“No surprise. Reps are engineers, not operational types.”
“Listen, Dutch. Round up a navigator, a communicator and an operations officer from three boats that can best spare them. They’ll report to me for temporary staff duty. Better get a couple of yeomen too. We need to crank out a practice emergency dispersal plan.”
“Aye, aye, sir. I’ll do that. How about the Commander, Naval Base, Seattle? Has he been cut in?”
“Hell of a way to run a Navy. I don’t know, Dutch, and I’m not saying anything without direction from SUBPAC.”
“Shall we advise him of the drill, sir? If the newspapers pick up on this, they’re sure to contact him. If he claims not to know, that alone might throw the fat in the fire.”
Danis considered the keen mind that functioned behind Dutch’s unobtrusive countenance. “Real good point. I’ll tell him the damn submariners are up to another Chinese fire drill. Hopefully, he won’t suspect anything.”
Relieving his chair of its load Dutch left. Though ordered in soft tones, he knew this to be the most complex and important assignment of his career. He also recognized omissions of specific instructions by Danis to be a vote of confidence. Another tough task lay ahead. It made no sense to pull half repaired submarines from the yard without the right people to finish the job. He’d personally pick key individuals to survive and spare his commodore this weighty chore.
The old mustang pulled a notepad from his pocket and began a list of yard workers.
SHOP # NEEDED SKILL
X11 3 Shipfitters
X26 5 Welders
X38 3 Outside Machinists
X51 2 Electricians
X56 2 Pipe Fitters
X67 2 Electronics
X72 4 Riggers
Dutch would ask the shipyard commander for his best men. And he’d requisition the team that had successfully installed an auxiliary saltwater pump at the remote ballistic missile submarine base at Guam. Their recent experience conducting repair operations in the field would round out Dutch’s ragtag repair crew. He’d order ships in dry dock to have plates welded over nonessential underwater openings. There’d be time for only one welding pass, violating the rules, but better than nothing. These would hold out seawater but only at shallow depths. Non-propulsive ships would be towed to shallow water in the Sound, submerged to sit on the bottom till whatever might happen blows over.
A myriad of things required attention. Provide Danis with a copy of local ferry schedules so the sortie could be completed before they started running. Passengers might notice the abrupt flurry of Naval activity and become suspicious.
Commodore Danis picked up the phone and dialed after Dutch left the room. It rang only once at the other end.
“Dave Zane speaking.”
The commodore greeted his old friend, “Should’ve known you’d be in the cockpit. Damn, I’m looking forward to retirement.”
Dave Zane kept his instruments, the phone, TV and VCR remotes within easy reach of his lazy boy recliner, hence the term cockpit.
Dave replied, “Depending whether you get two or just one term as Chief of Naval Operations, I’d say you’ll be retired in eight years minimum.”
“I’d retire today if you could fix me up as commodore of the local yacht club. That’d be a lot more exciting.”
“We’ll talk about it over the weekend, old Buddy. Why don’t you ride home with Bea after work tomorrow? We’ll drive to the peninsula together in my car. Don’t show up in that damn Navy vehicle. The neighbors worry about their taxes when they see that thing in the driveway.”
“Sorry, Dave, but I gotta beg off. Navy’s gone all to hell since you left it. Us old guys are supposed to sit around and drink coffee and watch the youngsters. We’re not supposed to work, but that’s what they’re making me do. Better get you back on active duty to straighten things out.”
“You’re kidding. We can put it off a day and leave Saturday.”
“No, Dave, I’m afraid not this time. I’ll be at sea.” Danis offered no further explanation and Dave pressed for none.
“You and Bea will go ahead without me, won’t you? I don’t want to be a total wet blanket.” Danis resisted the urge to warn Dave to leave the area.
“We’ll go. Some stuff we have to take care of up there. We’ll miss you, though. Next time I won’t take no for an answer … understand?”
“Understand. I’ll come by and see you before I leave for Dago, and you can tell me about all the fun I missed. See ya, Dave.”
“See ya, Eric. Don’t get seasick out there.”
After hanging up, Danis felt a great sense of relief that his friend planned to be away from Bremerton for the near term. He did not buy CNO’s view that the impending war would be limited to non-nuclear weapons.
An eerie red glow bathed Denver’s Attack Center to protect the conning officer’s night vision; essential in case a periscope observation is needed. Rig for red is enforced between sunset and sunrise and gives the crew a sense of conditions in the world above the waves. Brent enjoyed the quiet time.
Miracle of miracles, he and the captain saw eye to eye on reverting to the traditional four-hour watches. The previous six-hour watches brought on fatigue, boredom and a loss of touch with ship’s operations.
The captain’s training schedule took five full days. Brent’s day began at 0330 when called for the morning watch then came a full day of drills, followed by watch again from 1600–2000. Brent kept his word and squeezed three hours of new weapons training into each day. Land Attack Tomahawk Missiles, TLAMs, loaded in vertical outside the pressure hull, got the most attention. Operation and maintenance had to be conducted from within the ship. The Tomahawk Ship Attack Missiles, TSAMs, stowed in the torpedo room, were accessible, but limited because of being encapsulated.
Brent nursed a cup of hot coffee, not so much for enjoyment but for the wakening effect of the caffeine. At 0530, he executed sunrise and the Attack Center returned to normal lighting.
Denver cruised three hundred miles off Oregon’s coast, submerging deep enough to avoid motion imparted by large swells on the surface as she made her way south toward San Diego and home.
A voice crackled over the 21MC, “Conn, Sonar. Can you come in here a second, Mr. Maddock?”
Brent called back, “On the way,” and then said to Senior Chief Cunningham, “COB, you got it for a few minutes.”
“Aye, sir,” Cunningham replied.
Brent entered the sonar shack to find a pair of operators monitoring a maze of green lines on the sonar video displays, “What’ve you got?”
A sonarman replied, “Don’t really know, sir. I’ve never heard it before. It sort of rumbles at frequencies too low to get a good bearing. They come generally from the east, though. Look, sir, there goes one now.”
“Run that back on the LOFAR.” Then he and two sonarmen reviewed the Low Frequency Analyzer Recorder (LOFAR) trace but could make no sense of it.
“An earthquake? Or maybe Mount St. Helens erupting again?”
The sonarman disagreed, “Don’t think so, sir. I’ve heard a few quakes and volcanoes and they don’t sound anything like this. I’ve got some tapes if you want me to run them, Mr. Maddock.”
“That won’t be necessary. Keep track and log everything. We’ll want trace-recorder sheets from LOFAR annotated with times. Advise me of any changes.”
An ominous feeling built in the pit of Brent’s stomach.
“Aye, Mr. Maddock. Will do.”
Brent went back to the Attack Center and advised Cunningham of his return then he picked up the telephone and dialed the captain’s stateroom.
Bostwick’s sleepy voice mumbled, “Captain.”