“It’s incomplete, XO.”
“And it will be, unless the Russian’s deck log is in that pile somewhere,” remarked Shimko with a broad grin. Then more seriously, “Still, it will be very useful.”
He leaned closer, as if to examine the plot, and spoke softly. “I’m hoping it will convince the captain that the collision was not his fault.”
Jerry had to fight to control his reaction. The encounter had been hashed over last night, and he heard it rehashed in the control room this morning. Most of the crew thought they were lucky to be alive, and that Rudel had been the only thing keeping them from an icy, wet end.
When Jerry didn’t immediately reply, Shimko explained. “You know how much the Skipper cares about this crew and this boat. They’re a part of him. He’s hurting because
Jerry felt another pang of responsibility himself. In the back of his mind he’d been trying to see if he’d missed a chance to grasp the Russian’s purpose. It was hard to second-guess a “failure of the imagination,” but he kept thinking that he should have realized what was happening.
“I would like to show him, and anyone else, Jerry, that given the circumstances we were in, and the data we had on hand, Tom Rudel made the right calls.”
Shimko straightened up and Jerry saw that he didn’t look like he had slept much either. As if on cue, the XO stretched and stifled a deep yawn.
“Keep at it, Jerry. I need a logical, cogent analysis of the events leading up to the collision if I’m going to get through to the Skipper. Stay objective. I need an honest assessment based on facts, not sympathy. The Captain isn’t about to let us blow sunshine up his skirt.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll do my best.”
The XO nodded appreciatively. Then, reaching down and putting his hand on Jerry’s shoulder, he said, “A wise man once said, ‘The difficulties in life are intended to make us better, not bitter.’ Well, right now, our Captain is slowly gnawing away at his stomach lining based on a belief that he made a mistake. We need to show him, if we can, that it wasn’t his fault. We owe him that much, at least.”
By lunchtime, Jerry had a draft master plot with all the data mixed together. He looked at the plot he’d been working on for hours.
Even with the data he had, the likely errors in the information made it difficult to make the conclusive case the XO wanted. This wasn’t going to be enough to convince the captain. A gurgling sound from his stomach made it clear that the sticky bun he had early just wasn’t enough. Jerry needed a break, and he needed some more eyes on the problem.
He took the plot and a printout of his timeline to lunch and showed it to the rest of the wardroom. They passed the diagram around, chewing over the dry facts, reviewing the collision again. The most concrete data that had come out of Jerry’s work had been that their relative speed at the time of contact was eighteen knots, and that the angle between the two boats’ bows at impact was about sixty-four degrees. Useful but unsatisfying.
Jeff Palmer traced the UUV’s movements, looking for any relationship between them and the Russian. He didn’t see any, but he did find a problem. “This track isn’t right,” he told Jerry. “Our data show a lot more maneuvers.”
“The deck log shows all the commands we sent to LaVerne,” Jerry said, a little defensively.
“And they were all brilliantly executed,” Palmer agreed, “but she also maneuvered on her own. When the Russian showed up, all big and noisy and closing fast, her collision-avoidance routines kicked in. If the UUV senses a potential collision risk, it locates the offending unit and moves to open the range.”
“And she found out where the sub was. ” Jerry started.
“. by using her active sonar,” Palmer completed. “We can get range and bearing readouts for both
Jerry kicked himself. The UUV’s sonars were high-definition imaging sets, with wonderful resolution but very short range. They were not designed for general search, so he hadn’t thought of using La Verne’s sensor logs.
Jerry and Palmer stood up from their seats at almost the same moment. “It’ll take some time to print out the logs from LaVerne’s memory,” Palmer reminded him.
“Then I’ll work off the console until you have them,” Jerry answered. He left his lunch unfinished.
He reported to Shimko’s cabin three hours later, beaming, with Palmer in tow. “It was better than we thought, sir,” Jerry explained. “Not only did LaVerne track the Russian with her active sonar, but her imaging sonars also intercepted the Russian’s mine-hunting set. They overlapped frequency bands.”
Armed with this new data, Jerry had completely redrawn the plot. The fan of passive bearing lines with a range dot here and there was gone, and two dark lines ran across the paper. The black line,
Shimko took it eagerly, praising both of them. Then his face fell as he comprehended their maneuvers. “My God.” He paused and looked up at the two officers. “I’m assuming you’ve double-checked these tracks — scales, bearings. That I’m reading these distances correctly.”
Jerry quickly nodded. “Yes sir, the data from LaVerne is of better fidelity, but it closely matches our own. The distances are correct.”
On the first pass, the Russian had approached to 372 yards, not a lot compared to
“Wise man says ‘If dancing with crazy person, listen to crazy music.’ There’s no way we could have dodged this guy.” He stood up abruptly, rolling up the plot, and began marching toward the door. Jerry and Palmer stepped back so Shimko could walk into the passageway. “Let’s go brief the Skipper.”
The lights were on in the captain’s cabin this time, and Rudel was at his desk. He was pale, almost white, and his face was deeply lined. Jerry remembered a friend who looked that way after he’d broken an arm. He knew the captain hadn’t slept.
Shimko handed Rudel the plot. “Please, look at this, sir.”
The captain cleared a spot on his desk and laid the plot out carefully. All three officers watched as he studied the chart piece by piece. First the label and legend, then the supplementary tables, and then, finally, the tracks of the two submarines and the UUV.
“This is where I turned right to open the range on the first pass?” Rudel pointed to a mark on
“Yes, sir,” Jerry answered.
“And this is the second turn,” Rudel observed, but this time he said it as a statement, not a question. He picked up a straightedge and laid it along
He moved the straightedge. “The second time it would have been”—he checked the scale—”less than a hundred yards.”
“It reminds me of when I visited Naples. The Italians all drove like that.” Jerry regretted the joke as soon as he’d said it, but even Rudel laughed.
“Maybe the Russians have been studying Italian submarine tactics,” Rudel observed. Jerry knew Rudel had a good sense of humor. It was one of the reasons, and one of the ways, he’d connected so well with his crew.
Rudel looked at the three officers, then slowly paced in the small space allowed to a sub’s commanding officer.
