My Navy Adventure: The Roll
Richard Alexander
In early 1985, in March, I think, the USS Yellowstone, AD-41,
completed her refurbishment in the Portsmouth, Virginia, drydock. Ever
since I had reported aboard her, she had been in drydock. Now, she was
finally going back to her element.
All enlisted men, E-3 and below, are routinely assigned a month or so
of mess deck duty soon after they first report aboard their new
command. Most of the temporary mess cooks on my ship were sent to the
main decks, where the crew ate their meals. Fireman Ferguson was sent
to the Officer's Decks. I was sent to the Chief's Mess Decks. Thus, I
was working in the upper decks of the ship, up in Chief's Country,
when my ship finally returned to the sea from drydock.
My 2nd Class mess deck supervisor had been increasingly critical of my
work in Chief's Country. That morning when my ship set sail across the
Chesapeake Bay, he was expressing his dissatisfaction as I followed
him around the port side chief's compartments. My job was to clean the
port side head, straighten out the laundry room and perform limited
duties in the chief's berthing compartment. Another mess deck worker
was with us as the 2nd Class began his inspection in the head. We 3
were walking from the chief's portside head (that I had cleaned) to
the chief's portside compartments (that I serviced) when the roll
began.
We had just entered the locker area. I didn't think much about the
deck gradually gaining an incline to my left. I thought the other two
guys were goofing around when they shuffled backwards into the lockers
against the bulkhead. They laughed briefly in mild amusement. I
resisted the growing incline, climbing up the sloping deck, eventually
grasping the fan room hatchstop on the portside bulkhead. I hung on
tightly as the deck angled ever higher. I heard one of the guys, the
2nd class, I think, exclaim, "His feet aren't touching the deck!" I
looked down, and could see about an inch or maybe 3 inches of space
between the deck and the back of the heel of my boondockers. The 2nd
class and E-3 were lying with their backs against the lockers and the
soles of their feet on the deck. If I had let go of the hook, I would
have dropped right on top of the 2nd class. Don't think I wasn't
tempted.
I hung there, watching my feet to see how far they would get from the
deck--but, they separated no farther. I was too ignorant to know that
I was actually in grave danger. I thought it was fun! The rate of
inclined had slowed to a stop, and for several seconds, I hung,
watching to see what would happen. Then, to my regret, the incline
gradually subsided. When we could, the 3 of us walked into the Chief's
Mess Deck. The ship was running on emergency power and was mostly
darkened from the loss of the main overhead lights.
Soon after gaining a level deck, the ship's intercom announced, "Stand
by for heavy rolls." There then followed a rapid series of medical
emergency announcements for locations throughout the ship. One man in
the starboard material handling passageway, behind the Chief's galley,
had been on a folding ladder, with his feet about 6 feet in the air,
replacing lights when the roll took him off the ladder. I think he was
seriously injured by his fall. Two of my mates (who were supposed to
have been cleaning the mess decks) had been loafing on the boat deck
when the roll came; they said that if there hadn't been a cargo net on
the side of the ship, they would have been swept overboard. One of the
two often spoke of his legs hanging out over the side of the ship, his
feet nearly skimming the water. Several days after the incident, as I
was in the Chief's Mess, I listened to a chief who was wearing a neck
brace, explain that he was higher than a kite, due to the pain killers
the doctor had him taking due to his broken neck.
Several crew members (maybe 5, maybe 7, maybe 13; I can't remember the
number) had to be medivacted by helicopter off the ship. One man died;
I think it was the man whose intestines had ruptured out of his body
when he was crushed. Another man had a leg bone sticking through his
skin. I don't recall anyone from my division, Engine Room, being
injured, though MM3 Skillman often mentioned that he had been hanging
spread eagled in the escape hatch when a portable lantern came loose
and fell directly towards his crotch. Some of the large, 36-inch
lathes down in the machine shop had broken from their deck welds,
sending at least one man running to get out of their way. I think the
guy who died had been struck by a lathe.
None of us in the Chief's Country were hurt. One of my coworkers,
Seaman Hawkins, had been washing dishes, so, when the roll came, he
was dodging ceramic plates. The mess decks were really a mess. I
remember particularly the coffee pots having been strewn and
shattered.
The crew was informed that the ship came within a few degrees of her
main cranes falling off, which presumably would happen before she
capsized. Of course, she was only a few degrees from capsizing, too.
The Captain announced over the 1MC that there was no truth to the
rumor that the cranes had explosive bolts. He emphasized that the
cranes had only break-away bolts, that would not have detonated.
Someone informed the crew that none of us were allowed to talk to the
press about what had happened. Some people did, but the report that
came out in the newspaper (Virginia Ledger-Star) still managed to get
some facts wrong. I don't have a copy of the newspaper report with me
now, but I remember 2 of the errors being the claim that the boilers
had not gone offline (the boilers certainly did go offline) and the
claim that the ship only righted itself when the helmsman regained
control of the ship. The newspaper had a picture of the "Yellowstone"
in the Chesapeake Bay included in the article.
There was also a rumor that the Throttleman had saved the ship by
shutting the throttles. This rumor was flatly denied by the LPO, MM1
Gibson. Gibson had been sitting at the usual command station, over by
the Engineering phone booth, directly behind the throttleman. When the
roll began, Gibson had smiled, because he thought he knew what was
happening. He didn't smile very long, according to MM3 Stout. The
throttleman, himself, went slidding across the deck, finally stopping
over by the Ship's Service Turbo Generators, with his sound-powered
headphone cable extended its full 15-foot length. It was impossible
for anyone to reach the throttles during the roll.
The explanation for the roll that eventually reached Engineering is
that our ship, lightly loaded with minimal fuel and no cargo as it was
fresh out of drydock, had been engaged in a high-speed (for the
Yellowstone) run in choppy water with brisk wind when the Captain
ordered a hard port turn. The helmsman had hesitated, asking the
Captain, "Are you sure?" The Captain said, "Don't argue with me; make
the turn!" When the helmsman complied, the wind caught the side of the
ship, flipping the ship up like a sail in high wind. Everyone on the
bridge slid to the starboard bulkhead, where they could not reach the
ship's controls. No one had expected the roll to be nearly what it
was. It appeared that the only reason the Yellowstone did not capsize
is the force of the water passing over the side (now the top) of the
rudder held the ship at the critical angle, and her boilers went
offline, reducing her speed as the steam pressure bled off. No
personnel had any control over the ship during those seconds near the
maximum angle.
It is worth mentioning that the angle of the roll that the crew was
given was low. Engineering knew it was low, because one of the men in
Damage Control Central (DCC) looked at the tilt gauge during the roll;
it was over 50°, though I don't remember exactly how much over
(somewhere around 53°). I do know that I stood 75 inches tall
barefooted, and, with my arms raised over my head, I would stretch
about 90 inches. My boondockers (half-inch heel) did not touch the
deck as I hung from the fan room doorstop, meaning that my body would
have been part of an hypotenuse slightly longer than my body length. I
don't remember the height of the doorstop, but I believe it was about
4' 6". Some trigonometry (I joined the Navy as a Nuke; what can I
say?) gives me an approximate angle slightly greater than 53° (very
close to the value I recall from Engineering). In theory, the
Yellowstone was not supposed to be able to recover from a roll greater
than 53° or 55°. Someone (I think it was my LPO) pointed out that the
Navy would not accept my estimated value, because I could not be
certain that the floor in my area was perfectly level, and there was
no guarantee that the gauge in DCC was accurate (it hadn't been
calibrated in a long time). Even so, here were two angles that were
very close to each other, and significantly different than the
official 45° angle reported to the crew.
The Captain was eventually permitted to retire. I asked my Lead Petty
Officer what kind of job someone could possibly get after such an
incident, but the LPO didn't think that would be a problem. He was
sure that the Captain would get a job as a consultant for a shipyard,
where he would still make more money than any of us in the Engine
Room.
