a sea story klong story
definition klong: when you realize you just f***ed up bigtime, and 4 pounds of shit breaks loose from your arteries and hits your heart all at the same time.
underway on nuclear power. Operational Reactor Safegaurd Exam (ORSE) team is onboard, conducting drills and interviews. for non-nuke types, an ORSE Board can make or break a commmanding officer and his wardroom's careers. no fun for anyone, especially us grunts on the deckplates.
the ORSE team conducts drills on all watchsections, and they are generally of the form of an easy, a tough, and a ballbuster per section. but everyone gets to play, because often the drills become whole boat drills.
anyway...
here we are, steaming along at a steady 2/3 bell, waiting for the ORSE members to come aft to start drills.
i was a second class petty officer (that's an E-5 to you non navy military types) standing Engineroom Supervisor, responsible for all the mechanical watchstations, answering to the Engineering Watch Supervisor and the Engineering Officer of the Watch.
cut to Maneuvering. the sound powered phone growled, and the throttleman picked up the phone "Maneuvering" "mumble mumble" "Station calling Maneuvering, say again" "mumble mumbe"
about this time i see the drill monitors walking aft through the reactor compartment upper level, heading my way.
"Station calling Maneuvering, say again?" "Fuck it! LOSS OF SHAFT LUBE OIL PORT SIDE, YOU IDIOT!"
what was this? one of our forward friends overheard the drill monitors talking as they were leaving the wardroom, and thought he'd give us a heads up.
what really happened?
Throttleman: "Engineering Officer of the Watch, Loss of Shaft Lube Oil, PORT SIDE!"
click {2MC announcement} LOSS OF SHAFT LUBE OIL, PORT SIDE
to which i promptly hauled ass back to the port main engine, took manual control and cut in astern steam to stop the shaft. as soon as it was stopped, the Engineroom Upper Level watch engaged the jacking gear.
then i looked up at all these drill monitors, wondering what the hell just happened. the O-6 looked at me and said "well done ERS". now, shall we conduct the drill?"
they walked into Maneuvering and asked what the hell just happened. guess what the throttleman and the engineering officer of the watch experienced?
KLONG
there was a lot of explaining going on up in the wardroom.
underway on nuclear power. Operational Reactor Safegaurd Exam (ORSE) team is onboard, conducting drills and interviews. for non-nuke types, an ORSE Board can make or break a commmanding officer and his wardroom's careers. no fun for anyone, especially us grunts on the deckplates.
the ORSE team conducts drills on all watchsections, and they are generally of the form of an easy, a tough, and a ballbuster per section. but everyone gets to play, because often the drills become whole boat drills.
anyway...
here we are, steaming along at a steady 2/3 bell, waiting for the ORSE members to come aft to start drills.
i was a second class petty officer (that's an E-5 to you non navy military types) standing Engineroom Supervisor, responsible for all the mechanical watchstations, answering to the Engineering Watch Supervisor and the Engineering Officer of the Watch.
cut to Maneuvering. the sound powered phone growled, and the throttleman picked up the phone "Maneuvering" "mumble mumble" "Station calling Maneuvering, say again" "mumble mumbe"
about this time i see the drill monitors walking aft through the reactor compartment upper level, heading my way.
"Station calling Maneuvering, say again?" "Fuck it! LOSS OF SHAFT LUBE OIL PORT SIDE, YOU IDIOT!"
what was this? one of our forward friends overheard the drill monitors talking as they were leaving the wardroom, and thought he'd give us a heads up.
what really happened?
Throttleman: "Engineering Officer of the Watch, Loss of Shaft Lube Oil, PORT SIDE!"
click {2MC announcement} LOSS OF SHAFT LUBE OIL, PORT SIDE
to which i promptly hauled ass back to the port main engine, took manual control and cut in astern steam to stop the shaft. as soon as it was stopped, the Engineroom Upper Level watch engaged the jacking gear.
then i looked up at all these drill monitors, wondering what the hell just happened. the O-6 looked at me and said "well done ERS". now, shall we conduct the drill?"
they walked into Maneuvering and asked what the hell just happened. guess what the throttleman and the engineering officer of the watch experienced?
KLONG
there was a lot of explaining going on up in the wardroom.
posted by bothenook at 11:39
3 Comments:
My favorite ORSE was the time I was sat down in the XO's stateroom to be interviewed by one officer who had just left the Nimitz as its commisioning unit Reactor Officer (hint! hint! never been to sea on a sub! ;-) ).
The interview got as far as "You are Petty Officer C____ of the RC Division. Right?" That's when the 1MC announced "Test of the Emergency blow system!" followed a deep rumbling noise. "Is that real or a test?" he asked. "Yes,sir. A quarterly, I beleive." At this point the rollercoaster ride was in full force, followed by the wonderful butterflies in the stomach feeling when we reached the peak of the arc. His office chair seemed to float for a second and his face changed expressions and color several times.
That was the end of that interview. Easiest one I ever had.
when we saw them guys come through the hatch from the wardroom, we (helm, bow and sternplanes) knew we were going to do some angles and dangles. Usually put the guy with the most on the ball as relief cause he would man the headphones. Especially the micro per millilers jargon.
My first ORSE on the Shark and the first drill they called away was a fire in the main seawater bay. We all got suited up to suck rubber and grabbed all the hoses, extinguishers, etc that we could and ran to the engineroom. As soon as we passed maeuvering though, the ERLL watch was at the top of the ladder yelling "my mistake, FLOODING!!!!"
By the time we dropped everything and shifted gears, it was certainly not our most stellar performance.
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