“It’s moving faster than the speed of sound,” Stevie said — his Fifth Grade Science finally coming in handy. “The noise is all following behind it. We won’t hear anything until it passes.”
He was wrong for two reasons. First, the meteor thing wasn’t going to pass. It was coming straight down toward them. Second, there was something to hear after all. Tiffany looked up from her iPhone and screamed.
Then the shockwave and fireball hit. The boy named Stevie Bishop felt the briefest imaginable flair of pain, and everything was gone.
CHAPTER 33
In 1775, David Bushnell, an engineer trained at Yale College, built a one-man attack submarine which he dubbed the Turtle. Constructed from curved oak planks strengthened by iron bands, the vessel’s hull resembled a wooden peach.
Bushnell equipped the Turtle with a hand-operated propeller for horizontal propulsion, and one mounted vertically for minor depth adjustments. The primary depth control mechanism consisted of ballast tanks which could be filled or emptied by hand-pumps. With a few refinements, his pump and ballast tank concept remains in use aboard modern submarines.
The following year, after the American colonies declared independence from Britain, his little submarine was put to the test.
British warships had blockaded New York harbor, giving them control of the Hudson River Valley and dividing colonial forces. The newly-formed United States of America had no navy to challenge the British fleet and the tactical situation was desperate. If the blockade remained unbroken, the revolution was in danger of failure.
Bushnell had designed his submarine for just such an eventuality. With the help of fellow Yale graduate Phineas Pratt, he created an underwater bomb with a clockwork detonator, to be carried by the Turtle. By current standards, this new weapon would be considered a limpet mine, but Bushnell called it a torpedo—in honor of a harmless-looking (but lethal) cousin of the stingray.
Ezra Lee, a sergeant in the Continental Army, climbed into the submarine shortly after midnight on September 7, 1776, and submerged beneath the waters of New York harbor.
His target was HMS Eagle, the flagship of the British fleet, commanded by Admiral Lord Richard Howe.
Sergeant Lee’s orders were to sneak below the hull of the Eagle, attach the torpedo to the ship’s bottom using a crank-style auger, then retreat to a safe distance before the clockwork timer detonated the explosive.
The plan was approved by General George Washington, who referred to the Turtle as the ‘infernal machine.’ Though he saw little chance of success, Washington was willing to try anything to break the blockade.
Working by the glow of bioluminescent moss surrounding the compass and depth gauge, Ezra Lee maneuvered the Turtle beneath HMS Eagle. He cranked the auger but he couldn’t penetrate the planking of the British ship.
After several minutes of rest, he tried again. His second attempt was no more successful than the first.
With his air supply running low, Lee pumped out the ballast tanks shortly after the Turtle was clear of the Eagle’s hull. He probably hoped that his tiny craft would be hidden by the darkness. If so, his plan didn’t work. British lookouts spotted the strange vessel and deployed a longboat to chase it down.
Realizing that the boat would overtake him, Lee jettisoned the torpedo and the Turtle gained enough of a lead to disappear into the darkness. Lee made it to shore, glad to be alive but disappointed by the failure of his mission.
But Bushnell’s invention wasn’t done yet. Detaching the torpedo had activated the weapon’s clockwork timer. The discarded bomb lay on the harbor bottom, just fifty yards from HMS Eagle.
When the timer expired, the explosive charge detonated. The blast lit the harbor like underwater lightning.
Admiral Howe was understandably concerned by a massive explosion so close to his flagship. Caution outweighed his desire to maintain the blockade. He ordered his fleet to head for open sea.
Without damaging a single enemy ship, the infernal machine had achieved an important naval victory.
In 1797, the American inventor Robert Fulton offered to build a submarine for France to use against British warships. In a letter to the French government, he described the proposed vessel as: “A Mechanical Nautilus. A Machine which flatters me with much hope of being able to annihilate their navy.”
Fulton’s intent was to build and operate the submarine at his own expense, in exchange for which he would receive payment for each British ship he destroyed. After two years of delays, his offer was accepted. He proceeded with construction of the submarine Nautilus.
Similar in concept to Bushnell’s Turtle, the Nautilus had a longer hull form and a significantly larger propeller. Fulton’s submarine was also equipped with a sail for maneuvering on the surface, as well as a lengthy ventilation tube which allowed the crew to receive fresh air while submerged.
The Nautilus made several successful test voyages, reaching depths of up to twenty-five feet, dive durations of nearly six hours, and a submerged speed of about four knots. The French Navy was impressed.
Unfortunately for Fulton, the Nautilus never managed to conduct an attack. British ships were able to spot the approaching submarine and avoid contact.
After a number of failed engagements, the French government backed out of the agreement. Speaking to Fulton, an officer of Ministère de la Marine said, “Go, sir. Your invention is fine for the Algerians or corsairs, but be advised that France has not yet abandoned the ocean.”
When it became clear that no other governments were interested in a similar arrangement, Fulton had the Nautilus broken up for scrap.
The next attempts to use submarines in combat came during the War of 1812 when the United States deployed two submersibles against the British Navy.
The first attack took place during the week of June 14, 1814 in the waters off New London, Connecticut. A semisubmersible torpedo boat manned by nine American sailors attempted to ram a spar-torpedo into the hull of a British warship. The name of the target ship and other details are not recorded.
The semisubmersible ran aground near Long Island, and was destroyed by the British Navy. Eight of the American sailors swam to shore. The ninth man drowned during the swim.
The next attack occurred a few weeks later, also in New London Harbor. The vessel in this case was a fully submersible submarine, built and operated by Connecticut inventor Silas Clowden Halsey.
The only recorded details of the submarine’s design come from a sketch in the notebook of industrialist and gun manufacturer Samuel Colt. Except for the elongated hull, air tube, and variations in configuration, the design appears similar to David Bushnell’s Turtle from the American Revolution.