T&T: "landlubbers"??

[Rich Gano]

One of my main jobs as a bridge watch officer was to monitor the helmsman.
With the exception of special sea details such as underway replenishment and
entering and leaving port, the regular underway helmsmen (no women afloat in
my Navy) were drawn from the most junior and inexperienced seamen of the
deck force.  Upon leaving home waters for foreign deployment, our watch
sections were flooded with newly reported junior folks.

My modus operandi was to closely watch each helmsman as the boatswains tried
to train them during the first few days underway, especially in daylight,
when I could go out on the bridge wing to watch the wake.  After a
reasonable amount of time under instruction, when he thought he was getting
the hang of things, I'd go in and take the helm and send the helmsman out to
the wing to look at his snake wake.  Then I'd call him in and give him my
own thoughts on steering, especially about feeling the roll of the ship
through your feet and how to use that information in anticipating the ship's
change of heading.  I'd talk and steer for a while and them send him out to
look at the now arrow-like wake stretching over the horizon.  When he came
back in I'd tell him that as an officer I got a whole lot less practice
steering the ship than he did and that by the end of the week he certainly
should be able to beat my poor steering.  It never took long to get a man to
steer a course well.

Anybody who wished to do so could go on to qualify for special detail
helmsman in a few months during a deployment when all the various conditions
were experienced on a regular basis.

Speaking of reverse reading compasses being confusing reminds me of the time
I was conning alongside an ammo ship and our gyro went out.  Those who have
heard this before can stop reading now.  At one point, the special detail
helmsman screwed himself up into a knot over the shift to the magnetic
compass (not reverse reading BTW, but he convinced himself it was) and
basically got vertigo trying to come to course by shifting the rudder ever
farther in the wrong direction!

The initial gyro casualty had caused us to end up at twice the normal
120-foot separation (still barely connected by wire high lines fore and
aft), and now that I had ordered the helm to steer by magnetic and lost the
gyro, I was on the engaged (port) bridge wing with no heading reference
since my pelorus was a gyro repeater, not a magnetic compass repeater.
Using rudder commands and what looked like good headings and appropriate
changes in distance between ships, as indicated by the flagged line held by
two men on the deck forward below me, I gave "steady as she goes" commands,
telling the helmsman to steer the magnetic course under the pin at the
instant I spoke.  I couldn't see the compass, but I could get him under
control using this method while watching the action from the best vantage
point on the wing.  The C.O. was now inside the bridge trying to get the
information from the chief engineer about the gyro.

This is when the helmsman had a brain f__t and went the wrong way.  We had
been closing back to 120 feet between ships from 200 feet, and I was giving
engine orders to speed us up a few turns to catch back up with our proper
position alongside the ammo ship.  Next thing I knew we were at 120 feet and
closing with a standard rudder (15 degrees) TOWARD the ammo ship.  Holy
crap!  That's like crossing the median on a freeway in heavy traffic - DOOM
in slow motion.

As my career flashed across my mind the words "RIGHT HARD RUDDER" almost
involuntarily erupted from me, and I didn't need the speaking tube either!
An otherwise busy bridge went completely SILENT as if a gunshot had gone
off, but the rudder indicator swiftly went where ordered.  The captain
materialized in front of me looking down and aft, as I watched the bows of
the two ships close.  He simply said, "Careful of your stern," and did not
take the conn.  But I couldn't bring myself to look aft knowing I was
trading time and distance between sterns for degrees turned to starboard as
the bows got even closer.  Had I looked aft, the rapidly closing sterns
might have scared me into a premature rudder command to straighten us out;
besides the skipper was looking that way - it was gonna be his job to watch
the smashup.  Neither one of us ever looked the opposite direction.

Guessing now as the bows LOOKED parallel with water shooting clear above the
bridge levels between the two impossibly close ships (lots of yelling and
emergency blasts on steam whistles too - all shut out for processing of
survival responses), I ordered LEFT standard rudder to check the swing of
the ship, and the skipper silently nods OK.  In rapid succession, I now
ordered rudder amidships, but skipper shakes head NO thinking that it's
maybe too soon; Left 5 degrees rudder, I respond - shakes his head YES.
Then rudder amidships - nod YES.  Now hopefully, RIGHT 2 degrees rudder -
another nod.  Right 5 degrees; is the bow opening with no accompanying crash
from aft - YES.

I am told that we got within three feet of the ammo ship and that the loads
of ammo when cut free of the high lines landed on the other ship's deck.  I
couldn't tell you because I never looked aft - way too scary.  In later
years at reunions of the USS Henry B. Wilson (DDG 7), the C.O. gave me
credit for saving his career, but I'd have to credit him in return because
it was a two-man job to steer that day.

Oh well, back to the boatyard to tend to the wounds of age in the old
CALYPSO.

Rich Gano
CALYPSO (GB-42 #295)
Southport, FL