by Larry Bond
“Thank you, Igor. Gather your data and make your calculations quickly.”
“Captain,” interrupted Dr. Balanov. “Forgive my ignorance, but why are we even discussing this? Shouldn’t we move the surviving crew members into the rescue chamber and abandon ship?”
An eerie silence filled the central post, as most of the senior officers looked down or away from the doctor and declined to speak. Sensing that he was missing an important point, he asked, “Why are you looking that way? What is it I do not understand?”
It was Kalinin who finally took pity on poor Balanov. “The reason why we haven’t used the VSK, Doctor, is that our port list is too great. The locking mechanism that secures the chamber to the boat is friction-bound. There is no way for us to detach.”
“I see,” said Balanov nervously. “Thank you for the explanation, Starpom.”
“Your report, Doctor,” ordered Petrov.
“We have suffered at least six dead and we have over a dozen moderate to serious injuries. At least eight men are missing and are presumed dead. We are compiling a comprehensive list of the deceased, missing, and injured and you will have it within thirty minutes. We also have one psychological casualty.”
“Psychological casualty?” inquired Petrov curiously. “Explain.”
“I was forced to sedate Captain-Lieutenant Sadilenko. He suffered a total loss of control and he was becoming a danger to his men.”
Both Petrov and Kalinin were now even more confused. Yakov Sadilenko was a most promising young officer with nerves of steel. His performance during the certification trials had been exemplary and he clearly knew his duties. What could have caused him to crack?
Kolesnikov, the chief of damage control, spoke up. “As the commander of compartment five, Sadilenko personally initiated the delivery of the LOKh into compartment six when it appeared that the fire would fully engulf the space. We didn’t know if everyone in compartment six had escaped. We couldn’t see because of the thick smoke and we couldn’t communicate with compartment seven.” There was a pause in the narration as Kolesnikov fought to keep his emotions in check. He too was clearly affected.
“There were tears streaming down his face, sir, as I watched him turn the wheel and flood compartment six with Freon gas. After the fire was out, we went into the compartment and found two bodies. Both men had been suffocated by the gas. One of them was Captain Third Rank Aryapov, the commander of compartment six.”
Kalinin closed his eyes and turned away, hiding the pain he felt. Petrov felt another blow. Aryapov and Sadilenko were exceptionally close. The joke was that they were twin sons born of different mothers. They worked together, played together, and drank together.
“He fulfilled his duty, comrade Captain,” continued Kolesnikov. “But I fear it will cost him his sanity. As soon as he saw Aryapov’s contorted face, Yakov knew he had killed him and his mind snapped. It took four of us to pin him down while the doctor administered the sedative.”
An uncomfortable, haunting quiet fell upon the participants of the meeting. The grief and stress they all felt was palpable.
“Comrades,” spoke Petrov softly, breaking the uneasy silence. “I know we all want to grieve the loss of our friends and shipmates. But unless we are willing to grieve much more, I need you to be focused on securing our survival. We have to fulfill our duty to the living first, then to the dead.”
The shallow nodding of heads by all present told Petrov that his gentle admonishment had gotten through. “All right, then. Doctor, what are our biggest challenges, in priority order?”
“We have three major issues to deal with, comrade Captain.” Dr. Balanov counted on his fingers as he ran down the list. “Number one. Captain Fonarin is absolutely correct, hypercapnia, carbon dioxide poisoning, is our greatest obstacle. A human being can function with oxygen as low as fourteen percent, and live down to about twelve percent with reduced mental capacities. But if carbon dioxide concentration gets above two percent, there are immediate and significant negative effects. Most prevalent are severe headaches, fatigue, and an increase in the rate of breathing. At five percent, an individual experiences hyperventilation, convulsions, and unconsciousness. Above six percent, death occurs.
“Second is atmospheric pressure. The more gas we release into the compartments, the higher the pressure. If the pressure gets sufficiently high to drive enough atmospheric gasses into our bloodstream, the crew could experience decompression sickness during the rescue operation.” Decompression sickness, or the bends, results when an individual breathing compressed air is suddenly moved to an environment with a lower pressure. The gases in the blood form small bubbles that can cause significant pain, and even death if not treated promptly.
“In addition, higher atmospheric pressure will increase the effects of carbon dioxide poisoning. So this must be monitored carefully. Finally, the third issue is hypothermia. Without power for the heating system, the temperature inside the submarine will be down to about two or three degrees Centigrade in a few hours. Every possible effort needs to be taken to try and keep the crew as warm as possible. Excessive cold for long periods, while bad in and of itself, will also exacerbate the carbon dioxide problem.”
“Understood, Doctor,” Petrov responded, feeling a little more like his old self. Instead of merely reacting to circumstances, he was working with his men to come up with a plan of action to deal with a significant problem. “Starpom, make up a duty roster and limit the number of watchstanders to three: a deck officer, an engineer to keep watch on the reserve battery, and a sonar technician to monitor the underwater communications system.”
“Aye, Captain,” replied Kalinin. “Do you want a chemical service watch-stander to monitor the atmosphere?”
“Fonarin will conduct an air sample once every four hours and report the results to the deck officer and Dr. Balanov. Beyond that, I don’t think we need a dedicated watchstander. Everyone else not on watch is to lie down, no unnecessary physical activity. This should reduce the amount of carbon dioxide we produce.”
“Captain,” said Kolesnikov, “I recommend that we get as many men into survival suits as we can. They were designed for immersion in water and so they should work just as well, if not better, in air. This will help to reduce the chance of hypothermia.”
“Good suggestion, Yury. Please, see to the distribution of the suits. Anything else? Anyone?” No one offered a response to the captain’s questions.
As the officers collected their notes, Petrov spoke again. “One last item. Tell your men that the situation is not hopeless. We are not just waiting to die. The V-600 emergency distress information buoy was automatically deployed when we hit the ocean floor.
“Northern Fleet Headquarters is aware of our plight and will send all available resources to find us and rescue us. We are taking these measures to give the fleet time to get here, ascertain the situation, and effect a rescue. Emphasize that we need their help if we are to succeed.
“All right, then. You have your assigned duties, comrades, please carry them out with all due diligence. I will await your reports. Dismissed.”
Petrov escorted the now-splinted Kalinin up to the central post, where his starpom started to put the watch rotation schedule into effect. Tired and very sore, Petrov walked over to the sonar post and sat down in one of the chairs. It would take his officers a little time to compile the detailed reports, and he just wanted to be off his feet for a minute or two.
An hour later, Kalinin woke him up with the reports in his hands. His demeanor spoke of more bad news. Petrov thanked his first officer and started to read the reports in the dim light.
Dr. Balanov’s report was first. Seven crewmen were known dead, with nine missing and presumed to be dead. There were eighteen men with moderate or serious injuries; two were in critical condition, and in the doctor’s professional opinion probably would not survive another day. And then there was Sadilenko’s mental state. Virtually everyone else had some minor injuries of one form
or another.
Petrov did the math in his head. Thirty-five men, well over a third of his crew, were dead or badly hurt. A stiff price to pay for his folly.
Fonarin’s report was worse. They only had fifty-eight V-64 cassettes for the chemical air-regeneration units. They’d left port with only an eighty percent loadout and many cassettes had been lost in compartments one, seven, and eight. With sixty-nine men still alive, they only had three days’ worth of chemicals. The only good news was that there was adequate electrical power in the reserve battery to run the blowers in the regeneration units for up to six days.
Given their resources and the number of men, Fonarin and Balanov recommended maintaining oxygen at seventeen percent and carbon dioxide at one percent. Dr. Balanov articulated the medical effects of this atmospheric composition, and it was clear they would all be suffering from nasty headaches and fatigue.
Petrov placed the reports on the dead sonar console, his head already throbbing. His thoughts were drawn back to the list of the dead and missing. Sixteen men gone because of him.
No wait, it was likely more than that. He hadn’t even thought about the American submarine. Were they on the bottom, struggling to survive? Or were they already dead? He remembered that U.S. submarine designers didn’t emphasize survivability like the Russian Navy.
And then he thought of the half-truth he had told his officers. It was true the emergency distress buoy had deployed, but he didn’t know if it reached the surface, or that its message actually was sent and received by the Northern Fleet Headquarters. Could all of the measures they were preparing to take be pointless? Were they all doomed to die a slow and painful death from carbon dioxide poisoning?
And why? Just because he couldn’t let go of the American after he had beaten him. Suddenly, the words of advice from Vice Admiral Kokurin jumped up from his memory: “Aggressiveness can be a blessing or a curse. If it is not tempered by wisdom, it will lead to recklessness. And that can have unfortunate consequences. Be my wolfhound, but don’t be a rabid one.”
A cold sweat broke out on Petrov’s brow as he realized he had become rabid during the heat of the hunt. He’d lost control and let emotion replace reason. The loss of sixteen men, and perhaps as many as two hundred, weighed heavily on Petrov’s conscience. And there in the dark, cold and alone, Petrov wept.
~ * ~
10
EXIT
While the storm raged above them, Seawolf crept westward at the stately speed of four knots. With the bow ripped apart, they really couldn’t go faster without something loose banging away. If they were going to leave quietly, this was the best they could do. Unfortunately, at this rate it would take them nearly five days just to get out of the Barents Sea. It was going to be a very long trip to Faslane.
Anxious to reestablish a routine underway schedule, Shimko encouraged his department heads to gently push a sense of normalcy. Jerry wholeheartedly agreed with the XO’s plan, but he had reservations. Without the skipper, it wasn’t going to fly with the rest of the crew.
Like a symphony conductor, a commanding officer sets the tone and tempo for his command. A good one can meld the various personalities of his crew into a cohesive group that works together in harmony. Without proper direction, the well-meaning efforts of individuals can work at cross-purposes with each other, generating a fair number of sour notes.
Commander Thomas Rudel was a master conductor. He had shaped the crew of Seawolf into such a well-oiled machine that they believed there was nothing they couldn’t do. He was the quiet motivating force behind the scenes. Without his direct personal involvement, it would be nearly impossible to reestablish anything close to normal on board the boat.
Jerry usually ate dinner at the first sitting, along with the rest of the senior officers. It wasn’t so much a class prerogative as a chance for Seawolf’s leadership to sit down together. It was amazing how hard it could be to find time for a simple meeting on such a small vessel.
He had heard the supply officer tell the cooks to put on a really good dinner. Constantino knew how important food was to the crew’s morale, and he was playing that card for all it was worth. Besides, Seawolf would be going into the yards as soon as they returned home. Anything they didn’t eat would have to be offloaded. Knowing it was a way they could help, the cooks had worked flat-out, creating a meal that was memorable without being celebratory: fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, greens, fresh biscuits, and three kinds of pie for dessert, including Dutch apple pie, the skipper’s favorite.
But Captain Rudel wasn’t there. The XO sat in his place, and diverted any questions about the captain by asking his own questions—about the crew or the boat. After a few exchanges of question and counterquestion, they figured out that Shimko wasn’t going to budge. The officers shifted their thoughts toward sharing their experiences during the collision. Stories almost bubbled out of the diners, but the discussion quickly turned to the most important topic: the Russian’s identity and purpose.
Shimko didn’t have to tell the others about Senior Chief Carpenter’s information. It’s very hard to keep a secret on a submarine, and the identity of the Russian attack sub had spread like wildfire throughout the crew. Seawolf’s own sonar techs had come to the same conclusion on the sub’s identity. It was a Russian nuclear attack boat, but one that didn’t match anything in the database—Q.E.D. Severodvinsk. The name Severodvinsk now echoed off the bulkheads in discussions all over Seawolf, as if it were some mystical creature.
“But what was he doing?” Greg Wolfe was the third to ask the question, but nobody had an answer. Lieutenant Commander Stan Lavoie described the Russian’s movements, and the XO confirmed his account. Lieutenant (j.g.) McClelland told the others what the sonar gang knew about the Russian’s sonar lashing, and there was general consensus that the Russian was “certifiable.”
But the Russians didn’t put lunatics in command of nuclear submarines. He’d certainly disrupted their survey. “Could he have been trying to ram the UUV?” asked Wolfe.
Shimko quickly shook his head, chewing. He swallowed and said, “His aim couldn’t have been that bad. His mine-hunting sonar would see it. That’s a precision set, accurate to within a couple of yards. He was a lot closer to us than to LaVerne.”
Everyone at the table agreed that the Russian had “conclusively won” the encounter by disrupting their survey. “But he disrupted our operations the instant he announced his presence,” Jerry said. “He didn’t need to run circles around us.”
“Is that what you call it?” Lavoie grumbled.” ‘Announcing his presence,’ he says. Might as well have used a torpedo.”
“He was trying to herd us,” Constantino observed. “He cut across our path as we headed northwest.”
“That was on his third run,” Jerry countered. “On the first two, he passed down our port side, west of us. Was he telling us to sail east, toward the Russian coast?” Even as he said it, Jerry knew that was wrong. Russia was a hundred-plus miles away. Way too far.
“Was he herding us away from something else, then?” Wolfe asked.
“What’s out here?” Constantino asked. But they all knew the answer. Nothing but them.
“The UUV. He was trying to herd us away from LaVerne,” Wolfe said.
“So he could capture it?” Lavoie asked. “We had it under control the whole time. We could have kept it away from him.”
“He didn’t know that,” Jerry realized. “He must have assumed we had a wire to it. Break the wire, and it goes dead. Then he sits on it until someone arrives to salvage it.”
“And the Russians have an intelligence coup,” Shimko concluded. “It might have worked, if LaVerne had a tether.” He looked around the table. “Anybody see any holes in his theory?”
Jerry couldn’t. The Russian captain didn’t know that LaVerne was controlled by an acoustic modem. It explained a lot, and Jerry kicked himself mentally. He should have thought of that. It would have been simple to deceive them . . .
It was Will Hayes who finally asked the one question that had eluded everyone. “What about the Russian? What do you think happened to him?”
Jerry’s first thought was reflexive: He didn’t want to know about him, and he didn’t want to think about him. But the question demanded an answer. He’d been damaged, certainly, but Russian subs were double-hulled, with internal compartmentalization that U.S. boats lacked. Their design philosophy had a significant emphasis on survivability, while U.S. designers focused predominantly on stealth. All other things being equal, the Russian sub was probably in better shape than they were.
“He wasn’t waiting for us when we submerged,” Lavoie reported. “If he headed south, toward home, while we were headed west, then we’ll never see him again.”
