helicopterjim R.I.P. Posted April 3, 2005 Share Posted April 3, 2005 I first heard about this about 12 years ago but it was about a Canadian light house on the east coast of Canada and the ship was the USS Mississippi, a WW2 battleship! I really don't know if there is any truth to the story but it sure is fun! Your Call Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
al_roethlisberger Posted April 3, 2005 Share Posted April 3, 2005 Yeah, always good for a laugh, however... http://www.snopes.com/military/lighthse.htm As you note, probably just a tall tale Although I do like the version you link to quite a bit But speaking about Canadian lighthouses, and warships... this comes to mind http://www.satirewire.com/news/feb02/warship.shtml Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
callison Posted April 3, 2005 Share Posted April 3, 2005 Nothing's perfect. I remember the sonar techs reporting a bearing contact with a speed of 12 knots only to have the bridge reply back that they were tracking an island. I had the Electronics Warfare watch during an exercise with a submarine. Hot shot operator that I was, I was well prepared when the sub popped up their radar antenna, made 3 short sweeps and yanked it down again. But I caught it, got a bearing and made the report to the bridge. We took off flank speed in pursuit of the contact. Little did we know, the yard at Pearl Harbor had installed the synchos on our surveillance antennas 180 degrees out and we were making flank speed directly away from the submarine. The sub captain must have had quite a laugh... There are no shortages of these types of sea stories. The worrisome thing is - a lot of them are true. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
helicopterjim R.I.P. Posted April 3, 2005 Author Share Posted April 3, 2005 I knew it was a a hoax because a friend of mine whose father is stationed at one of the few manned lighthouses left said that they wouldn't be giving any course directives on the radio anyway. When I was flying in the arctic the radar there (up to 1985) was so archaic it could not handle anything under 100 knots airspeed. my helicopter would either show up as supersonic or not at all. There was once a major scramble to intercept some unknown bogies that turned out to be a flock of snow geese. The present radar however pinpoints aircraft to within metres! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve G. Posted April 3, 2005 Share Posted April 3, 2005 The sheer arogance of the American military unfortunately is unmatched by the sheer lack of mechanized power of the Canadian military. Amazing what happens when you let a communist run a free entrerprise country. To think we had the second biggest navy after WW2. I'm embarrased. Ciao, Steve G. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
callison Posted April 3, 2005 Share Posted April 3, 2005 The sheer arogance of the American military unfortunately is unmatched Ciao, Steve G. Arrogant as we are, there are others that are worse. However, the typical US military person is not generally inclined to start wars and such. The US Congress and/or President however, are perfectly willing to engage in wars for reasons that do not always make good sense. We're not alone there either, but the US is very conspicuous because of our size and history. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Martin Barrett Posted April 3, 2005 Share Posted April 3, 2005 Whilst having a pop at the Canadian Navy. Remember that The British sold them four surplus Diesal Electric Subs. The deal was running 3 years behind schedule when last October on its maiden trip back to Canada one caught fire and a crewman died. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/3722902.stm I had a brief spell in the RAF. I wouldn't have wanted to crew a warship or even worse a submarine. Military capablity a neccessary evil. Dependant on confident young people , rather simular to motorcycling. No body can match the US for military power. But there are very few who are trying to be a global super power these days. We British are in a quandary and can't quite accept our current global possition. We've gone from Imperial super power. Through USS Great Britian a permanant stationed aircraft carrier off the coast of Europe with a cold war role of protect the Greenland-Iceland-UK Gap. to wannabe world Police (what have we learned in the last 80 years in Ireland). Every Strategic Defence Review cuts our forces and narrows our role and then we commit our troups to more and more out of area actions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
al_roethlisberger Posted April 3, 2005 Share Posted April 3, 2005 Nothing's perfect. I remember the sonar techs reporting a bearing contact with a speed of 12 knots only to have the bridge reply back that they were tracking an island. I had the Electronics Warfare watch during an exercise with a submarine. Hot shot operator that I was, I was well prepared when the sub popped up their radar antenna, made 3 short sweeps and yanked it down again. But I caught it, got a bearing and made the report to the bridge. We took off flank speed in pursuit of the contact. Little did we know, the yard at Pearl Harbor had installed the synchos on our surveillance antennas 180 degrees out and we were making flank speed directly away from the submarine. The sub captain must have had quite a laugh... There are no shortages of these types of sea stories. The worrisome thing is - a lot of them are true. 47662[/snapback] I tell ya, this one is the one that amazed me. I can't believe the sub didn't sink after sailing into a MOUNTAIN at cruising speed, and that more weren't killed. I guess it is a testament to the durabilityof some of these multi-million(billion?) $$ machines. http://www.rednova.com/news/display/?id=120053 http://www.anomalynews.com/phorum/read.php?f=1&i=256&t=256 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichMaund Posted April 3, 2005 Share Posted April 3, 2005 I spent five years on the 689 boat, one it's sister ships. Tough and fast boats. They used to send two of us up from the engineroom from time to time to "plot dots" in Control as a manual back up to the computerized sonar and fire control system. (Dam sonar techs spent most of their time reading Westerns! ) We used old manual equipment left over from WWII. We'd diligently plot a contacts course and tell the Officer of the deck when we detected a change in it's bearing. He'd answer with a curt "Very well." A few MINUTES later sonar would report that THEY'D detected a change the contacts bearing and the damned Officer would tell them what a great job they were doing. I think they got medals for it too! Us engineroom types were never very welcome in the Control room. <_ i think we made the nose-coners look bad. src="%7B___base_url___%7D/uploads/emoticons/default_bier.gif" alt=":bier:"> The 689 Boat had a bad collision in the early 90's some years after I had left its crew. My old Engineer was it's Captain. Boat came home under it's own power, but was decommissioned not long after that. The Navy has an old saying.... "A collision at sea can wreck your day." The Russian sub they hit has been docked ever since too. That photo brings back alot of bad cold war memories! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stormsedge Posted April 4, 2005 Share Posted April 4, 2005 Yes, trading paint is almost mever a gppd thing. Amazing how we manage to get soooo close sometimes with all that water! k Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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