Around the World Submerged: The Voyage of the Triton

To my surprise, even the ersatz poi had a number of takers, although so far as I was concerned, it was just like Hawaiian poi: paste without taste. And when the meal was over, and a large, specially baked cake cut and passed around, we all relaxed for an hour, singing songs of the Navy and the submarine force dating back to the war years and before.

From the Log:

Monday, 21 March 1960 Shortly after midnight, as we came to periscope depth for celestial observations, it was discovered that the sextant built into our new periscope has gone out of order. This will be a serious blow if we can’t fix it, ameliorated only by the fact that running continuously submerged as we are, we find that our dead-reckoning is most phenomenally accurate. Rarely has our estimated position deviated from our actual observed position by more than a mile or two. It appears that currents and other forces affecting surface ships during transits are much less a factor during submerged runs. To paraphrase an aphorism, “deep waters run still.”

0531 Periscope sextant is back in commission as the result of some rather inspired work by L. L. Garlock, FTC (SS) and W. E. Constantine, FT1 (SS).

Our submerged navigation was accomplished by several methods. One consisted of regular observation of the SINS mechanism, a system so new, however, that it was in effect an experimental model, full of bugs and therefore not dependable. Celestial observations through our special periscope proved to be far more accurate; and to Will’s satisfaction, dead-reckoning also surpassed the SINS. Since the celestial observations were by far the most accurate of the three methods, loss of the periscope equipment would have been serious, despite the stand-by system which, thanks to George Sawyer—who had put long hours into having it ready in case of need—we could have placed in service.

From the Log:

Midnight, 21 March A double babygram: an 8 pound 7 ounce girl [Frances Ann] for Leonard F. Lehman, Electrician’s Mate First Class; and 6 pound Kari Jeanne for Richard Brown, also Electrician’s Mate First Class. Birth dates respectively 15th and 18th of March. Mother’s and Father’s copies of babygrams are duly delivered. Fathers are honor-bound to bring the one with the cupids home to their wives.

Wednesday, 23 March 1960 0834 Crossed International Date Line from west longitude to east longitude at latitude 10° –36’ North. As this significant milestone was achieved, a message arrived from King Neptune informing us that because of our highly satisfactory conduct on 24 February, when we first crossed the equator, all hands were automatically, without further examination, taken into The Royal Order of Golden Dragons and so recorded in his log. There will, however, be a severe price.

Thursday, 24 March, is dropped from our calendar. This day, a full day from the lives of all hands, has been exacted from us in tribute for crossing the date line [technically speaking we advanced all clocks twenty-four hours]. Additional penance consists of working the ship for 24 full 25-hour days before we will be home again, although it should be noted that a number of these 25-hour days have already been worked off enroute to this area.

Still from the Log:

1733 The gravity meter indicated a rise in the ocean floor. There is no indication from sonar for 5 minutes, until 1738, when sonar detects a ledge from dead ahead around to port to a bearing of south.

1834 Gravity meter and sonar together show a dropping away in the ocean floor.

1933 First trial on our hand-made fathometer transducer: Unsuccessful.

The new fathometer transducer, the product of much inspired work by the Electronics Technicians gang under “Whitey” Rubb, had at last been completed, and had passed a successful test. In the Electronics Technicians’ workshop, a sonar signal set into the transducer was clearly heard outside it, even though the frequency response was theoretically in the inaudible range. The thing was worked in reverse also and was proven sensitive to the reception of noise beamed at it by radio or tape recorder at an approximately correct frequency. The problem now was to find some means of getting this sound into the water and catching it on the return.

Steel is a good conductor of sound. Our theory was that if we could send out a sufficiently strong signal, it might pass through the steel of our pressure hull and carry to the ocean floor, there to be reflected, hopefully, in sufficient strength to be detected either on the transducer itself or on one of our external hydrophones.

Another of our problems was that the pressure hull was the inner of Triton’s two hulls. When Jones had gone to work with the sledge hammer, we hoped that the water between the two hulls would carry the signal. But this experiment had been completely unsuccessful; in order to get the maximum possible chance of success with our handmade fathometer transducer, we had to do better.