“Suddenly, the thermocline just vanished, and we started sinking.”
Tuesday evening found me wrapping up the monthly astronomy group at the retirement community. A new fellow had joined the festivities, and pulled me aside afterwards to tell me about a strange light in the sky he saw from the deck of his submarine in ‘55. “We woke up the captain, and he said ‘that’s a blimp.’ ‘Captain', that’s no blimp.’ ‘It’s a blimp, I tell you, and that’s what’s going in the logbook.’”
I must do a program on UFOs. As we walked and talked, I looked at this guy and thought “of course he was a submariner.” Some people just look right for their jobs. I asked him if he had any close calls, and that’s when he started to tell me about the thermocline.
According to NOAA, “A thermocline is the transition layer between warmer mixed water at the ocean's surface and cooler deep water below.”
As his sub was “flying” on this warmer water, suddenly the thermocline disappeared. Cruising at 300 feet, they were already knocking on Davy Jones’ locker: their “crush depth” was 310 feet. This was what the sub had been tested for - any deeper and the structure of the craft might fail, crumpling like tin foil, the pressure of the sea rupturing the hull, twisting, killing, drowning, breaking, consuming, dragging down to join the Dead at the bottom.
They were on an exercise, “attacking” their own base at Pearl Harbor. Davy Jones had on his Hawaiian shirt, and was watching them from below. Somebody woke the captain. 310 feet. 315. 320. The metal started to creak, “just like the movies.” The crew sweated, frantically working. “Increase speed to 1/3 power” came the order. 325 feet. 330. Breathless, soaked. 335. Groan. Tink. Creak. Squeak. 340. 345.
“We finally pulled it up at 350.”
Back to the present, he slowly shuffled along with his walker down the carpeted hall.
“WOW. How close were you?”
“I don’t know. I mean, test depth was 310. Two subs were lost during my time in the service.” We talked about the Thresher, the nuclear sub that took 129 souls to the bottom of the Atlantic in ‘63. Davy Jones means business. Thankfully, he spared ___ to tell the tale on dry land.
I can’t wait to hear the story about the fire on board next time.
People sure are interesting.