Larry Bond - Dangerous Ground

“Where is Dr. Patterson? What’s her emergency station?” asked Jerry.

“She’s still in bed,” answered Davis. “She says these drills are silly and refuses to have anything to do with them.”

“What?” exclaimed Jerry.

Everyone looked at Emily with as much surprise as their division officer. Even Foster stopped his instructions in mid-sentence. Nobody on a sub ignored casualty drills.

Hardy’s voice over the IMC announced: “Secure from drill. All hands remove EABs. If that had been a real fire, I’d be heading for the nearest port and hoping we’d make it. It took too long to isolate the circuit and once again the Casualty Assistance Team was too slow. Count on doing this again until you do it right.” The lights came on and Jerry wearily headed back to bed.

Hardy hit them with a reactor scram at five, and then an engineering casualty during breakfast. As that drill ended, Jerry heard the General Alarm and the IMC announcement, “MAN BATTLE STATIONS TORPEDO.” Jerry was the Officer of the Deck under instruction for this drill, so he hurried to the control room.

He came into the space on the tail end of yet another argument between Hardy and Patterson. “… tired of these games. I’ve got work to do, and these drills keep slowing us down.”

“Doctor, I will drill this crew until I am satisfied with their performance. If our only job is to get you north, then how I run my boat is none of your business.” He spoke calmly, almost casually.

“Captain Hardy, you will stop these pointless drills!” Patterson’s voice was more than firm.

Hardy paused before answering. For a moment, Jerry thought he was going to comply. Then his expression hardened. “Respectfully, ma’am, I refuse.” As Patterson started to protest, he cut her off. “And in the future, Doctor, for the safety of this boat, you will participate in any casualty drills.” She didn’t answer him immediately and he continued. “Do not mistake me, Doctor. It truly is the safety of the boat — and the mission — that is at stake here.”

Patterson, almost expressionless, looked at Hardy for a moment, then nodded silently in agreement. She turned and left the control room.

Jerry realized he’d been holding his breath. So there were limits, things even Hardy couldn’t be bullied into doing. It made Jerry a little more hopeful, but he wondered what price they’d pay for Hardy’s defiance.

The drills continued throughout the day, with Hardy mixing accidents, engineering casualties, and battle drills almost continuously.

Drills are a normal part of submarine life, but Hardy was merciless in his pace, as well as in his critique of the crew’s actions. Even the smallest infraction brought blistering condemnation. The best the crew could hope for was a plain: “Secure from drill.” If Hardy didn’t have anything bad to say, he wouldn’t say anything at all.

Jerry watched as the crew took grim satisfaction in the lack of praise. During one of the engineering drills, he overheard one of the nuke electronics technicians say proudly, “Even the old man can’t find anything wrong with that one.”

But if there was any criticism from Hardy, the department head and division officers echoed it, passing it down the chain of command. When the machinist mates didn’t deal with a feed pump casualty quickly enough, Hardy held a “washup” in the wardroom — for all the officers. After reviewing the casualty in detail and pointing out each and every thing that had gone wrong, Hardy laid into Lieutenant Commander Ho, the Engineer.

“Your people aren’t properly trained or supervised. You tell Jackson, Hughes, Train, and even Chief Barber that their performance is not satisfactory, nor is yours for letting it happen.”

Ho stood at attention in front of the entire wardroom while the Captain lambasted him for several more minutes. He managed to work in an “Aye, aye” or “Yes, sir” where appropriate, but Hardy never gave him the chance to explain or even apologize.

Jerry listened to it with the rest of the wardroom, embarrassed for Ho, and remembered how different his old squadron commander had been. He suspected that the difference in command styles was not because one was an aviator and the other a submariner.

After Hardy left the wardroom, Jerry watched as Ho turned on Al Millunzi, the Main Propulsion Assistant. His division maintained and operated the feed pump in question and had muffed the drill. “What were your people thinking, mister? Or were they thinking at all?” Ho spoke loudly, much more loudly than he had to, and Jerry saw him glance in the direction of the passageway, as if he wanted to make sure Hardy heard him berating the MPA.

Millunzi immediately came to attention and didn’t respond as Ho criticized his leadership, his technical knowledge, and even his dedication to the Navy. “I’ll expect nothing less than perfection from you and your men, mister. Now, go make it happen!”

The lieutenant, red-faced, nodded silently and left the wardroom. Jerry felt sure that Chief Barber and M division were next in line for “verbal admonition.”

As the crew demonstrated their competence with the basic drills, Hardy and the XO increased the complexity. Engineering casualties caused flooding. Toxic smoke from a simulated insulation fire in forward compartment middle level caused dozens of simulated casualties, including Jerry and his men, who were told to lie in place and wait to be treated.

The rescuers appeared quickly, all wearing EABs and their fire-fighting suits. As the leading “rescuer” reached down to pick up one of the casualties, the XO stopped him. “Wait a minute, Brown. Is your mask on properly?”

Machinist Mate Second Class Brown nodded, “Yes, sir.” His answer was muffled by the mask.

“Good,” the XO replied. “And can you see all right?”

“Yessir, as well as the mask allows,” responded Brown.

“Do you have a nifty with you?” Bair asked innocently. The nifty is the handheld Navy infrared thermal imager (NIFTI), which is used by firefighters to locate a fire in thick, obscuring smoke. It can also be used to find personnel casualties by their body heat.

“Uh, no, sir. The fire-fighting teams have both of them.”

“Well, that’s no good! This compartment is filled with toxic smoke. It’s not only poisonous, it’s nearly opaque.” Bair pulled out a small green trash bag and slipped it over Brown’s head. He then passed bags to the rest of the team. “Here, all of you put these on, just like Brown.”

As they pulled the bags over their heads, a muffled curse came from somewhere in the group. “I can’t see shit!” exclaimed an anonymous voice.

“I can’t see shit, sir!” the XO replied, amused. “If you can guarantee that fires will never have smoke, I’ll let you take off the bags.”

“Permission to proceed, sir,” Brown said in a tone that managed to mix frustration with proper respect for the XO’s rank.

Bair nodded approval, and then, remembering they couldn’t see him, said, “Proceed.”

The rescuers were required to actually “examine” each casualty, then bodily lift the “unconscious” man from the space and evacuate him to a safe portion of the sub. Stumbling, moving carefully to avoid the angular equipment that filled the space, the rescue team had only evacuated half of the casualties in the torpedo room when Hardy came clattering down the ladder from the deck above.

“What’s going on…” he started, but then stopped himself as he realized what the XO had done. He saw Bair checking his watch and asked, “How long have they been at it?”

“Ten minutes, sir. They’ve cleared five casualties so far.”

“Leaving the other five breathing toxic smoke for ten minutes,” the Captain said harshly. He pointed to the men, including Jerry, still lying “unconscious” on the deck. “Well, we might as well stop the drill, because these men are all dead.”