We're heading into another winter... (homes, pine, yard)

[Submariner]

Originally Posted by Northern Maine Land Man

moughie asks:
"You were in the Arctic? It must be so incredibly gorgeous there!"

I was not in the Arctic. I was in the Antarctic. It is indeed beautiful. Huge mountains, awesome cliffs, glaciers 2 miles thick and penguins not afraid of people.

Here's a quiz for you: I was on the only American military ship ever to run aground inside an active volcano. What was the name of the volcano?

No idea.

So many ships run aground, I have been aboard during a grounding. To my understanding most ships will at least scrape bottom once or twice every few years. But since so few records are kept of these occurrences, how would you know that nobody else had grounded there?

It all gets recorded in the ship's logs, half of the time those are re-written, once they are sent off to the archives only the crew's memory remains of an event. Every year a third of the crew is replaced on average, so after four years it is likely that nobody onboard will even know that the vessel ran aground. Unless of course it is one of the public media events in which case they always fire the Captain and the Navigator.

I remember once while making repairs on some of my equipment, we discovered evidence of a major flooding incident, and no crewmen onboard had any knowledge of any floodings in that boat's history.

[Submariner]

Originally Posted by moughie

Amazing photos, forest, of the Northern lights!

Thanks, the photos are very poor quality, the periscope cameras do that. It is very hard to get clear photos using one.

One shot was taken in port, you can see what I think are power lines in the tree tops.

[moughie]

I thought you took them in Maine!

I have seen the Northern Lights flying over Greenland many times

Wow- I have never seen shots via a periscope- another first for me

Thanks forest!

[Elcarim]

Awesome photos!! That is so cool. I've seen those on TV, but never actual photos. How is it that the submarine breaks through the ice but it's still safe enough to walk on? I guess I don't understand that. It seems it would destroy the integrity of the surface completely. I'd be afraid of falling through!

I envy you having seen so much of the world, Forest!

[Submariner]

Originally Posted by Elcarim

Awesome photos!! That is so cool. I've seen those on TV, but never actual photos. How is it that the submarine breaks through the ice but it's still safe enough to walk on? I guess I don't understand that. It seems it would destroy the integrity of the surface completely. I'd be afraid of falling through!

I envy you having seen so much of the world, Forest!

LOL

My first patrol, we went out to sea from Rota Spain, shot through the Gibraltar straights, and spent three months in the Mediterranean sea. We did bunches of loops, we went very close to each shore line following the contours, of each of the 'ancient' seas of myth and legend. Basically we went everywhere in the Mediterranean. Then after three months went back out through the straights and hung out in the ocean for a while before finally surfacing once again at Rota. For around 100 days we were underwater, ,,,

However we never surfaced in the Mediterranean sea. I was very junior and not qualified to operate the periscope, so the few times that we did go 'up' to peek at things, I was busy doing other jobs. It was the officers and just a few of the qualified enlisted who had an opportunity to take a 'peek'.

So I could safely say that I had been everywhere in the Med, I had never actually seen anything in the Med.

For the next six years that I spent on that boat, we shifted to a home port in Scotland, and we basically went North from Scotland each patrol. So that boat never went back into the Med.

At the end of my career, I did negotiate orders to do a tour of duty living in Italy, working Law Enforcement, so I was finally able to see the Mediterranean / European countries, though twenty years later and not onboard a boat.

It still amazes me even after having worked a career in the field, that we can go somewhere and spend so much time, and yet never surface or never see a port.

[Northern Maine Land Man]

Hmm. No guesses on where we ran aground inside the active volcano. OK, I'll post the link.

Deception Island (South Shetland Islands) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[moughie]

Hey, wait!

I guessed a ship - USSNiagra Falls.

Wrong active volcano and I guess that ship did not run aground inside the active volcano.

What ship were you aboard?

[Northern Maine Land Man]

Oh, yes it did. We ran aground INSIDE the volcano. It was the USCG Icebreaker, Eastwind; WAGB 279. I have photos, but they are slides. There were no digital cameras in 1963. Come to think of it, there were no calculators, GPS navigation systems or sonar on many ships at the time. Icebreakers certainly had no sonar because the ice would have torn it off anyway.

The Coast Guard didn't send their own helicopters to the Antarctic at that time. All helicopters in the Antarctic were US Navy helicopters. I'm so old that I flew helicopters with wooden rotor blades.

[moughie]

Originally Posted by Northern Maine Land Man

Oh, yes it did. We ran aground INSIDE the volcano. It was the USCG Icebreaker, Eastwind; WAGB 279. I have photos, but they are slides. There were no digital cameras in 1963. Come to think of it, there were no calculators, GPS navigation systems or sonar on many ships at the time. Icebreakers certainly had no sonar because the ice would have torn it off anyway.

The Coast Guard didn't send their own helicopters to the Antarctic at that time. All helicopters in the Antarctic were US Navy helicopters. I'm so old that I flew helicopters with wooden rotor blades.

You are not old, just wise and mature!!!

Wooden helicopter blades

[Northern Maine Land Man]

Why, Thank you. And suave and debonair and a fine judge of apple jack.