Shortly after ringing in the New Year for 1957, USS Greenfish (SS- 351) slid quietly out of her berth at the U.S. Naval Submarine Base and departed Pearl Harbor for what was called a SPECOP.
SPECOPs, short for Special Operations, were a routine part of subma- rine operations during that Cold War period. At the time, I had been on board Greenfish for less than eighteen months and she had already successfully completed two since I had reported. I guess the best way to define them is as information gathering missions off the coast of the Soviet Union.
When Greenfish got underway, my assignment was as Electronics Officer and I believe that I was also the Communications Officer. I had recently been promoted to Lieutenant and had also recently been des- ignated Qualified in Submarines. I believe that I was the fourth senior officer, of a total of eight, on board under the C.O., Jack Knudsen; the X.O., “Mac” McKenzie; and the Senior Watch officer and OPS/NAV; Nevin Kennedy.
The mission proceeded normally for about a week in generally heavy seas. We were south of the Aleutian Islands when our Chief Hospital Corpsman diagnosed one of our electricians with acute appendicitis. The man was in considerable pain, and a decision was made to proceed to Adak Island to put the patient ashore for treatment. Course was adjusted to head for Adak. The weather deteriorated and we were navigating by Loran and soundings due to heavy fog. We made radar landfall during the midwatch, arrived in the harbor at Adak during the early morning hours, and tied up at a pier using only a bow and stern line. Adak is a small but very mountainous island with a well-protected small harbor, a landing strip, and a Navy complement at the time of an estimated 500 people. A striking aspect of the pier side was a large number of very large Alaskan Malamutes running free in the area and on the pier. The air temperature was cold, in the thirties, but I don’t remember very much, if any, snow. Water temperature was 38 degrees Fahrenheit and I will never forget that figure
When on a SPECOP, submarines did not carry their normal com- plement of mooring lines since we didn’t expect to enter port until we returned to Pearl Harbor. Mooring lines were normally stored in the free-flooding superstructure of the ship and were considered a source of noise. Therefore the bow and stern spring lines had been left ashore at Pearl, and the bow and stern lines were stowed below decks in the forward and after torpedo rooms respectively. To save time, only the needed portions of these lines were led topside through the upper tor- pedo room hatches and the remaining portions were kept below in their storage areas.
In another time-saving measure, the ship was not rigged for surface when we entered port. Since we were not expecting to remain in port more than the time that would be needed to offload our sick crew mem- ber, a number of short cuts were taken to help speed us on our way. For instance, underway watches remained set. I was the O.O.D. (Officer-of- the-Deck) for either the 0400-0800 or the 0800-1200 watch and was the
O.O.D. when we arrived. I remember that the pier was very high and a crane was needed to bring in a long brow. Even with the long brow, the pathway leading from the foredeck to the pier must have described at least a thirty-degree upward angle and we had to pull ourselves up the brow when leaving the ship.
During our entry to port, the bow line handlers reported an unusual rattle in the superstructure. After mooring, an inspection of the super- structure revealed a torn section of aluminum superstructure in the vi- cinity of the bow planes near the water line. Since further tearing might interfere with the operation of the bow planes, a decision was made to remove the torn section. Because the ship was still rigged for dive and all fuel ballast tanks were full, the torn section was beneath the water surface by about a foot. The cutting was to be done by an oxyacetylene cutting torch so the section of damaged steel would need to be brought above the surface to work on it. At about this time, I was relieved as
O.O.D. and went below. None of the officers had had much sleep during the previous night, so I grabbed something to eat in the wardroom and crawled into my bunk for a short rest before we would be getting under- way again.
I was awakened a short time later by the sounding of the collision alarm and the tipping of the bunk toward the stern. I would estimate that the up-angle on the ship was about twenty degrees. I don’t remember how I got topside but, when I did, I could see that the after deck was beneath the surface from the stern to about the forward bulkhead of the maneuvering room. I went aft of the sail and saw TM1 (later ENS) Ver- non Speed in the water near the position of the upper after torpedo room hatch. You could tell where the hatch was because air was bubbling up from the open hatch. Speed was pulling the bitter end of our stern line from the hatch opening. Somehow this part of the line was passed to the pier and the hatch was finally cleared. At about this time, we learned that one of our third class IC men (I believe his name was Fitch and will call him that from now on) was trapped in the flooded after torpedo room.
The flooding happened as a result of trying to raise the bow to permit the cutting torch to get at the torn section of superstructure. As I remem- ber, the method used to achieve this goal was to cycle the after ballast tank (MBT#6) vents under the supervision of the O.O.D. on the bridge and the X.O. in the Control Room. The O.O.D. ordered the vents to be cycled via the Bridge intercom, the Chief-of-the-Watch quick-cycled the vents, and reported completion to the O.O.D. This was apparently done several times. As the stern of the boat increased its depth upon the loss of ballast in the after tanks, somehow the water came up far enough to begin spilling into the open upper after torpedo room hatch.
When the water began to enter the after torpedo room, the leading torpedoman-in-charge of the room, a TM1(SS) who was present in the room, ordered everyone to clear the room via the hatch in the forward bulkhead. He opened all of the bilge valves, checked the bunks to insure that everyone was out, and then proceeded into the maneuvering room himself. At this point, a large amount of water was coming through the upper hatch, covering the deck, and approaching the lower lip of the for- ward bulkhead hatch. As the TM1 was about to shut the hatch, he turned to give the room a final check and saw the head of IC3 Fitch peering over the edge of his bunk. (The after torpedo room had one bunk in the center of the overhead under the torpedo loading hatch. This bunk was general-ly called the “Honeymoon Suite” and, because of its inaccessibility, was usually assigned to one of the smallest and most junior men in the room.) When the TM1 had ordered the room cleared, he had checked the bunks but, due to its location, he could not see into the honeymoon suite. Due to the small size of its occupant, the bunk did not sag as it would have with a larger size man in it. Because of the high water level, it was too late to get Fitch out of the room. He ordered Fitch to stay in his bunk, shut and dogged the hatch, and turned on the emergency salvage air. He then reported that Fitch was trapped to the O.O.D. via the sound-pow- ered talker who was on watch in the Maneuvering Room.
(I have just mentioned “dogged the hatch.” Submarine hatches are held shut by a set of heavy steel fingers mounted around the hatch’s edge. These fingers are called “dogs.” They are operated by either a lever or handwheel mounted at the center of the hatch.)
The knowledge that one of our crew members was trapped in the flooded room lent a feeling of tension and crisis to the ongoing opera- tions aimed at getting the ship back to normal. As soon as the mooring line was cleared from the hatch, the next problem was to get the hatch shut so that the salvage air now being fed to the room could begin to drive the water out. At the time that the line was cleared, the hatch was about five to six feet below the surface. All of the upper hatches except the torpedo loading hatches in this class of submarine were spring-load- ed to stand fully open when they were not dogged shut. An auxiliary latch could hold the hatch open by about an inch working against the force of the spring that functioned to keep it open.
One of our first-class Enginemen was a big, brawny man about six feet tall and weighing in at about 250. His name was Smith, and, as usual in the Navy, was often called Smitty. Smith and I volunteered to try to shut the hatch. Our plan was to walk down the sloping deck to the hatch. The hatch’s position was clearly marked by the fountain of air that was now being emitted due to the salvage air that was being fed into the room to supply Fitch with oxygen and keep an air bubble in the room’s overhead space. When we got to the hatch, I was to go under water and push the hatch shut so that Smith could stand on it while I dogged it shut. The first part of the plan worked well. I was able to push the hatch shut and Smith was able to get on it. However, it was difficult for Smith to stay on it because the air pressure coming out of the room was acting to force the hatch open. It was also causing random currents in the water that made Smith’s balance precarious. When we would get him into position on the hatch, I would take a breath and go into a handstand with Smitty holding my legs while I tried to dog the hatch. We attempted this several times but I was unable to get the dogging wheel to move. Af- ter one of these attempts, Nevin Kennedy waded into the water behind us. He came up to me and made a counter-clockwise signal with his hands. I understood that he was telling me that the dogging wheel had to be turned counter-clockwise to shut it. This was because it was on the outside of the ship and operated in the reverse of the normal clockwise closing action from below decks. I immediately went down again and had no trouble dogging the hatch shut. What an embarrassment for a recently qualified officer.
Once the hatch was shut, the pressure of the salvage air was added to the suction of the bilge pumps to clear water from the after room. It seemed to be no time at all before that infamous hatch was above the surface. As soon as the hatch and the trunk below it was cleared of water, the hatch was opened, and the C.O., Jack Knudsen, went down the ladder into the dark and still mostly flooded room. He called to Fitch and got an immediate answer. At this point, Fitch was still in his bunk and was still dry. The salvage air bubble had surrounded him for the whole time. He now dropped out of his bunk, into the water, and came up the ladder with the C.O.
For many years afterward, I was unable to think of this day’s experi- ences without tears coming to my eyes and I have experienced the same reaction even now as I write about it. I remember meeting Vern Speed in the forward torpedo room about an hour after Fitch was freed. We both leaned against each other and sobbed.
Fitch had served in destroyers before reporting to Greenfish. After this incident, he often said that he was certain that if he had been trapped in a similar fashion on a destroyer, he would have died because too few of his shipmates would have known what to do to rescue him. In the ensuing months, he qualified to wear dolphins in near-record time. Iron- ically, less than two years later, he and his wife died in the crash of a light plane while on leave in Hawaii.
