As a former submariner, I think I can add a bit to this. Thresher and Scorpion were both US Nuclear submarines, lost in the late 50's or early 60's. Thresher was the first of it's class. The entire class was renamed after the incident, and became the Skate Class. Thresher was lost due to some basic procedural and design flaws. These flaws were corrected immediatly and lead to the Navy's Sub-Safe program. Though know one will really know the exact cause of the loss of the Scorpion, it is believed she was lost due to a torpedo detonating inside of the ship (like the Kursk). The only other major submarine disaster that has occured to a US sub since the second world war was a battery fire (nasty business) on the USS Bonefish in the late 80's. The Bonefish was one of the last of the diesel boats. Three men died in that fire, one of whom was a friend of mine. ASW Stuff: When we played games with the ASW folks down at AUTEC, we almost always had to broach (stick the sail above the water) so that the choppers and P-3 Orions could see us. The sonar buoys almost never picked us up if we were running under normal patrol noise control conditions, even when they were actively pinging at us and not just passively listening. Ob Classic Computer stuff: For some reason, it seemed that they always used us nuclear engineering folks to man the Mk 113 fire control system during battle stations. It was great fun to simulate targeting a fishing fleet on the surface and seeing how many "kills" we could get with one shot of a simulated "special" weapon. ----- Christopher McNabb, Former EM1/SS on a Steely Eyed Killer of the Deep

----- Original Message ----- From: "Eric Dittman" <dittman(a)dittman.net> To: <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org> Sent: Thursday, October 24, 2002 12:17 PM Subject: Re: Naming Computers [was: A Momentous Decision] ISTR a tv special somewhere (Discovery?) early this year that suggested they may have had a 'hot' fish, and that the procedure was to launch it, then make a hard turn away, and that under some circumstances this would lead to the fish looping around and hitting them. Something like that. They ran a reenactment of such a scenario for the special and in that the fish hit the boat, so if they had reacted the way they did in the reenactment, which was done 'by the book' for that situation, then the same thing would likely have happened. Geoff in Oz

At 07:51 AM 10/24/02 -0400, Bob wrote: I think you misunderstand. You're right about the torpedoes having a safety mechanism that disarms the torpedo in the event of a 180 degree turn to prevent "wild" torpedo hits. However in the event of a hot run (torpedo starting inside the sub) the torpedo would become armed after a certain amount of time. Therefore the sub has to make a 180 degree turn in an effort to disarm the warhead before it can arm (exactly the same procedure as disarming a "wild" torpedo but now you have to turn the entire sub). However the sub has to do it before the torpedo becomes armed and it's not easy to make 180 degree turn that quick in something as large as a sub. Apparently the Scorpion didn't make it in time. Another possible scenerio is that some of the batteries in one of the torpedoes shorted out and burst into flames. That started a chain reaction among the other batteries and at some point the fire became hot enough to cook off (detonate) one or more of the torpedo warheads. The batteries used in some of the Scorpion's torpedos came from a KNOWN bad lot but the Navy had such a problem getting enough batteries that they decided to use them anyway. Somewhere I have a book on the subject including interviews with several people that witnessed a torpedo battery fire in a land based repair depot. Even in a relatively open area with unarmed torpedoes, fire extinguishers and modern fire fighting equipment the damage was extensive. In a confined area with numerous armed topedoes the results would be disasterous. You aren't kidding. And the early boats were even worse! Conditions in them could only be called in-human. I just finished reading 'Silent Victory, the US Submarine War Against Japan' (two volumes) by Clay Blair, Jr. I HIGHLY recommend it to anyone interested in submarine warfare or the war in the Pacific. Joe

There's been some recent material declassified and some more research done. I recently read a book about various sub disasters, both US and Soviet. The widely accepted belief is that a torpedo was "running hot". If I remember correctly the details, when a torpedo is running hot, it means the primary battery is activated (something about a seal has to be punctured, which allows the battery to activate?) and the weapon is armed. In this event, if the sub makes a hard turn to starboard, an inertial interlock can be activated that will disarm the weapon. The Scorpion is believed to have made a hard turn to starboard, engaging the interlock, but the torpedo "cooked off" anyway. Later interviews with the torpedo and battery manufacturers revealed that several defective batteries had been shipped, and serial number lots account for one of these being on the Scorpion. The SOSUS bouy tapes that were later reviewed seem to indicate that the acoustical signature was not a detonation type signature, but two slower explosions, as when explosives are burned (as the overheated battery would have done, after catching fire). The first explosion was the torpedo explosives burning, and the second explosion most likely a detonation caused by the ensuing fire. Of course, the only people that know for absolute sure died. The book might have been "Blind Mans Buff". I have about a 90% hit rate of getting read books into my spreadsheet. I may have my recollection details wrong, but this is the basic theory. --John -----Original Message----- From: cctalk-admin(a)classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-admin@classiccmp.org]On Behalf Of Eric Dittman Sent: Wednesday, October 23, 2002 22:48 To: cctalk(a)classiccmp.org Subject: Re: Naming Computers [was: A Momentous Decision] I seem to recall reading that the cause of the Scorpion was determined by the Navy but classified for some reason. Of course any time a ship is lost under unknown circumstances there are people that will either come up with their own reason or assume that unknown=undisclosed/classified. Unfortunately I can't remember if the article I read fell into the second category. -- Eric Dittman dittman(a)dittman.net Check out the DEC Enthusiasts Club at http://www.dittman.net/