well that can’t be any kind of minisub! There’s no way any known minisub could travel that far in such a short period of time. Or maybe there’s more than one…”
Pinnnnnnng.
“Again?!?”
Pinnnnnnng.
“What the hell? This is ridiculous!” said Buffalo. “I haven’t heard this many active pings in my entire career! Now I’ve heard four in less than half an hour — three within a minute!” Blam! “What the hell was that?” demanded Buffalo.
After their near-miss with the Chinese Kilo, Pappy and Mac laid off a ways, let their hearts stop pounding in their ears, and had a talk about their tactics.
“We have a steep learning curve here, Mac. We learned our lesson on that one not to rely on passive ranging, especially at close quarters. It’s hard to overcome ten years worth of training that taught us to never use active sonar unless absolutely necessary to stay alive. But in this sub-fighter, all the old rules are out the window. Since no one can defend against us anyway, let’s ping the hell out them!”
“I imagine they’re all going crazy trying to figure out who we are, what we are, how we’re doing this, and what we’re going to do next!” said MacKenzie, reveling in the moment.
“Yeah, well they can fret and think all they want, but the truth is, even if they knew exactly who, what, and how we’re doing what we’re doing, and even if they knew exactly what we intend to do next, they are powerless to stop us. So let’s make this gap a little wider — we want the Louisiana to have plenty of room to slip through. Who’s the next one down the line?”
“There’s a pretty good gap, XO, but it sounds like the Hawaii may be moving into it from the south.”
“All right! A worthy adversary! Top of the line U.S. attack boat… think we can, uh, render her ineffective?”
“Absolutely, sir!”
“So do I. I’m accelerating to fifty knots… let’s close this gap in a hurry. We’ll slow down when we get closer, but I want to move right in on her — inside minimum torpedo range — before we go active. It shouldn’t be a problem. We could fly circles, or even loops, around her completely undetected.”
After ten minutes on a course toward the Hawaii, the XO slowed to twenty-five knots and began a series of sweeping S-turns to generate changing bearing angles to the contact so MacKenzie could get a passive ranging solution.
“XO, aren’t you concerned about a repeat of our Kilo near-miss?” asked Mac nervously.
Pappy felt his heart race and noticed the palms of his hands were wet. However, he needed to keep an air of calm for the sake of the mission. “No. The reason we closed that gap quicker than expected was because the Kilo panicked after we pinged her and turned into us at flank speed. We’re not going to make that mistake this time. We’ll ping the Hawaii all right, but not until we’re practically in firing position. I just need to get a final ranging to know when we might be in visual range with the spotlight.”
“Okay, XO. I’m showing the Hawaii at about ten thousand yards on a heading of approximately zero-three-zero degrees.”
“All right, we’re headed west, directly for her. We’ll swing around to the south and circle in behind her… no wait… I think I have a better idea. What’s her depth, Mac?”
“I can’t really tell, sir. We have a single, horizontal row of sonar transducers mounted around the bow. So we can get pretty good azimuth information, but I can’t really tell whether they’re above or below us.”
Pappy appeared lost in thought for several seconds and then it was like a light bulb came on. “By Jove, I’ve got it!” he exclaimed.
“Sir?”
“Tighten your harness, Mac. I’m going to roll this baby into a ninety-degree angle-of-bank to the left. With a little top rudder and forward stick, I can hold the nose level and keep us pointed at the Hawaii. You get an angle-off reading on that sonar, and because we’re banked at ninety degrees, it will convert into a “depth-off” angle. By that, I mean it will indicate how much the Hawaii is above us or below us or whether she’s level with us. Since we know the range — probably about eight thousand yards by now — with a little quick trigonometry, we can calculate the difference in depth.”
After the maneuver, Mac determined the Hawaii was running at a depth about two to three hundred feet above SF-1. SF-1 was currently at eight hundred feet, so that put the Hawaii at five to six hundred feet.
“Okay, Mac, I’m descending to nine hundred feet. Give me a mark when we pass under the Hawaii. At that point, we’ll turn to a reciprocal heading of two-one-zero degrees for thirty seconds and then do an Immelman.”
“A what, sir?”
“It’s a maneuver like doing the first half of a loop and then rolling to an upright position at the top of the loop. I’ll go to full power and start raising the nose. We’ll pull about three Gs until we reach the top of the loop in an inverted position. Then we’ll level off and roll upright. We should be about three hundred feet higher than we are now, on a reciprocal heading, somewhere behind the Hawaii. At that point, we’ll give her the first ping. Got it?”
“Yes, sir.”
“All right, Mac. Double-check Master Arm — On.”
“Master Arm — On, XO… Weapons Hot!”
“I’ll slow us down some during the Immelman so we come out of it somewhere around five or ten knots. The Hawaii is basically station-holding now, so she’ll be doing about five knots.”
The maneuver went as planned, and they finished the Immelman on a heading of 030 degrees.
“Nice move, XO. I’ve got her dead ahead. We’re somewhere inside a thousand yards, but I can’t tell you exactly.”
“Ping her.”
Pinnnnnnng.
“She’s six hundred yards ahead, sir.”
“Thanks Mac. Pappy accelerated slightly to close the gap. Give her another ping.”
Pinnnnnnng.
“Two hundred yards, dead ahead, sir,” announced Mac.
“Spotlight — On. We’re moving in. How about one last ping for good measure and to really ring their bell!”
“Aye-aye, sir!”
Pinnnnnnng.
“Position confirmed, sir… one hundred yards and closing. We should pick her up visually any moment.”
Then, out of the gloom, there she was — a monstrous machine lumbering along like the Hindenburg. “I’ve got her, Mac. Slight angle off, she’s started a port turn and that screw is starting to cavitate. Looks like we surprised her and she’s gone to flank speed and is trying to maneuver. I’ll just slide over behind her and line you up for the shot.”