Re: Submarine story

Tim Marks (tmarks@internetx.net)
Sun, 22 Aug 1999 00:19:46 -0400


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West Wight Potter Website at URL
http://www.lesbois.com/wwpotter/
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Being a submarine officer, I can probably help out a little on that one.

If we are surfacing in US waters in a busy traffic area, we generally turn
on
the submarine ID beacon (flashing yellow light) as soon as possible
(since a submarine is really hard to see at night). Usually, on my
submarine,
we turned it on as soon as we got the periscope out of the water (it was
mounted on the scope fairing, might not be true of all classes of sub).
That way,
it could be lighted long before (10 minutes) the sail with the running
lights broke
out while surfacing. When you first saw him, he had probably just surfaced.
The sub ID beacon is only visible from the front of the boat, so if he
maneuvered after he passed you, you might not see the beacon.

Why no running lights? You think it is hard to keep your boat trailer
lights
working... you should try submerging them to >400' and see how they
fare. We fought a constant, losing battle to keep our stern light
functional.

tim