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The St. Louis Admirals R/C Model Boat Club The St. Louis Admirals R/C Model Boat Club UU http://stlouisadmirals.comUU BROADSIDE 26 November 2020 Commodore – Jane Benefield (636) 447-4016 Secretary – Bob Keeler (314) 434-8640 HH Vice-Commodore – Kent Morgan (314) 892-8669 Asst. Secretary – John Ziemer (636) 566-8810 Asst. Vice-Commodore – John Ziemer (636) 566-8810 Editor – Jane Benefield (636) 447-4016 Treasurer – Lin Blaszkiewicz (314) 843-4995 NOW HEAR THIS YOUR COMMODORE FROM THE BRIDGE It looks as if there might be a vaccine on the market soon, which will enable us to meet again. In the meantime, I hope everyone is doing their best to stay safe during this coronavirus difficulty. With the holidays upon us, I hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving. Groups A and B, thank you for providing me with articles for the newsletter, you did a great job. Russ Wick, from group A, has been remarkably busy and has provided me with articles for our future newsletters. Thank you, Russ for your informative and progress updates of your USS Constellation. Please continue providing me with articles for our newsletter as these articles make for an interesting newsletter. Lin Blaszkiewicz, our treasurer, is doing a great job, although we have not been able to hold a meeting, she makes sure our bills are paid and she is updating our membership list. Thank you, Lin, for a great job. Scheduled Events Wednesday, 2 December 2020 Cancelled Wednesday, 6 January 2021 2021 meetings cancelled until NOTES further notice The following Gatherings are suspended until further notice: Prior to our 5PM monthly 1st Wednesday-of-the-month dinner-meeting, sailing is from 2-4 PM at our usual St. Ferdinand Pond, Florissant, MO – weather permitting. Dinner is set for 5:00 PM at our Handel’s Restaurant, 599 St. Denis, Florissant, MO 63033m followed by our 7:00 PM meeting at our meeting place at the Old St. Ferdinand Shrine, the Old School House, 1 St. Francois Street, Florissant, MO. The following Gatherings are suspended until further notice: 3rd Sunday every month (2-4 pm), March thru November: Sailing at St Ferdinand Pond -- weather permitting. Gratefully, Jane Commodore ************************************************************************************* Article from “The Forecastle” Nov 2020 *************************************************** ********************************************************* I received a telephone call from our member, Emil Wolfshoefer, and he informed me of the disaster of the USS Thresher during the Cold War era. Since we had Veterans Day this month, he felt this would be a nice tribute to all who served. Thank you, Emil, what a wonderful suggestion. USS Thresher (SSN-593) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia History United States Name: Thresher Ordered: 15 January 1958 Builder: Portsmouth Naval Shipyard Laid down: 28 May 1958 Launched: 9 July 1960 Commissioned: 3 August 1961 Motto: Vis Tacita (Silent Strength) Fate: General characteristics Class and type: Thresher-class submarine Displacement: 3,540 short tons (3,210 t) light, 3,770 short tons (3,420 t) submerged Length: 279 ft (85 m) Beam: 32 ft (9.8 m) Draft: 26 ft (7.9 m) Propulsion: 1 Westinghouse S5W PWR, Westinghouse Geared Turbines 15,000 shp (11 MW) Speed: 33 knots (61 km/h; 38 mph) The second USS Thresher (SSN-593) was the lead boat of her class of nuclear-powered attack submarines in the United States Navy. She was the U.S. Navy's second submarine to be named after the thresher shark. On 10 April 1963, Thresher sank during deep-diving tests about 350 km (220 mi) east of Boston, Massachusetts, killing all 129 crew and shipyard personnel aboard. It is the second-deadliest submarine incident on record, after the loss of the French submarine Surcouf, in which 130 crew died. Her loss was a watershed for the U.S. Navy, leading to the implementation of a rigorous submarine safety program known as SUBSAFE. The first nuclear submarine lost at sea, Thresher was also the third of four submarines lost with more than 100 people aboard, the others being the Argonaut, lost with 102 aboard in World War II, the Surcouf, and the Kursk, which sank with 118 aboard in 2000. Significance of design and loss created to find and destroy Soviet submarines, Thresher was the fastest and quietest submarine of its day, matching the smaller, contemporary Skipjack class. She also had the most advanced weapons system, including launchers for the U.S. Navy's newest anti-submarine missile, the SUBROC, as well as passive and active sonar that could detect vessels at unprecedented range. Shortly after her loss, the Commander of Submarine Force Atlantic wrote in the March 1964 issue of the U.S. Naval Institute's monthly journal Proceedings that "the Navy had depended upon this performance to the extent that it had asked for and received authority to build 14 of these ships, as well as an additional 11 submarines with very much the same characteristics. This was the first time since World War II that we had considered our design sufficiently advanced to embark upon construction of a large class of general-purpose attack submarines." Sinking On 9 April 1963, Thresher, commanded by Lieutenant Commander John Wesley Harvey, left from Kittery, Maine, at 8 a.m. and met with the submarine rescue ship Skylark at 11 a.m. to begin her initial post-overhaul dive trials, in an area some 220 mi; 350 km (190 nmi) east of Cape Cod, Massachusetts. That afternoon, Thresher conducted an initial trim-dive test, surfaced, and then performed a second dive to half of test depth. She remained submerged overnight and re- established underwater communications with Skylark at 6:30 a.m. on 10 April to commence deep-dive trials. Following standard practice, Thresher slowly dove deeper as she traveled in circles under Skylark – to remain within communications distance – pausing every 30 m (100 ft) of depth to check the integrity of all systems. As Thresher neared her test depth, Skylark received garbled communications over underwater telephone indicating " ... minor difficulties, have positive up-angle, attempting to blow", and then a final, even more garbled message that included the number "900".When Skylark received no further communication, surface observers gradually realized Thresher had sunk. By mid-afternoon, 15 Navy ships were enroute to the search area. At 6:30 p.m., the commander of Submarine Force Atlantic sent word to Portsmouth Naval Shipyard to begin notifying the crew's family members, starting with Commander Harvey's wife Irene, that Thresher was missing. By morning on 11 April, all hope of finding Thresher was abandoned, and at 10:30 a.m., Chief of Naval Operations Admiral George W. Anderson Jr. went before the press corps at the Pentagon to announce that the submarine was lost with all hands. President John F. Kennedy ordered all flags to be flown at half-staff from 12 to 15 April in honor of the 129 lost submariners and shipyard personnel. Search and recovery The Navy quickly mounted an extensive search with surface ships and support from the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), with its deep-search capability. The laboratory's small acoustic research vessel Rockville, with a unique trainable search sonar, left on 12 April 1963 for the search area. Rockville was to be followed by other personnel with a deep-camera system. Allegheny, Mission Capistrano, and Prevail became engaged in a close sonar search of an area 10 nmi (19 km; 12 mi) square. Atlantis II, Robert D. Conrad, and James M. Gilliss investigated likely contacts found in the sonar search. The NRL deep-towed camera system and personnel later operated from James M. Gilliss with some success, finding debris later confirmed to be from Thresher. The bathyscaphe Trieste was alerted on 11 April and brought from San Diego to Boston. It was deployed for two series of dives into the debris field: the first taking place from 24 to 30 June, and the second from late August until early September. The equipment-handling capability of Gilliss proved inadequate, even hazardous, to handle the towed vehicle, and the entire search was paused in September. Cause Deep-sea photography, recovered artifacts, and an evaluation of Thresher's design and operational history permitted a court of inquiry to conclude that the submarine had probably suffered the failure of a salt-water piping system joint that relied heavily on silver brazing instead of welding. Earlier tests using ultrasound equipment found potential problems with about 14% of the tested brazed joints, most of which were determined not to pose a risk significant enough to require repair. High-pressure water spraying from a broken pipe joint may have shorted out one of the many electrical panels, causing a shutdown ("scram") of the reactor, which in turn caused loss of propulsion. The inability to blow the ballast tanks was later attributed to excessive moisture in the submarine's high-pressure air flasks, moisture that froze and plugged the flasks' flowpaths while passing through the valves. This was later simulated in dockside tests on Thresher's sister sub, Tinosa. During a test to simulate blowing ballast at or near test depth, ice formed on strainers installed in valves; the flow of air lasted only a few seconds. Air dryers were later retrofitted to the high-pressure air compressors, beginning with Tinosa, to permit the emergency blow system to operate properly. Subsequent study of SOSUS (sound surveillance system) data from the time of the incident has given rise to doubts as to whether flooding preceded the reactor scram, as no impact sounds of the high pressure water in the compartments of the submarine could be detected on instrument recordings from SOSUS at the time. Such flooding would have caused a significant sonic event, and no evidence of such may be found in the recorded data Submarines typically rely on speed and deck angle (angle of attack) rather than deballasting to surface; they are propelled at an angle toward the surface.
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