Our friend, MaryAnne was an officer in the US Navy stationed here in Muskegon, and she wanted us to see the great Naval Museum here and the very well preserved USS SILVERSIDES.
The USS SILVERSIDES was commissioned on December 15, 1941, eight days after the attack on Pearl Harbor. The ship left for the first of her 14 war patrols on April 30, 1942. SILVERSIDES served with the Pacific Fleet along the coast of Japan, the East China Sea and key enemy shipping routes around the Marianas, Carolinas, Bismark Archipelago, and along the Solomon Island to Guadalcanal. SILVERSIDES sank 23 ships and damaged 14 ships. She ranks third highest among all World War II U.S. submarines in ships sunk, totaling 90,080 tons.
This is the front steering cockpit. There is a second pilot station for vertical motion, and yet a third for the rear of the ship. In a sub you have a similar complex piloting situation as in an airplane, in that you move in 3 dimensions as well as being able to pitch (e.g nose-up, -down), yaw (nose-right, -left like a skid), and roll (clockwise, counter-clockwise) along the longitudinal axis. On top of this complexity you do not have windows to see what you are doing, so the sub pilot is basically doing the equivalent of flying on instruments alone.
This view is from the front cockpit rearwards. Notice the handrail on the left.
These are the front four torpedo tubes. There are sleeping cots all around these and the stored torpedoes in the torpedo room since the sub had a crew of over 75
No comments:
Post a Comment