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Description: file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20history.txt USS BARB (SSN-596) dp. 3070 tons (surf.), 3500 tons (subm.); l. 278.5'; b. 31.8';

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file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20history.txtUSS BARB (SSN-596)dp. 3070 tons (surf.), 3500 tons (subm.); l. 278.5'; b. 31.8';s. 15k (surf.), 28k (subm.); td. 700'; a. 4-21\" tt. amidships aft of bow.;cpl. 9 officers - 76 enlisted men; cl. \"PERMIT\"Keel laid down by Ingalls Shipbuilding Co., Pascagoula, MS, 9NOV59;Launched: 12FEB62; Sponsored by Mrs. Eugene Fluckey;Commissioned: 24AUG63 with Cdr Charles D. Grojean in command;Decommissioned and struck from the Navy List 20DEC89;Disposed of through SRP at PSNS 14MAR96.Compiled by SUBNET from \"UNITED STATES NAVAL SUBMARINE FORCE INFORMATION BOOK\"-- J. Christley file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20history.txt26/09/2010 4:12:56 PM

file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txtRescue from the heart of a typhoonB-52 Rescue Rescue from the heart of a typhoon Crewmen of a downed bomber are saved from a raging sea in a daring feat by nuclear subs fighting 40-foot waves. by Capt. Charles Barton, USN (Ret.) Capt. Leroy Johnson, pilot of Cobalt 2, a B-52G of the Strategic Air Command, taxied into takeoff position at Andersen Air Force Base, Guam. It was past 4:00 a.m., July 8, 1972. Two other planes in the flight already were airborne. Airman Daniel Johansen, gunner and , at 21, the youngest menber of the crew, felt the power surge, the runway bumps, then liftoff. With Typhoon Rita building up to a full-scale blow, the B-52G died at 30,500 feet. Six crewmen hit the silk to experience a night of horror.Lights dropped away in the predawn darkness as the aircraft headed seaward abovethe surf that crashed against Guam's precipitous northeast coast. Crosswindsfrom local showers burbled over the cliff, tossing the plane, an indication ofbad weather throughout the Western Pacific. Three tropical storms were on ornear their flight path. The nearest would grow into Typhoon Rita - a stormthey'd come to remember. As the bomber climbed through 20,000 feet, Johansen'sheadset came alive. \"I've lost airspeed readings.\" It was the captain. \"it's outover here, too,\" replied his 25-year-old copilot, Lt. William Neely III.\"Johansen, come forward and give us a hand.\" The gunner unstrapped and went tothe flight deck. The pilots looked worried. Johansen read out corrective actionsfrom the manual. It called for more power. But even when this was applied,Cobalt 2 still dropped behind the other planes. Capt. Johnson leveled at 30,500feet, let the aircraft pick up speed in a short descent, and engaged theautomatic pilot, with \"altitude hold.\" A few minutes later the plane began toshake. Suddenly the autopilot disengaged and the nose pitched down. Therate-of-climb indicator pegged out at 6000 feet per minute down, and thealtimeter began to unwind.CREW MUST BAIL OUTThe pilots struggled for control. Johnson snapped orders. \"Everyone to yourseats.\" Maj. Ronald Dvorak, 35, the electronics warfare officer, watchedJohansen climb back in his gunner's seat. \"strap in!\" he yelled at him. Theshaking increased violently, and the angle of the plane approached a dive. Thegunner struggled to hook up for ejection. His throbbing head and pounding heartmuffled the interphone. Then came the order: \"Everybody out! Bail out!\" Johansen file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txt (1 of 8)26/09/2010 4:12:57 PM

file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txtarmed his ejection seat and saw Dvorak eject. He pulled his own trigger and shotthrough the open hatch, somersaulting through space. The chute opened with ajolt. It looked small. He was swinging wildly. The risers which attached thechute to him were twisted. He pulled them apart and his body spun as theyunwound. Sharp snapping sounds came from the left, then the right. Fear joltedJohansen. He thought the risers were breaking! He grabbed frantically to keepfrom falling, but it was only the sound of tack lines breaking free. As hestopped spinning, the chute blossomed. He felt faint.AIRCRAFT ENDS IN FIERY CRASHNow he lowered his survival kit on its retaining line so it dangled 10 or 15feet below and helped dampen the swinging. He inflated his life preserver andlooked around. Low in the night sky, he saw the running lights of theiraircraft, then a brilliant flash as it struck the sea. The flare lighted thechutes of at least three other crew members below him. He tried to steer towardthem without success. He blinked his flashlight, but no one responded. At thelast moment he unsnapped the covers from the parachute canopy releases andcrossed his arms through the risers to prevent falling from the chuteprematurely. As he neared the raging sea, he could hear and see huge waves,their crests blown to spray on a stinging wind. The moment his feet touched thewater, he pulled the canopy release rings and plunged feet first beneath thesurface. His chute blew free. He surfaced and swam to his raft which hadatuomatically inflated. Once in it he lay back to calm himself. The luminousdial of his watch read 5:25. It would be daylight soon. He felt okay; nothinghad broken, and he hadn't swallowed water. But the weather was getting worse.TROUBLES PLAGUE CHUTISTSUsing his flashlight, he opened his survival kit and made several distress callson the radio. He shot off one flare which made a brief mark in the dark predawn.Nothing happened. He put out a sea anchor and the raft rode better. Patches ofplankton fluoresced as each wave broke. Lt. Kent Dodson, 25, the navigator, washaving trouble. The sight of their B-52 exploding in the dark had hypnotize himand delayed his preparation for water entry. Just as he reahed for the releaserings a strong gust yanked the chute.He hit the water swinging and a great, rolling wave tossed him into his shroudlines, which snared him like a fishnet. Time and again he slipped below thesurface. Luckily, Dodson was a strong swimmer. Struggling for breath., heslashed line after line with his pocket knife and finally fought free. Heclimbed into his raft and lay panting for an hour, recovering. One line he'd cutwas to his survival kit. With daylight, the sea increased and the wind drove astinging rain. Dodson could see rescue aircraft, but without signaling deviceshad no way of making contact. Eventually a C-97 buzzed him. He'd been spotted.That night the waves, wind and rain built higher. Dodwson fought to keep his file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txt (2 of 8)26/09/2010 4:12:57 PM

file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txtraft from overturning. He was exhausted. \"Good God,\" he thought, \"Is this theend?\"NUCLEAR SUBS ORDERED OUTOn the morning of July 8, the nuclear fast-attack submarine Barb was in Guam'sApra Harbor completing repairs on a hydraulic pump prior to a six or seven-weekMarianas patrol. News of Typhoon Rita was no worry. The big sub would sailsubmerged and untroubled below the surface. That's what everyone thought.Instead, from the Joint Search and Rescue at Agana, orders were requested andissued to the Barb's skipper, Commander John Juergens: \"B-52 down in vicinity12-07 north, 140-20 east...three of six crewmen sighted by rescuecraft...Proceed best speed...\" An hour later a similar \"operational immediate\"went to USS Gurnard, a sister sub inbound from Japan. Within an hour the Barbslipped past Apra's harbour jetty, entered deep water and nosed under. Lt. CmdrMike Rushing, engineering officer who would be officer of the deck during therescue attempt, had been up for 36 hours supervising the repairs. Now he slept.Cruising submerged at flank speed, all was smooth. An undercurrent of excitementpermeated the ship. Chief Torpedoman Jon Hentz of Brunswick, Me., penned a quickletter to his wife: \"We left Guam in a hurry , there are two tropical stormsheaded here and a B-52 crashed at sea 300 miles away . . .\" Nuclear submarineslike Barb and Gurnard don't carry banks of batteries or great volumes of fuel,which occupy nearly half the hull space of conventional subs, and they're muchlarger - about as long as a football field and more than 31 feet in diameter. Inthe crew's mess of the Barb, 30 men can be fed at once, and in minutes thecompartment converts to lounge or theater. It was here the crew gathered todiscuss ways of rescuing the downed airmen.PROSPECTS NOT PLEASANT The prospects were not pleasant. A submarine is designed to perform submerged, not on the surface. In any sea, her keelless cylindrical hull rolls and wallows like a sick whale. Further, when surfaced, a sub is \"conned\" from a three-by-four-foot cockpit bridge atop the \"sail\" which projects like a dorsal fin 15 feet above the center of the hull. It houses ladder and communications link between control room below and upper bridge, and also serves as a fairing for masts and antennas. The cockpit itself, separated from the ship by a watertight hatch, is open to the weather. Chief Torpedoman of the Barb, JonHentz, recieves the Navy and Marine Corps Medal for Heroism. He swam a line to survivors.There is no provision for getting down to the main deck from the cockpit, nor isaccess to the deck possible from deck hatches except in calm weather. Even smallwaves wash into open hatches. In this operation there was a real risk that file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txt (3 of 8)26/09/2010 4:12:57 PM

file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txtsurvivors pulled from the sea would be dashed to death against the hull. It wasdecided to bring them over the port sail plane, a winglike vane extending some10 feet out from the sail. Though even at the tip they wouldn't quite clear thehull's bulge, it would be far less dangerous than working from the main deck.Finding the men in the storm-tossed sea would be less difficult. Militaryaircraft already were circling them. Sophisticated navigation and communicationsequipment would solve the rest. That evening at 7:30 Lt. Cmdr. Rushing,refreshed by sleep, came on duty, stepping around a clutter of rescue equipmentbeing readied. Barb was still submergeed when the PA system clicked on: \"This isthe captain. Commander Submarine Squadron 15 report five B-52 crewmen have beensighted by aircraft, but heavy weather has forced surface ships to turn back.Barb and Gurnard will handle the operation.\" Juergens then instructed Rushing tocome to periscope depth. As the ship rose above the 400-foot level, the menbegan to feel surface motion. At 200 feet Rushing noted the ship was rolling 10degrees each way. It was about 11 p.m. when Barb came to periscope depth,rolling and pitching violently. Lt. Cmdr. Jim Okeson could hear radiocommunications between the orbiting aircraft and Guam Search and Rescue Control.Barb was about 12 miles from the rafts.SUB SURFACES VIOLENTLYBy midnight the sub had closed the distance enough to surface. Suddenly she wassucked upward. Instead of a normal keel depth reading of about 26 feet, thereading dropped to 11. Instantly the ship heeled over on her beam. Men swore.Some ended against bulkheads or dangling from handholds. The ship hung for amoment, then went the other way. Rushing shouted course changes to the helmsman,looking for mnimum roll. One heading took her nearly head on into the seas,which broke over bow and sail, forcing her beneath the surface. This would neverdo with men on the bridge. Trial and error found a \"best course,\" but it wasstill rugged. Men hung on as best they could. Some were sick. Never had Barbtaken such a beating. Her single screw drummed air when it lifted clear. Theimpact of the stern and sail planes slamming back into the waves sent shuddersthrough the hull. \"let's go.\" Rushing and Torpedoman Steve Glasgow climbed thepitching bridge trunk. As Rushing opened the hath to the cockpit, wind whistledand water slopped in. The men clambered through. It was dark. Wind-driven rainand salt spray stung their faces. They careened to the four compass points asmountainous waves tossed the ship like a canoe riding rapids. They had to yellto be heard above the storm's roar. Their course toward the survivors was nowwith the seas. Though they were drenched by rain and spray, water boiled intothe cockpit only occasionally. They tied themselves to the structure to keepfrom being swept overboard. At 1:15 a.m. the rain stopped briefly and they saw abrilliant flare about three miles ahead. Aircraft orbiting in the light radioedthat eight rafts (some dropped from the planes) were visable. Even the emptieswere marked by lights. Lt. Lee Price, manning the periscope in control, was file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txt (4 of 8)26/09/2010 4:12:57 PM

file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txtfirst to spot lights., and notified the bridge. Minutes later, in the flailingcockpit, Rushing could see three sets of lights bobbing up from behind giantwaves. \"Port 5 degrees,\" he ordered, steering for the closest. Suddenly a redflare blossomed off port bow.SURVIVOR SIGHTED\"Steer two-nine-zero,\" Rushing ordered. \"Notify the captain we have a survivorin sight.\" He tried to put the Barb to the right of the raft, so they'd approachupwind. An orbiting aircraft dropped a flare revealing the full extent of themountainous seas for the first time. Rushing wished he hadn't seen it. Capt.Juergens, Lt. Ron Ricci the Barb's weapons officer, and Chief Hentz camecrowding up into the cockpit. They could hardly move. Glasgow unstrapped andwent below. Juergens tied himself in beside Rushing. Ricci and Hentz, equippedwith life jackets and lines to keep from washing overboard, rigged a Jacob'sladder down the side of the sail to the safety track on the deck. Then theyclambered down to the port sail plane. Typhoon winds ripped the wave crests toshreds, blasting rain and spume in disorder. White water rolled over sail planeand bridge. Rushing's approach to the raft put the wind-driven rain and spray attheir backs, and the tossing raft came in sight some 10 yards off the port bow.As it passed amidships, Hentz aimed the throwing gun and fired. The line snakedout of sight in the darkness. He tried a weighted line, but the wind carries itoff. As the raft passed, Ricci yelled, \"Hey! You okay?\" and heard an affirmativeyell. \"We'll pick you up in a couple of minutes.\" \"Okay.\" The response whiskedaway on the wind and the distance widened. Rushing ordered engines to back down.As she slowed, Barb rolled 40 degrees. A wave buried the bow and she began to gounder. Ricci felt himself float off the sail plane, tethered to a submergingship. Hastily, Rushing ordered the helmsman back to his original course onforward speed. The ship sloughed off its load of water and rose again. Severalattempts to turn brought seas over the sail and water cascading down the hatch.Finally, by scrambling below, securing the hatch, changing coures, thenreturning to the bridge, they were able to find a better approach.WIND BLOWS RAFT AWAY The raft was now a mile distant. It was 2:20 a.m. On the second run the wind blew the raft out of reach before they could fire a line. They tried the downwind side. The wind blew the weighted line back at them. On one try they fired a line right over another raft that hove in sight. There was no response. It appeared empty. Path of Typhoon Rita and course of ailing B-52 (dotted line) are shown in the map above. The plane went down directly in the path of oncoming storm, which grew as it swept past the survivors who had parachuted into the sea.At 4:26 a.m. Juergens decided that further attempts in darkness would endanger file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txt (5 of 8)26/09/2010 4:12:57 PM

file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txtboth survivors and rescuers. Wet and exhausted, they clambered back down thetrunk banging the hatch behind them. Barb submerged to wait for the dawn. At7:40, after a hot shower and soup, Rushing returned to the bridge. It was light,with heavy overcast and intermittent rain. The eye of Typhoon Rita had passedabeam. Though still rough, conditions had improved. Aircraft still orbited thesurvivors. Using their radioed vectors, Rushing conned Barb toward a group ofthree rafts. As the distance closed, he made out two or three men sittingmotionless in the nearest. \"Rescue team to the bridge!\" he ordered. Ricci, Hentzand Gary Spaulding, an electronics technician, hauled themselves up through thehatch with their gear. The plan was to shoot a line with a harness to eachsurvivor. One by one, they'd be pulled through the water to the sail plane whereSpaulding, a giant of a man, would lift them aboard and help to keep them frombeing battered as they were hoisted up the side of the sail. The harness linewas fed down the bridge trunk to the control room where six men would providethe muscle to pull the survivors into the cockpit. Rushing maneuvered the Barbto put the raft on her lee. The shifting wind blew the raft first one way thenanother. One minute the thing would ride a crest high above the submarine, thendisappear in a trough under her bow the next.LINES KEEP MISSINGAt 20 yards, Hentz shot a line. It blew off on the gusting winds. A secondattempt was better, but it whipped just before the men could grab it and driftedaway. The raft drifted out of range. Hentz, a top scuba diver, offered to swim aline out. \"You don't have to,\" Juergens said. \"I want to,\" Hentz replied. Heclipped the line to his belt, timed his jump to coincide with the crest of awave, then swam like hell to clear the ship. Wave after wave swamped him. He wasthrown violent about on the crest of larger waves as they exploded in the wind.Finally, he reached the raft. There were three men in it - Lt. Neely, Maj.Dvorak and Lt. Dodson, who was exhausted. He had been lying down out of sightwith his head pillowed on the lap of one of the others. Dvorak had broken hiselbow during ejection and couldn't use that arm. The next step was to get aheavier mooring line to the raft. Gary Spaulding hurled a weighted messengerline, but it fell short. Hentz swam out to recover it. The heavy mooring linewas hurled out and secured to the raft. It was about 8:15.ALMOST DOESN'T MAKE ITHentz was wrung out, but he knew he'd be needed on the sub to help haul thesurvivor aboard. With safety line secured around him, he started the long swimback.. As he neared Barb, he saw the screw come completely out of the water. Thenext moment all he could see was the top of the sail. Several times he saw theforward flood ports -- sea intakes close to the hull bottom. Some of the swellshad to be 40 feet high. By now Hentz was so exhausted he had doubts about makingit, but with Spaulding pulling the line, he soon neared safety. Waiting for a file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txt (6 of 8)26/09/2010 4:12:57 PM

file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txtbig wave, he kicked upward as Spaulding tugged. The wave dropped him on the hullsafety track three feet from the dangling Jacob's ladder. The next wave threwhim against the side of the sail. He grabbed the ladder and willing hands helpedhim stay up. Trundled off to his quarters, he lay on the floor recovering hisbreath. Topside, the crew moored the raft 25 yards off Barbs port quarter.Rushing's problem was to keep the raft downwind and the men clear of the screw,while preventing the sub from sliding into the trough where she would roll soviolently the survivors might be endangered. It called for a remarkable feat ofship handeling. Lt. Dodson was the first brought aboard. A life jacket was sentout by messenger line, and the crew started pulling him in. Dodson laterrecalled: \"They pulled me to the conning tower and I hung there like a dead man,I was so tired. Then this big guy, the strongest man I had ever seen, pulled meover the edge of the conning tower.\" Dodson was lowered down the trunk intocontrol.TWO MORE BROUGHT INDvorak and Neely, being less tired, were brought in more easily. By 10:00 a.m.,the orbiting aircraft had vectored Barb to the next raft. With a single shot,Spaulding sent a messenger line over a lone survivor's head. The man grabbed it,pulled out the heavy line and the harness, buckled up and started swimming. Thesub heeled over as the swimmer approached. Everybody heaved on the line and asthe sub righted itself the survivor popped from the ocean like a penguin andlanded on the sail plane. It was Airman Johansen. He had been in the water about28 hours. The pickup had taken 13 minutes. Barb was getting good. Meanwhile, theGurnard was having problems. She had reached the scene after Barb. Any thoughtsthat Cmdr. Clyde Bell, the skipper, had of making a quick rescue were quicklydispelled by the 70-mph wind. At one time the force of the seas tilted andshoved her to a depth of 150 feet before the crew could fight her back up.Finally, Cmdr. Bell elected to withdraw so as not to interfere with Barb orendanger the survivors. But he stayed on the surface to maintain radio contactwith the aircraft. He had been assigned the job of co-ordinating the rescueefforts. At daybreak, spotter aircraft directed Gurnard to the aircraftcommander's raft. Capt. Johnson, having ejected last, had become separated fromthe others. As the ship maneuvered to try for a pickup, wind and waves conspiredto prevent more than one chance per approach to get a line out. When they pulledalong side, the raft blew one way and the submarine another. When they bothdrifted in the same direction, the raft moved faster and soon outranged the linegun.SUPERB SEAMANSHIP NEEDEDEach atttempt required superb seamanship, maneuvering to stay along side asvisibility closed periodically to 500 yards in drenching squalls,and the shiprolled 60 degrees across the sky. What made matters worse, Gurnard's sail was file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txt (7 of 8)26/09/2010 4:12:57 PM

file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txtnearly twice as high as Barb's, rising some 35 feet above the waterline. Apulley-mounted hoist had to be rigged between bridge and trunk base, with aharness line feeding through to men in the control room. At long last, using aheavier line, Chief Torpedoman W.A. Neilson got a successful delivery rightacross the raft. Then Capt. Johson grabbed it, hauled in the rescue line anddonned the harness. In the cockpit, Lt. Cmdr. Ed Morgan, officer of the deck,waited until the mast completed a dip toward the raft. The he yelled the crucialcommand:\"Heave!\" In the control room the crewmen slipped and scrambled on thetilting deck to keep the line coming in. Johnson was snatched from his raft andflew through the air. As the ship rolled upright, the line hoisted him over thetop of the sail. Someone tackled his boots and dropped him to the cockpit.MISSION ACCOMPLISHED Johnson's feet hit the deck. He looked at the makeshift rig and shook his head. Later he told how he had been thrown from his raft three times during the night. \" I must have bailed 15,000 gallons of water,\" he said. The mission was accomplished. Enroute to Guam, Commissaryman Curt Avery of the Barb baked a cake in honor of Lt. Dodson's 26th birthsday. The celebration was dampened by the absence of the B-52's radar navagator, Lt. Col. J.L. Vaughn. Arriving in Apra Harbor, Guam. B-52 copilot Neely is on bridge in flight suit.Aircraft had sighted his body floating face down, still tied to his raft. AirForce and Navy crews who maintained vigilant watch over the survivors day andnight at dangerously low altitudes in the jaws of a typhoon had made thespectacular rescue possible. Admiral Bernard A. Cleary, Commander-in-ChiefPacific Fleet, put it well. \" The coordination and teamwork were superb,\" hesaid. \"I have never seen a more professionally executed operation in the face ofso many difficulties.\" Adm. John S. McCain, Commander-in-Chief Pacific, radioed:\"This rescue presented the ultimate test of professional skill and courage ofthe airmen and seamen involved.\" Each ship was presented the Meritorious UnitCommendation, and 10 submariners who played perilous topside roles recievedindividual commendations. It was, indeed, a job \"well done.\" file:///F|/Navy/New%20folder/500%20pamphlets/SSN-596%20Barb%20B-52%20rescue.txt (8 of 8)26/09/2010 4:12:57 PM