Silent Sea

CHAPTER 7

The moaning scream of the runaway torpedo vibrated throughout the length of the Eelfish. Mike Brannon turned, his face grim.

“Flanagan, what in the hell can be done about this?”

“Only one thing to do, Captain. Get back there and open the inner door of the tube and snake that son of a bitch out of the tube somehow and shut the engines down.”

“You ever see it done?” Brannon asked.

“No, sir, but I sure as hell am going to find out how to do it.”

“Get back there. Lee, go with the Chief. Keep me informed.” Flanagan headed aft, opening each watertight door as he came to it. Lee, following him, closed the doors behind them.

The thunder of the destroyer’s screws drowned out the noise of the runaway torpedo as Flanagan and Lee hurried through the engine rooms. The first depth charge of the renewed attack went off with a shattering roar, throwing Flanagan against the guard rail of an engine in the After Engine Room. Lee heard him curse quietly as he regained his balance.

The scene in the After Torpedo Room was one of frantic activity. Fred Nelson had put in place the heavy bars that joined the skid supports on either side of the torpedo room and had moved the reload torpedo for Number Seven tube on to the crossbars. His reload crew, working with sheer muscle, had moved the 900-pound spare torpedo skid from the port side of the room over the tops of the reload torpedo in front of Number Eight tube and the torpedo that was now in the center of the room and put it in position in line with Number Seven tube. Flanagan and Lee ducked under the torpedo that was sitting on the skid cross bars and duck-walked their way up to the after end of the room to the clear space in front of the tubes.

“Cussed that damned extra skid every day since we left Fremantle,” Nelson said. “Now I could kiss the son of a bitch. At least we got something to put that bastard on that’s running away in the tube. If we ever get it out.”

“You got any bright ideas on how we’re gonna do that?” Flanagan grunted.

“Petreshock called from the Forward Room while you were comin’ aft,” Nelson said. “He figured the exhaust comin’ out of that tail cone would be hot enough to fry a man so gettin’ a line or a cable around the tail assembly to haul the bastard out would be a bitch unless we had asbestos hoods and gloves and we ain’t got any of them. He thought maybe we could shove a slewing bar down the tube, if we can reach the fish, and jam it in the screws.”

Flanagan shook his head. “Burn your damned hands off trying to put a slewing bar in the tube. You got some steel cable back here?” Nelson nodded.

“Get some steel cable. Make a coil, three or four turns about two feet across. Lash it together so it makes like a butterfly or a figure eight with a belt or something. We can feed a cable down one side of the tube so we don’t get burned off at the elbows and maybe whip it around until it catches in the screws. Might even catch good enough so we could use the cable to pull the fish out.” Nelson went scrambling forward on his hands and knees underneath the torpedo in the middle of the room. Flanagan turned to Lieutenant Lee, who had put on the Battle Station talker’s telephone set.

“Tell the Old Man what we are going to try to do, sir. Tell him we’ll do it as quick as we can.” Lee nodded and spoke into the telephone. He listened and then made a thumbs-up sign to Flanagan, who turned and looked at the cable that Nelson had prepared. He nodded his approval and picked up the heavy wrench that was used to revolve the bayonet ring that held the solid bronze inner torpedo tube door closed.

“All hands, out of the way. When this son of a bitch of a door comes open there’s gonna be noise and heat and gas like you never saw.” He put the wrench on the stud and spun it viciously. The door flew open and a high-pitched scream filled the room as boiling hot exhaust gases belched out of the tube.

Flanagan crouched below the level of the tube and to one side. Nelson gave him the looped end of the cable and Flanagan gingerly fed the loop into the tube. Nelson fed him cable as he pushed the loop down the tube. He felt it hit something solid.

“It’s at the fish,” he grunted. “Hold on to me, Fred, so’s I don’t slip and get in front of that damned exhaust.” Both men staggered as four heavy depth charge explosions shook the stern of the Eelfish. Flanagan took the cable in both hands and began to whip it up and down and to one side. Suddenly the cable jerked through his hands, and there was a grinding noise of gears shearing themselves to bits and the sound of the propellers stopped. The hot exhaust continued to pour out of the torpedo tube. Flanagan turned and saw that Nelson was laying out a block and tackle and fastening the cable to one block. The reload crew, coughing in the increasingly foul atmosphere of the torpedo room, were crouched on their knees in a line, ready to begin hauling on the block and tackle to pull the torpedo out of the tube. Flanagan turned to Lee.

“She ain’t frozen in the tube, sir. See that little bit of water leaking past the fish?” He pointed at a thin stream of water running out of the torpedo tube.

On the surface up above the Eelfish the sonar operator on the Chidori destroyer looked at his Sonar Officer.

“Whatever it was making that funny noise has stopped, sir. Shall I begin a sonar search?” The officer nodded and the sonar man punched a button. A sonar beam began pulsing out into the ocean, searching in a circle. Suddenly the beam bounced back, ringing loudly in the Sonar Room of the destroyer.

“Target bears zero two zero, sir,” he said calmly “Range to the target is five hundred yards.” The Sonar Officer murmured into the telephone he wore, and the Chidori’s bow reared high and then settled down as its engines went to full speed.

The first depth charge exploded above the Forward Torpedo Room of the Eelfish, driving Petreshock to his knees in front of the torpedo tubes, lifting the upper bunks upward and out of their chain hooks to fall with a crash against reload torpedoes. In the Control Room the bow planesman saw the bubble in his inclinometer move sharply, and he began to strain against the big brass wheel to tilt the bow planes upward to compensate for the downward push of the depth charge.

The sudden slant down by the bow that was caused by the crushing force of the depth-charge explosion brought the torpedo sliding out of the tube as Flanagan yelled a warning. The torpedo, its tail cone belching a stream of burning hot exhaust gas, its turbines howling inside the afterbody, slid down the reload skid and crashed into the thin metal side of the Engineering Log cubicle and jammed there. A 24-inch thick stream of sea water driven by the 500-foot depth Eelfish was cruising at, burst into the torpedo room out of the tube, slamming against the warhead of the runaway torpedo. Flanagan ducked under the stream of water, grabbed the bottom edge of the tube’s inner door, and tried to close it. It moved easily and then it stopped, kept from closing by the warhead of the torpedo. He ducked back under the warhead and the rock-hard stream of water and realized that Nelson had shut down the torpedo’s engines.

“Clear the room!” Flanagan bellowed, his voice loud in the suddenly silent torpedo room. “All hands get out except Nelson. Close the watertight door. Maneuvering Room, open the salvage air valves, get a pressure in here soon’s these people get out and close the door!”

The electrician on watch with Chief Morris in the Maneuvering Room pulled the watertight door closed and dogged it tight as Chief Morris, standing on the padded bench seat, reached up and opened the salvage air valves. Air under a pressure of 225 pounds to the square inch roared into the sealed-off torpedo room. Lee pressed the talk button on his phones.

“Sorry about the noise, Captain,” he said calmly. “The torpedo is out of the tube. It’s jammed into the Log Room bulkhead. We can’t close the inner door on the tube because the warhead is in the way. The tube will be secured as soon as possible. Salvage air is being bled into the room to try and keep the water level down. Water is now knee deep and still coming.”

“Very well,” Brannon said into the phone Olsen had handed him. He gave the phone back and turned to the auxiliary-man at the high-pressure air manifold.

“As soon as that son of a bitch upstairs makes another run, as soon as you can hear his screws, blow Number Six Main Ballast tanks. All of them.” The auxiliaryman repeated the order and moved his wrench to the blow valve.

“That bastard up there isn’t going to have any trouble finding us,” Olsen said.

“He hasn’t had much trouble since that fish was fired in the tube,” Brannon said. He looked at the bubbles in the inclinometers in front of the bow and stern planesmen. The Eelfish was assuming a downward slant by the stern.

In the flooding After Torpedo Room Nelson had retrieved the block and tackle the reload crew had dropped into the water as they scrambled out of the room. He methodically untangled the wet lines and hooked one block over the horizontal surface of the torpedo’s tail fin. He carried the other block aft and hooked it into the skid. Flanagan joined him and took hold of the line.

“Take it easy on the haulin’,” Flanagan grunted. “We got a down angle by the stern. I don’t want this son of a bitch to hit the inner door and jam that fucker up.” The two men pulled carefully, and the torpedo slid out of the thin metal of the Log Room. Flanagan took the block off the tail and carried it to the nose of the torpedo. He pushed his hand and arm into the stream of water roaring out of the tube, wincing with pain as the water slammed into his flesh, and found the nose ring on the warhead. He got the hook in place and turned to Nelson.

“Get outboard of this fucker and when you’re set try to shove the ass end of the skid over far enough so the tail will clear the Log Room. Then we can pull the bastard back in the skid so’s we can get the inner door closed.” Nelson nodded and scrambled under the torpedo and braced his back against the hull. He put one big foot against the skid and pushed.

“Harder, Fred, harder!” Nelson heaved again and the skid moved another few inches. He scrambled toward the tail of the torpedo and explored the position of the skid and the edge of the Log Room bulkhead.

“She’s gonna clear,” he said, and ducked under the torpedo and took hold of the line on the block and tackle with Flanagan. The two men heaved mightily and then heaved again, fighting the downward angle Eelfish had assumed because of the increasing weight of the water pouring into the torpedo room. Lieutenant Lee heard Flanagan sob with effort and scrambled upward on the skid in the middle of the room, peering intently at the inner torpedo tube door and the warhead nose. The torpedo inched away from the inner door.

“That’s it!” Lee yelled. Flanagan came splashing forward and saw Lee’s white face in the eerie glow of the battle lanterns.

“This is what they give you that extra submarine pay for, Mr. Lee,” the Chief of the Boat said. He ducked under the stream of water and worked his body between the torpedo-tube inner door and the hull. Using his arms and legs he began to push his back against the inner door, narrowing the two-foot stream of water pouring out of the tube. He heard Nelson grunting as he scrambled under the warhead and eased his tall frame up beside Flanagan, who was straining, holding the door partially closed against the more than 200 pounds of pressure the stream of water was exerting.

“Lemme get a shoulder in next to you,” Nelson muttered. The two men pushed and the door gave a few inches. Nelson got his foot against the side of the ship’s hull, and with a loud grunt he heaved backward with all his strength. Lieutenant Lee, standing by with the door wrench, slipped it over the stud and threw every ounce of his 150 pounds downward. The bayonet ring caught and Nelson spun away from the warhead and grabbed the wrench from Lee and finished closing the bayonet ring. Lee thumbed the button on his phone set.

“Inner door on Number Seven tube is secured, Control. We’ve got about four feet of water in the room. Torpedo is now being strapped into the skid.”

Mike Brannon looked at the inclinometer bubble. The Eel-fish was sagging dangerously downward by the stern. He turned to Jerry Gold, the Battle Stations Diving Officer.

“Next time that guy up there speeds up to make a drop on us, as soon as he’s committed, start pumping the After Room through the drain lines.”

“Aye, aye, sir,” Gold said. He spoke briefly into his telephone set, and in the After Room Lieutenant Lee relayed the message to Flanagan and Nelson. Nelson shrugged.

“Fucking sump stop valve to the drain line is under four foot of water. I’m so wet now it don’t make any real difference.” He ducked down under the water and emerged a half-minute later, water dripping from his hooked nose.

“Bilge sump stop valve to the drain line is open, sir,” he said to Lee. “Now all we got to do is wait until that old Slant-Eye up there drops some more of his shit-cans and maybe that stupid fuckhead on the trim manifold can pump some of this damned water outa my room.”

“You won’t have to wait long,” Lee said. “He’s on his way.

The attack was sharp and heavy. Eelfish, her bow at 450 feet and her stern sagging below 500 feet, staggered through the attack. As the continual roar of the exploding depth charges went on, the man at the trim manifold ran the drain pump at high speed. In the After Torpedo Room the water began to recede and the down angle by the stern began to ease.

“If he comes back again we’ll do it once more,” Brannon said. “I can’t afford to pump the After Room dry. Number Six main ballast is empty and I can’t flood it because the damned air bubble from the vents would give us away too damned much. Even at night that son of a bitch up there could see that air bubble.

“We’ve got a seven-degree down bubble by the stern, sir,” Jerry Gold said. “We can hold pretty good if we can get that down to about four degrees, sir.”

“Very well,” Brannon said. “Get ready to pump, I can hear that bastard coming!”

After three more runs, dawn streaked the sky, and the destroyer gave up the hunt. Paul Blake, listening with all his being, heard the sound of the destroyer’s screws fade and then disappear. In the Control Room Mike Brannon nodded his acknowledgment of the information. He turned to Jerry Gold.

“Switch to hydraulic power on the bow and stern planes and the helm. Bring me up to sixty-five feet.’ He climbed the ladder to the Conning Tower, wondering at the weariness of his legs and then realizing that for hours he had been braced against the depth-charge explosions. He swung the periscope in two complete revolutions and saw nothing. He ordered Gold to bring the ship up to forty feet and took a radar sweep. No evidence of any ships. He walked to the hatch.

“Jerry, tell the engine and maneuvering rooms to stand by. I’m going to surface after one more radar sweep, and I’m going to stay up there as long as I can. I want a battery charge started as soon as the main induction is open. Start pumping that After Room now and keep at it until it’s dry.” He waited for the radar report and then punched the surface alarm three times. Eelfish rose, sluggishly, her stern sagging. The bow broke water first, rearing toward the sky, and then the Conning Tower burst through the surface. Brannon opened the hatch and scrambled back to the cigaret deck. The afterdeck of the Eelfish was under water from the gun mount aft. He heard the drain pump straining down below, and as he watched he could see the stern beginning to rise slowly. He turned as Jerry Gold, who had the OOD watch, spoke to him.

“Charging batteries on three main engines, Captain. Chief Electrician says if you can give him an hour he’ll have enough juice crammed back in to go down until after dark tonight if we behave ourselves and don’t go chasing anything.”

“Very well,” Brannon said. “Jerry, I’m going below. I want to take a look at that torpedo room. Keep the lookouts on their toes. If you see anything larger than a sea gull dive the ship.”

He stopped in the Maneuvering Room where Chief Ed Morris was overseeing the battery charge.

“Give me an hour or so, Captain,” Morris said. “After that we can dive and make out easy for a good twelve, fourteen hours.”

“I’ll try to give you more than that,” Brannon said. He stepped through the watertight door opening into the After Torpedo Room.

“Afraid you’ll have to duck down and crawl, sir,” Lee called from the torpedo tubes. Brannon ducked under the torpedo that was blocking the room and scrambled along until he reached the clear area in front of the tubes. He stood up gasping for air.

“Whew,” he said. “Air back here is foul.”

“You should have smelled it when we had the watertight door closed and that torpedo was belching exhaust gas in here,” Lee said. “I don’t know how the Chief and Nelson could work in that air.”

Brannon looked at the two men. “You did one hell of a job,” he said slowly. “I won’t forget it.”

“Mr. Lee just didn’t stand around, sir,” Flanagan said. “He stayed back here after I ordered the room cleared. He was one hell of a lot of help, sir.” Brannon nodded.

“You have any idea of the condition of the outer door, Chief, Nelson?”

“It’s either knocked off or it’s hanging by its hinges,” Flanagan said. “Nelson tried to close it but when he put the Y-wrench on the stud it just turned. Easy. So we lost the connecting linkage between the stud and the door for sure. But I don’t know if it’s still there or not. That’s not what’s worrying me, sir.”

“What is?” Brannon said.

“The warhead is leaking, sir. Must have split when it hit the outer door. When you mix sea water with the Torpex in the warhead you get stuff called exudate. Exudate is explosive. But we can handle that.”

“What else?” Brannon asked, looking at Flanagan’s hard face.

“I think we got an armed warhead, sir. The stream of water coming out of the tube was hitting the front of the warhead square. The little propeller that arms the warhead was right in the path of that stream of water.”

Brannon looked at the dull coppery sheen of the warhead and then at Flanagan.

“Anything hits that warhead with a force of four pounds of impact,” Flanagan said slowly, “anything hits that warhead, it’s gonna explode!”