I missed the “anniversary” of this in posting days, as the incident discussed here happened on October 2nd, but come the beginning of next year, the same number of years ago, I became involved in the incident where the mid-watch (0000-0400) team on USS SARATOGA (CV-60) made a terrible mistake and launched two NATO Sea Sparrow RIM-7 missiles into the former US GEARING Class destroyer, then the TCG Mauvenet. Some of the details are here.

Three Admirals are named in the Wikipeida notes, two of which I personally worked with during my career, and the third I knew of. One of my shipmates from a training command was working for Admiral Dur that night, and was present earlier in the evening when the SARATOGA Operations Officer came into the Flag Watch Command Center and mentioned they were going to play in the exercise using their NATO Sea Sparrow system (NSSMS). The reported response from Admiral Dur was “Yeah, right!”

The NSSMS was derived from the successful air-launched Sparrow AIM-7 series, brought “down” to serve on ships as a “point defense” system. This means it was designed to be used against threats coming at the platform where the missile system was located. It was by no means an “area” defense system, as it had a very limited capability against “crossing” (read headed for another target) threats. The first installations were Frankenstein like conglomerations of a F-4 Phantom II radar system, mounter on a stanchion for manual aiming and targeting by a sailor on the open deck, which would then fire a missile from an eight celled launcher, adapted from the Anti-Submarine Rocket (ASROC) system. The system, in this configuration, was the Basic Point Defense System (BPDMS – pronounced Bee-Ped-EMus in verbal reference). It was a start, but the operator, strapped to the send and receive antennas mounted on the station on the open deck, had to be verbally pointed in the direction of the target, then he would sweep the area of sky where the target is supposed to be, while listening to the audible return signal of the radar, which would tell him when he had acquired the inbound target by a change in pitch. He also had the firing key for the system, as he was the only one who had the ability to judge if he was on target or not.

More later, but this will be presented in series, as once I get through the technology involved, then it will be on to the investigation.

Capt Lex sent us to the archives for entertainment a few days ago. One of the linked choices was a story about life at sea and the availability of (fresh) water while keeping oneself in a state of good hygine.

He pointed out, in his fine style of prose, that aviators are regularly pilloried for being the ones who waste so much of the water, that others must suffer. He later learned, when assigned as “Ship’s Company” (that means the aviators share the joy of black shoe life, well, at least get a healthy taste of it), and that it is sometimes malfunctioning machinery, specifically the components used in water production or waste steam/heat recovery are the culprits, but, the ‘Shoe Navy has a cabal that always requires pointing the finger of blame at those who would slip the surly bonds of earth. It’s a union thing, I’m sorry, I gotta stick with the homeboys here.

Here’s my “water hours” story. It was a cool November in 1989. We had taken in all lines several weeks earlier in Charleston, SC and sailed east in our plucky little (453′) FFG. Equipped with two evaporators, and carrying a few over 200 aboard, conversing water was not a huge task, but did require us all to be mindful of only using our share. The CHENG and his A Div Officer did a fine job of maintaining the plant, so we weren’t constantly sweating the laod on this topic.

As we sailed through the Med, enroute Port Said to transit south through the Suez Canal and head for the Persian Gulf. The Chop (Supply Officer), Lt Wayne Aiken, had been on the previous cruise. At the Planning Board for Training the week before the transit of the Canal, Wayne suggested we accelerate the laundry cycle to get all the beding done, then we could make the transit easier on the water use, since you’re not allowed (by Navy sanitation requirements) to make water in enclosed waters, which the Canal certainly was. we copuld then top off the fresh water tanks, and shut down the evaporators at the 12 mile limit off of Egypt, yet still have plenty for food service and normal showers on the 24 hour transit, with reserves while the evaps caught up on the other side of Port Suez. I agreeed and the department heads and the command senior chief went about working up the details.

Over the next few days, the plan went like clockwork. The sheets got done and a few of the divisions got their dungarees taken care off off schedule. Early on the day of our scheduled arrival at Port Said (the north end of the canal), we had launched the helo on a Dawn Patrol, and brought them back aboard before we enetered Egyptian territorial waters (12 NM). I recall being on the bridge and, in addition to monitoring our navigational approach (I was navigator, too), I kept an ear out for the communications between the helo and CIC to make sure we didn’t break boundries.

We headed into the anchorage, the Engineering Officer of the Watch (EOOW) letting the bridge know the evaporators were “wrapped up” as the Officer of the Deck (OOD) completed the entering port checklist. We anchored about an hour later and the CHENG called up, saying we were losing fresh water fast. Immediately, the chain of command was sent around the berthing spaces, looking for running showers, or other “appliances” in the heads. They all reported back, that nothing was running, and there were no findings of pooled water in the spaces. We were still using water. This was a real problem, more frustrating as we had taken the time to make a plan just to keep a problem like this from happeneing.

More hiking around the ship. Nothing, until the Ops Boss, LT Tom Strother, found a garden hose, draped over the side of the flight deck, running at full output. He also found an airman from the helo detachment, with a long handled brush, dutifully scrubbing down the helo, as was standard procedure, after the flight. The problem was, he was supposed to have a nozzle on the garden hose, so he would only use the water required.

In this case, we lost almost half of our fresh water over the side, courtesy of the well intentioned maintained, keeping the risk of corrosion on the very expensive flying machine of HSL-44 Det 4. Marty Keany and I had an interesting chat a few moments later.

We regrouped, we did make water in the Canal, but it was super chlorinated, which, is it’s own reward.

When I checked off the Command, one of the helo pilots, Carl Bush, was a great cartoonist, drew a cartoon of me. The view was from behind me, sitting at my desk. The 1MC (General Announcing System) was blaring “WATER HOURS ARE NOW IN EFFECT!” and I had a cartoon thinking bubble saying “All RIGHT!” in response. There were other details, like an overflowing In Basket, and an empty Out Basket.

Yes, Capt Lex, it was the aviators this time.

Part IV

Sorry, I got distracted, but I continue on the journey. Just so you know, along the way between parts Iv and this one, I typed this up: Why We Shelved TASMs. That post details much of what the falout of the report we generated, but also some dealing I had years later, as a result of this exercise 20 years ago this past August.

We arrived back in Norfolk, and returned to our digs on the ground floor of Building “Whiskey-5” (“W5” as the sign on the building said). As usual, our plate was full and I looked at the Ops Boss and asked when we were going to get to work on the tactical analyis. He said he had the next operation to plan (he did) and went back to sorting through the large stack of daily messages. Being the Ops Boss, he owned the two operations types, OSCS(SW) Koch and RMCS(SW) Rumbaugh, and they were put to work. Oh, well, off to the small shared conference room I went, hauling box after box, after box of raido logs, DRT traces, radio-telephone (R/T) logs, weather reports, intel messages and much more. For quite some time, I would sit in there, with charts, dividers, logs and notepads, piecing together engagements from first detection to simulated impact.

I managed to pull a total of 59 complete engagement sequences out of the piles of data. This data not only included the track of the intended virtual, constructive or cooperative target reckoned by the shooters and search aircraft, but the overlay of the actual tracks. While the times of position didn’t always match, I plotted the ded-reckoned tracks to allow some degree of checking apples to apples. For the flight of the simulated TASMs, I plotted the ded-reckoned tracks, based on the engagement plans, printed for final approval by the CO before the simulated firings. During this, I read the tactical signal logs between the shooters and reviewed any other available data.

I don’t recall how many total engagements were run. Some were disgarded for the fact that not all elements of the detection and tracking process were there. Some were not written down, some were not included in the records, most likely to not being packaged up properly. In any case, for 4 dedicated days, an average of almost 15 engagements a day wasn’t too bad for extracting some meaningful info.

In order to manage the data, I hauled in my new toy, a Macintosh 512K, to the office, and ran Excel as my database manager. The data was all kept on 800K 3.5″ floppies, as internal hard drives weren’t a common thing with home computers yet. I seem to recall the printed out data was a 8 page wide by 2 page high form, which I peeled apart (tractor feed paper in an ImageWriter ][ dot-matrix printer) and taped together to show the Commodore. Included in the spreadsheet (which wasn’t even available for the IBM PC yet), was my first serious work in making calculations using spherical geometry. It took a bit of reading in Bowditch, then dusting off the college level trig, and spending quite a bit of time making sure the parenthesis were placed properly to do computations between two fixes. I also did a lot of testing of the formulas, just to make sure I’d get the right answers. This was done so for every fix of the target, I would compare the “miss distance” between the apparent position (from the shooter’s track files) to “ground truth” (the target’s navigational files, which were assumed to be accurate in any case). The speadsheet would indicate the azimuth and distance of miss all along the sequence to engagement.

Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome to another Wednesday. Link up your work so others may read it. Not saying I’m some powerhouse blog in readership, just another junction in the cyber-hiway, and it may get you another reader of three.

Yesterday I was discussing the absense of Tomahawk Anti-Ship Missiles (TASMs) from the surface and sub platforms. During the recounting, I mentioned a story about Adm Harry Harris, now the Commander of that lovely garden spot, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, with the thankless job of supervising the “detainees” captured terrorists (I can say it, he can’t). Here is it:

So, there we were in late November ’85, freshly arrived in the North Arabian Sea with the SARATOGA Battle Group, lead by Adm David Jerimiah of CRUDESGRU EIGHT. It was a deployment to make sure the bad guys of the region knew we were hanging around, with things that go “BOOM!” and a way to get them to their doorstep. One of the threats that was normally faced in that region went TU and was out of play. We sent the USS CAPODANNO (FF-1095) down south of Yemen to put some eyeballs on it, as it was being towed out of theater, just to make sure the intel was correct. It was. This act of the enemy’s misfortune had the added benefit of freeing up one of our own platforms, which gave us someone to exercise with regularly.

As Adm Jerimiah sat at lunch, scanning a message, with Capt Wes Jordan sitting next to him, he commented his staff couldn’t get the tasking done in 48 hours. Commodore Jordan “graciously” offered to peruse the comminique from CTF 74 and offer his assistance. He read it, then looked at the Admiral and said “My staff can plan this in 48 minutes!”

He gets up, and walks from the Flag Mess up to the O-7 level, where we have the watch station (they wouldn’t let us set up in CDC). He walks in, tosses the meesage on the chart table between LCDR Steve Nerheim and I and says: “I told the Admiral you could plan this in 48 minutes. That was five minutes ago. You’ve got 43 minutes.”

Tasking: Plan a joint TASM attack with surface and submarine assests. CTF 74 mentioned the subs don’t get a chance often to practice that type of coordination, or even receiving the LINK 11 data for Over the Horizon Targeting (OTH-T). Note the salient points: Surface and sub attacking a surface target together. Purpose is to get the sub some experience using surface supplied info. extra salinet info: Our staff is assigned as “AX” (the anti-submarine warfare commander) duty for the battle group. SARATOGA is “AS” (anti-surface warfare commander).

Yes, you’re now wondering why we are doing this, as the lowly sub guys, and having the junior 4 stripper as the boss. It’s because the Commodore is really, really (and I mean really) good at “volunteering” his staff for, well, anything that needs to get done. You get my drift, I’m sure. That’s how this happened.

Read the rest of this entry »

1781 – French Fleet defeats the Britsh Navy at Yorktown, VA.

Thanks to Comte de Grasse. later honored by the naming of the USS COMTE DE GRASSE (DD-974), was an integral player.

Capt Lex, enroute a permanent appointment with CIVPAC/LANT/Wherever, is up to his eyeballs in real world work (building resume entries).

He issues this tasking:

Insanely busy. Irrationally so. Firing on all synapses. Every sinew a-twitch.

Busy.

So. Talk amongst yourselves. As though you needed any encouragement from me.

Suggested topic: Close Air Support. How very hard it can be to deliver warheads on foreheads when those forehead are in close proximity to other foreheads whom you are actually trying to protect. And who need it bad, or else they wouldn’t be asking for you to drop 500 pound bombs over the top of them, because really, who needs the stress?

But only they’re locked in mortal combat, like. In the beatin’ zone, but with the roles of beater and beatee not yet clearly defined. But whose situation is not improved if in fact you mid-ID the target or otherwise drop short.

It made me connect two stories of my life from 20 years ago and almost 20 years ago now. Lots of details, but at the end of the real world operations in 86 off Libya, and as a result of playing out tactics later the same year, we (my staff) forwarded our report up the chain in early ’87. I know now, in the aftermath of all of that, the Tomahawk Anti-Ship Missile (TASM) began a fairly quick exit from bag of weaponry for the Surface Warfare community.

It revolved around the same points as Lex asked us to discuss in his moment of high focus regarding Close Air Support during a “Danger Close” (more like “Danger ‘Coz We’re Grappling with Each Other”).

If you need to catch up, I talked about the operations in the vicinity of Libya (an how I never got to have a beer on DGAR) back in “A Journey Into History” series. Part I is here, and it has links to walk you to the end of the posts on the subject.

That group of posts highlighted a particular incident in March ’86, which was the outcome of the volumes of civilian (“White”) shipping that cluttered our surface picture. We didn’t have any TASM equipped units in any of the three battle groups that made up Battle Force “Z,” but we often talked among ourselves in the staff watch space, of how wonderful it would be to have the new “wonder weapon” at our disposal, how more mighty we would be on the bounding main….

This, too, was at the time I first met Adm Harry Harris, now of Guantanamo Bay and Detainee fame. I came to know LCDR Harry Harris, of the USS SARATOGA (CV-60) Operations Department, when he stopped a briefing to Adm David Jerimiah I was giving and said: “We can’t do that!” Me: Why not? Him: “We can’t have aircraft flying on an alerted target!” Me:… That, readers, is fodder for tomorrow’s Ropeyarn Sunday “Sea Stories” and Open Trackbacks. Now, back to my regularly scheduled ramblings:

Read the rest of this entry »

Bear with me for a few paragraphs, for I need to lay a foundation for my point, before I dive it.

I’ll admit, the public discourse is wearing me out. Quite honestly, it sickens me to listen to talking head after talking head, or products of the American public education system of the last two decades respond to serious questions with what their opinion is. I don’t want an opinion when there’s truth to be had. The public educational system, however, has convinced people they need to respond to their feelings.

Hence, idiotic polls by agencies like CBS with this report as the outcome: “Poll: A Split On Confronting Terrorism”. About a year ago, i spent some valuable time blogging about the difference between truth and an opinion. It’s in the junior blog somewhere, and it applies here, but I don’t have the motivation to dig it up just now.

Of course there will be differences of opinions in how to execute a war fighting strategy and, in lower levels, tactics of same will be addressed.

Peopel with high school educations feel empowered to call into talk shows and tell people who spend a better part of their waking hours studying the issues, and try to tell the host that the President is killing innocent people, he knew there were no WMD and he sent popel there anyway.

Give.me.a.break. I didn’t have my “awakening” until the taxpayers sent me to 9 months of Command and Staff college. Not to say everyone needs an MA to speak on the topic, but it would be nice if they bothered to pull the iPod ear pieces out of their ears during the waking hours and took some time at the public library or local meag bookstore, doing some reading on the topic, before pretending they know what’s going on. I wish they’d do the wise thing and recuse themselves, much as is done in the legal system, if you are in a position to bias the outcome because of what you do/do not know.

My evidence is shown here, from the CBS article:

THE U.S. WILL BE SAFER FROM TERRORISM IF IT…

Confronts terror groups and states in the Mideast: 47%
Stays out of other countries’ affairs in Mideast: 45%

Just what, pray tell, do these valient individuals base their response on?

Which brings me to another point of ranting: Why can’t our leaders do it, if the other leaders are (or the reverse case)? A few days ago, the President mentioned, to a group at a meeting that he wondered if the US was going to have a 3rd awakening. This drew comments from the press, and they feigned fear of a “theocratic” government. Frst off, people need to chill out. Second off: Presidents of Iran and Venezuela stood before the world and prayed, one in the style of his Catholic heritage, the other in the Islamic faith. Not a peep out of the press, in fact, it looks like it was purposely ignored, so the press could always claim “plausible deniability” for the time being.

Now, get this:

IN TREATMENT OF POWs, THE U.S. SHOULD…

Follow international agreements: 63%
Do what it thinks right, regardless of what other nations think: 32%

News flash: We are treating “POWs” (defined therein in the Geneva Coventions as military members of a nation). I wonder if they would choke in horror if they knew that illegal combatants (those who are not wearing said uniforms while engaging in combat) are subject to summary execution? I doubt it would happen, but the old line : “Be careful what you wish for comes to mind.” If DoD directed firing squads, the same 63% would howl, but it would only be a case of answering an importatnt question from their place of ignorance….I’m glad we have a man at the helm with more compassion and sense than to give them what they ask for, for they don’t know what it is.

As far as the part about worrying about what others think, it seems to be, in my experience and opinion, that those who got me to “outperform” my self-imposed standards didn’t get my love in several cases, until years later, when it became clear the value of their hard pressed teachings. Teachers, baseball, basketball and swim team coaches alike have had a place in my life in helping me achieve what was better, right and more successful. We didn’t get to where we are as a nation because we copied the Euorpean ways an means of governance and social interaction for a reason: It had failed our forefathers. And, in my great admiration, they did what today’s protestors of our government should do when persecuted: Pack ther possesions you hold dear and go and build the country you define by your protestations. It should be easy to figure out: Just don’t elect George Bush as your President and study him well, so you make sure whatever it is he does in a situation, you do the exact opposite, to remove any possible connection to the man you hate so much. Oh…in the stream of consciousness mode, this has great possibility for terrific satire potential, combined with analysis of what the most likely outcomes would be of no military, no oil, no greenhouse gas producing items, no aerosol powered deoderants, and only vegtables to eat, produced with the use of no pesticides…but I digress…

So…finally taking the long way around, the biggest bone I have to pick is those who act like they know what it is to be the final authority in matters of great gravity, the point of my title.
Read the rest of this entry »

This post is placed to help showcase the writings (or rantings) of other bloggers. Please trackback your work!

When I first met him, he was GSE1(SW) Denny Rohr, the leading Gas Turbine (Electrical) petty officer for the Engineering Department of the USS CONOLLY (DD-979). When I arrived aboard in Sept 83, he had been on the ship for several years. During my tenure as Engineer Officer, he passed the test and was selected for and promoted to the rating of GSEC.

Denny was a methodical person and taught me this: “There are no gremlins. If you ever admit that there are gremlins, then you will have them.” However twisted that sounds, his point was nothing was an accident and everything could be explained, even the most transient event observed in the complexities of the gas turbine powered engineering plant. He was right.

When a problem appeared, the first stop for Denny were his several 3.5″ binders know as “Denny’s Brain Books.” His methodology was to record the symptoms and corrective actions for every significant problem/casualty. BY the time I arrived aboard, Denny had amassed quite a collection of solutions, so “issues” were routinely handled in minutes, or hours, not days, as I had been used to in my other shipboard tours. One day, though, a real thinking problem came along.

It was after the complex overhaul in Bath Iron Work from February to November 84. Enroute GTMO for refresher training, the Propulsion Auxillary Control Console (PACC) operator would be scanning his board and note that the clutch/brake for an offline engine in the after engineroom would be on, not a normal condition while we were steaming. Usually, with the shaft not powered, it was still “windmilling” as the other shaft had power. The PACC Operator would report this to the Engineering Officer of the Watch (EOOW), who usually scratched his head, because he hadn’t ordered it. A call would go to the on watch team in Main Engineroom #2 (MER2), asking if they had applied the brake. In fact, while the PACC in the Center Control Station (CCS) had control, the controls of the Propulsion Local Control Console (PLCC)s in the MERs were disabled, so, short of the watch below taking control back via a deliberate action at the PLCC, they could push all the buttons they wanted and nothing would happen.

So…the mystery of the self operating clutch brake began as described above…
Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome back and remember: Inline tracks backs are working! C’mon…show me your work!

Today’s “sea story” is not one of humor, but one of finding out I was in the presense of a man who almost was one of the original Project Mercury astronauts….

It’s a repeat, but from my earlier days of blogging, and a story I think is worth sharing once again. Capt Hawkins was quite a man. I include why such a fine leader never made flag rank, either….

Posted in the comments by Station Commando as a “war story” (he’s in the Army):

Being that I’m in the Army I don’t have any sea stories but here’s a good story along the same lines as yours. When the movie Tears of the Sun was being filmed I was stationed in Hawaii (where they filmed the movie.)

We received a request for any black Infantrymen who we thought we could do without for a few weeks to go be extras for the movie. They wanted black soldiers because they were playing the Nigerian soldiers in the movie. Our company sent four people over. One of them returned later that day because the movie people didn’t think he had dark enough complexion to pass for a Nigerian soldier, the other three were accepted.

They were going to be working on the movie all day every day for about 4 weeks. About 2 days into it they kicked one of our guys back. This guy was the biggest, dumbest klutz you’ve ever seen. Whenever the movie people would film a scene he would always be falling down or losing his fake AK-47. In one scene where all the Nigerians run through a small river bed he actually ran the wrong way, realized he was going the opposite direction as everyone else, and then promptly dropped his rifle in the river and had if float away. While everybody else was charging ahead he was chasing his rubber rifle down the river, falling down the whole way.

They gave him his check and sent him on his way.

The rest of the guys got paid pretty well (about $700 a week if I remember right) and got to tell everyone they were in the movie. They did say that for all you hear about Bruce Willis supporting the troops he never once came and said a word to any of the guys there and they were instructed by someone with the movie that if they said anything to him, even in passing, they would be promptly fired.

They also said that Bruce Willis didn’t so much as run up a hill. They had the stunt double do anything that would result in so much as breaking a mild sweat. I guess that’s Hollywood for you.

Part III left us hanging with lots and lots of engagements with simulated TASMs of simulated and constructive targets, and now we got around throught the Striats of Florida and parked south of Eglin AFB for the firing to two test rounds.

Not only was there tight OPSEC (operational security) around this because of the implication of the Soviets getting wind of the exercise and gathering data, but a family member of one of the staff at EGLIN was a member of Greenpeace and that organization had a plan, also. Something about finding out the time the Tomahawks would jet across the Flordia panhandle, overflying I-10, so they might park an 18 wheeler, equipped with barrage balloons to be sent aloft in a tethered configuration to try to stop the missiles.

I’m not sure if they figured they’d work in a deterrent mode and we’d just not launch, or if they thought they’d be able to “wing” a 450kt, one ton flying machine and bring it down. If the latter, rather than the former, I think they hadn’t thought out the negative pblicity that might come the way of Greenpeace if bits of high speed debris smacked into homes, vehicles or playgrounds along the ballistic path towards “the scene of the crash.”

Be that as it was, no balloons were sighted on the day of the test firing. We were embarked aboard USS CONOLLY (DD-979), and the Joint Cruise Missile Project Office (JCMPO) officers accompanied us as well. As officers, we all demonstrated our concern by standing behind the well trained fire controlmen of CONOLLY. Many, many things were double, triple and quadruple checked, but the firing went as planned inthe late morning. The afternoon was scheduled for the IOWA’s shot. Long story short (shortened because I don’t recall all the details), problems arose and the decision was made to wait until the following morning to try again. We had heloed over to IOWA after CONOLLY fired and got the grand tour by Capt Larry Seachrist. She certainly was a magnificent ship and the crew very proud of their charge. Gun Plot was quite a highlight of the tour, with the WWII era computational equipment still in pristine order and able to put 2000 lb rounds on targets 23 miles away.

Back to CONOLLY for the night, then up for the shot. By mid-day, things had cleared up and the bird left the armored box launcher as planned. The rest of the flight was not a success. Part way along the flight path, the missile suddenly deployed the recovery chute, which, as one might expect, caught the chase pilots by surprise. The good part was the TLAM was over land and an unpopulated area. The standby explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) detachment scrambled from Eglin in an Navy SH-3 and secured the missile.

We packed up our cruise boxes on CONOLLY and heloed off to Eglin, where BOQ accomodations awaited. We anxiously awaited a chance to sleep, as we had pretty much had none over the last 6 days. We checked in and I got in my room, set my bag down and the phone rang: “Get down to the Commodore’s room so we can capture the lessons learned while they are fresh in our minds.” So much for sleep, but we did get some useful stuff on paper. The next day we flew back to Norfolk in a Navy 707 from Pax River, one equipped for data collection and had been used for the Tomahawk shots. We got a little sleep then.

We were “blooded” now with Tomahawk experience and one of the reports we had committed to in our own Op Order was a lessons learned report to the chain of command in a few months. Part V will provide the interesting details of the “fallout” of the development of tactics for a notional battleship battle group (BBBG), in addtion to the value of digging up enough detail to know what you’re talking about when you have to take some performance data forward.

Up for reading: Part V – The Final Chapter!