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War Career of the USS Seal

 
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War Career of the USS Seal - 6/20/2010 6:54:51 AM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		Prologue:

On 17 Oct 1942 in simulation time, a digital submarine under computer control hit a digital mine near the simulated Japanese controlled port of Pusan. This was no great setback, for this Salmon-class submarine was worth only 8 victory points for the AI compared with the tens of thousands each side would accumulate over the course of the simulation. I did not know whether the submarine had reacted into a minefield or the AI had assigned it a patrol area that intersected one. In my game journal (this was my first campaign game against any opponent, and I expected that there would be many lessons learned) I recorded simply “Allied SS hits a mine at Pusan (Seal).” And that would have been the extent of the recorded war career of the Seal had my daughter not been sitting next to me waiting for the turn to end [so that I could save the game and start up Hearoes of Might and Magic IV (we had a collaborative team game going – HOMM4 is more to her liking than WITPAE).]

“The Seal’s hit a mine and I’m probably going to lose it” I remarked.
“Was it a harp seal?”
“Uhhh…”
“Was it a baby harp seal?”
Suddenly my daughter had an interest in a very small part of my epic struggle against the Japanese. And so here is the war history of my USS Seal, collected from my notes and the saved combat reports, interleaved with the real history of this ship and my imagination.





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War Career of the USS Seal - 6/21/2010 1:46:02 AM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		The USS Seal (SS-183) was the second ship of the United States Navy to be named for the seal. Her keel was laid down on 25 May 1936 by the Electric Boat Company in Groton, Connecticut. She was launched on 25 April 1937 at the Naval Submarine Base, New London and commissioned on 30 April 1937. Lieutenant Karl G. Hensel was her commissioning commanding officer.
The USS Seal (SS-183) was the second ship of the United States Navy to be named for the seal. Her keel was laid down on 25 May 1936 by the Electric Boat Company in Groton, Connecticut. She was launched on 25 April 1937 at the Naval Submarine Base, New London and commissioned on 30 April 1937. Lieutenant Karl G. Hensel was her commissioning commanding officer.

Following an extended shakedown cruise in the Caribbean Sea and a post-shakedown yard period, Seal departed New England in late November and proceeded to the Panama Canal Zone to commence operations out of her home port, Coco Solo. Arriving on 3 December, she conducted local operations off Balboa, Panama, and off Coco Solo into January 1939, then proceeded to Haiti where she participated in type exercises prior to Fleet Problem XX. That exercise, to test the fleet's ability to control the approaches to Central America and South America, was conducted during late February in the Lesser Antilles.

In March, Seal returned to the Haiti–Cuba area for exercises with Destroyer Division 4 (DesDiv 4). In April, she proceeded to New London, Connecticut, for overhaul which included modification of her main engines. In June, the submarine again sailed south, transited the Panama Canal, and continued on to San Diego, California, and Pearl Harbor. In Hawaii from July to September, she took soundings for the Hydrographic Office and participated in various local exercises. At the end of the latter month, she returned to San Diego, her home port into 1941.

During the next two years, she conducted exercises and provided services to surface ships and to United States Navy and United States Army air units along the West Coast and in the Hawaiian area. In the fall of 1941, Submarine Division 21 (SubDiv 21) - of which she was now a part - was transferred to the Asiatic Fleet. Departing Pearl Harbor on 24 October, she reached Manila on 10 November.





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War Career of the USS Seal - 6/21/2010 2:03:32 AM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		The Seal started the war tied up to the pier in Manila Bay. Her first war patrol assignment was the West Batan gap. Although not yet tested in combat, the Seal’s crew could not accurately be called “green”. LCDR Hurd and his wardroom had been well aware that war with Japan was a possibility. The crew has used the ship’s limited peacetime allocation of diesel fuel to practice approaches on the occasional merchant or warship plying the local waters, and had fine tuned such survival skills as crash diving and finding and hiding below the thermal layer. The Seal and her crew were ready for war even if the rest of the nation was not.

The Seal’s first contact with the enemy came quickly: three days after the Pearl Harbor attack she fired a torpedo spread at xAK Yamagiku Maru near Cagayan (82,69) but either missed or hit with faulty torpedoes. The next day she attacked xAK Lima Maru near Hengchun (83,67) with the same disappointing results. LCDR’s began to suspect something was wrong. Even the newest graduate of the submarine school at New London could hit a slow, fat merchant with straight-running torpedoes: just match the speed across the line of sight and fire. His first message back to the Asiatic Fleet command was terse: “EXPENDED TWELVE TORPEDOES WITHOUT EFFECT. SUSPECT FAULTY WARSHOT.”

The next opportunity to strike back at Japan came in the same waters on 12/16; the Seal attacked the lone xAKL Korei Maru on the surface scoring 11 shell hits without taking any damage in return. A shortage of deck gun ammo forced LCDR K. C. Hurd to break off the attack. Although the Korei Maru made it back to port, her cargo was damaged (three vehicles disabled).

News began to pour in and almost all of it was bad. Two battleships sunk in the Pearl Harbor sneak attack and several others badly damaged. Guam, Hong Kong had fallen to the Japanese and land based aircraft had put a torpedo into the Repulse and sunk several smaller warships. I-boats in the Java sea were wreaking even more havoc. But morale was boosted by the news that a US CV task force had surprised the invasion force landing at Wake island forcing the Japanese to abort the invasion attempt.

Five days later the Seal became a target of the IJN when the PB Shonan Maru #2 sighted the Seal on the surface, but was unable to attack before the Seal submerged and slipped away.

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RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/22/2010 12:08:39 AM   
CarnageINC


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Status: offline 		AH, a sub story, cool

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War Career of the USS Seal - 6/22/2010 1:48:38 AM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		The Seal returned to Manila Bay to find that her tender was gone. The Canopus had been bombed at the pier, and although still afloat, was too badly damaged (Sys 41, Flt 10, Eng 15) to service her squadron. The Canopus had limped out of port on 12/12 and was headed to Soerabaja for repairs. Salvageable equipment had been transferred to a pier designated as a temporary submarine depot station.

As the Seal put to sea for another patrol, the Japanese continued to overrun the allies in almost every theater. Rabaul was occupied on 12/21, Ocean island was captured three days later, and rapid Japanese expansion into the Philippines and Dutch East Indies was only being slowed by a vigorous defense mounted by Adm Hart’s small fleet. Even that resistance was swatted aside when the Japanese carriers entered the theater and began raiding both air stations and the merchant traffic still moving in the area. In a battle dubbed “The Carnage of the Java Sea”, nearly 60 ships were sunk by the combined efforts of Japanese carrier aircraft, land based bombers, and submarines over a two week period as they attempted to flee to the relative safety of Australia and India. But this concentration of force was successfully exploited when it became apparent that most if not all of the Japanese carrier force was in the Java Sea and US carriers broke up an invasion attempt of Canton Island with heavy losses to the invasion fleet.

On 1/7/42 the Seal made contact with an enemy convoy only to be detected at the last minute by an alert convoy escort. Skillful maneuvering below the layer prevented a counterattack by the escorts.

On 1/29/42 the Seal received a message rebasing her out of Soerabaja. Clark field had been captured and control of the air in the Philippine Islands had been lost. After holding their own for almost two months, the pilots at Singapore had finally been overwhelmed by land based air flying from newly captured bases on Borneo.

Hunting was poor for the rest of January but on the first day of February 1942, the Seal lined up on a heavily escorted convoy that included an AK, xAP, and two destroyers. Perhaps already alerted to the presence of a submarine in the area, the Hatakaze detected the Seal’s periscope before LCDR Hurd could reach a firing position; both the Hatakaze and Natsushio began combing the waters in preparation for a depth charge attack. The Seal dove deep and managed to elude a long determined search by zigzagging away below the thermal layer.

Frustrated with the lack of contacts after additional weeks of searching, the Seal pulled in to Soerabaja for refueling. The crew learned that the Lexington had been torpedoed by a submarine while supporting a convoy reinforcing Port Moresby to counter the growing Japanese strength on New Britain. Manila had been lost on 2/3/43, and Singapore had fallen the very next day. The remnants of the British navy in the Pacific had retreated to Australian ports.

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RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/22/2010 3:55:56 AM   
thegreatwent


Posts: 3011
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From: Denver, CO
Status: offline 		Enjoying the tale so far.

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War Career of the USS Seal - 6/22/2010 4:53:16 AM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		COMSUBPAC shifted the Seal’s patrol area to the waters off Kangean (60,105) to interdict an expected invasion force headed to Java. The Seal failed to intercept this task force or any other, until detected herself by an enemy ASW patrol of three destroyers. Although hunted for hours by DDs Kagero, Arashi, and Amatsukaze, the Seal managed to escape without taking any damage.

Then in the third week of March, the Seal lined up on a convoy and fired 4 torpedoes at xAKL Jouban Maru from a near-perfect firing position. As the seconds ticked by, the crew waited for evidence that their torpedoes had hit home. But the only new sound was the pinging of SC CHa-27’s sonar growing stronger as it became apparent that the torpedo spread had only alerted the convoy to the presence of an enemy submarine. LCDR Hurd took the Seal deep and the crew spent the next hour twisting and turning to avoid counterattack. LCDR Hurd’s next message included COMSUBPAC as an info addressee: “TORPEDOES USED IN ATTACKS AGAINST THREE CONVOYS HAVE FAILED TO DETONATE PLEASE ADVISE”. COMSUBPAC’s response was less than helpful – when the Seal returned to Soerabaja for refueling an inspection team was waiting … to evaluate the torpedo gang’s torpedo maintenance procedures! Other than a few administrative omissions (some of the torpedo record books were missing required entries) no deficiencies were noted and the team left without making any recommendations.

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RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/22/2010 5:03:13 AM   
aprezto


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Status: offline 		Just imagine the real life commanders frustrations.

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RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/22/2010 6:05:40 PM   
cantona2


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From: Gibraltar
Status: offline 		Tuned in as well

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War Career of the USS Seal - 6/23/2010 1:58:14 AM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		Hampered by growing enemy air patrols, the Seal was unable to close on a convoy for weeks. The long time at sea was taking a toll on equipment; the port visits were hurried affairs due to the continued weakening allied air power in the area. While at Soerabaja, daily air raids necessitated diving during the day and precluded repairs to her engines, which smoked excessively, and to a broken prism control mechanism in her high periscope.

Soerabaja fell to the Japanese on 4/8/42 and the Seal was transferred to Darwin where a Dutch refugee, the AS Zuiderkruz, had been stationed and hastily converted to handle US submarine ordnance. The increased transit distance hampered her effectiveness and unlike the Dutch East Indies, Australia was chronically short of fuel.

The urgency of emergency war preparations increased as the enemy began closing in on Australia. Two Japanese carriers had been released from the Java Sea to pound Noumea and then Suva, and the Japanese were advancing on Port Moresby both by land and sea. Two Japanese battleships pounded Port Moresby on the night of 4/10 and would have slaughtered a relief convoy about to arrive there had a small allied cruiser group been encountered first. The CA Minneapolis was crushed in hail of 16” and 14” shells but the battleships withdrew after this action. This bombardment was a prelude to a 4/15 amphibious invasion, but the Japanese had underestimated the allied forces that had been moved there and shore gunfire savaged the attacking transports.

In Burma, the British and Indian armies were driven all the way back to Chittagong and Calcutta was being reinforced in anticipation of having to make a final stand there.

On 4/28/92, the Seal was detected near Tanahdjampea by the PB Eifuku Maru and hunted for hours by an opponent that seemed to be able to follow her every twist and turn. Only after the quartermaster announced that dusk had arrived did LCDR Hurd finally evade the patrol boat. The submarine surfaced after midnight and "a healthy stream of air bubbles" was discovered "issuing from the starboard side....". The leaking fitting was tightened up and the submarine resumed hunting.

Just before dawn on the day following the encounter with the Eifuku Maru, LCDR Hurd was presented with the opportunity of a career. The sub dove upon an alert lookout’s spotting of hull on the horizon and continued on her course at periscope depth. In the growing light LCDR Hurd could make out the square deck edge of air aircraft carrier. As chance would have it, the angle on the bow was small and the Seal needed only to wait for the enemy warship to close the distance.

As the contact grew in the scope, it became clear that the CV was too small to be one of the six butchers of Pearl Harbor (it was the CVL Ryujo) but here was a target worth more to the allied war effort than every other enemy ship that had been viewed through the Seal’s scope combined. The CVL was moving fast compared with a merchant and it would be a tough shot since the Seal couldn’t move quickly enough to fire from broader on the ship’s beam. But the Seal’s luck held when the CVL maneuvered to present a broader angle on the other bow. Whether this was to launch a dawn air patrol, a course change to the intended destination, or just a “zig” to throw off a potential sub’s aim was not known. Quickly the control room team computed a new firing solution in response to LCDR Hurd’s excited masthead height and angle-on-the-bow calls and the Seal prepared to launch a salvo.

The minutes ticked by as the range continued to close. Firing too soon could result in a miss if the crew had underestimated the carrier’s range, a real possibility since the masthead height used in the range calculation was only an estimate. Wait too long and the target might zig again. When the torpedo run time on the analyzer reached three minutes LCDR Hurd ordered “Final bearing and shoot” and four Mk-14’s were launched at the CVL.

LCDR Hurd resisted the temptation to watch the rest of the attack through the scope. An alert lookout might detect the periscope feather, or a glint of the dawn sunlight off the scope’s optics. As the stopwatch advanced the three minutes, the crew eagerly awaited audible evidence that their ship had struck a serious blow against the IJN. Instead there was … nothing. Suspecting that the CVL had turned at the last minute LCDR Hurd raised the scope, but the target still steaming down the same track. With the opportunity lost, LCDR Hurd took the Seal deep and began to clear datum. The torpedo wakes must have been sighted, because the DD Oboro banged away with her sonar for over an hour before giving up and returning to the task force.

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War Career of the USS Seal - 6/24/2010 12:51:25 AM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		Enemy shipping was beginning to pick up in the Seal’s patrol area off the coast of Flores as the expanding Japanese empire’s supply needs grew. On 5/6/42 the Seal dove after sighting a ship on the horizon only to surface again when it was discovered to be a lone merchant. The crew engaged the xAKL Nichiro Maru with the deck gun and quickly found the range with a satisfying flash and belch of smoke as a 3” shell smacked into the merchant. But the breech mechanism of the gun jammed a few rounds later and LCDR Hurd disgustedly withdrew from the action. A gunners mate later managed to free up the mechanism but LCDR Hurd decided to avoid using the gun again until it could be looked at by tender personnel in Darwin.

The next day the Seal encountered another lone merchant and made a submerged attack. Although the crew had derisively begun referring to the Mk-14’s as “iron slugs” (because they were as effective as the “water slugs” fired from empty tubes for training), the Seal made her first kill when two torpedoes of a four torpedo salvo exploded into the hull of the xAKL Hokuyo Maru. A look through the scope revealed that the target was engulfed in smoke and listing badly. Although the Seal’s crew did not witness it, the 830 ton Hokuyo Maru sank later in the day.

Two days later the tables were turned when the Seal was sighted by the DD Sanae near Pamekasan. Based on the high speed at which the DD had been closing, LCDR suspected that she had been alerted to the Seal’s presence by an air patrol. The submarine crash dove and attempted to break contact but was subjected to a depth charge attack that scored one near miss and inflicted minor damage on the submarine. Light bulbs were shattered throughout the ship and, the forward air conditioning unit broke down and her refrigerating plant was inoperable. The Seal returned to Darwin for repairs and replenishment.

While in port the crew learned that a series of large naval battles had occurred during the last week of April and the first week of May as the Japanese attempted to capture Port Moresby and the allies struggled to reinforce it. Both sides had committed battleships and carriers to the action. The BB Mutsu had been sunk by the USS Maryland at the cost of two destroyers torpedoed and sunk in a close range night action. Then US carriers had bombed and torpedoed the retreating Japanese force inflicting damage on the BB Yamashiro that would eventually prove fatal. Then a near disaster had occurred. In the battle of the Coral Sea, the previously undetected Soryu and Junyo launched surprise attacks on the Hornet and Yorktown scoring two bomb hits on the Hornet. The US carriers counterattacked and scored a bomb hit on the Soryu. A second wave from the Japanese carriers put a torpedo into the Hornet before the two forces broke off. The Hornet had limped back to Sydney for a lengthy drydock repair.

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RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/24/2010 1:00:40 AM   
aprezto


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Status: offline 		You paint a very good mental picture. Enjoying it, please keep up with the story

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RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/24/2010 1:39:18 AM   
Bradley7735


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Status: offline 		I love this AAR. please keep up the effot!

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RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/24/2010 6:50:10 AM   
Jones944

 

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Bradley7735

I love this AAR. please keep up the effot!

Definitely agree. Your style leaves the perfect amount of room for imagination to fill in the blanks that it feels like I'm reading a real history. Nice work.

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RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/24/2010 3:53:36 PM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		Thanks! I didn't think many people would be that interested in the following:

ASW attack near Soerabaja at 57,101

Japanese Ships
PB Chohakusan Maru

Allied Ships
SS Seal, hits 1

SS Seal is sighted by escort
PB Chohakusan Maru fails to find sub, continues to search...
PB Chohakusan Maru fails to find sub, continues to search...
PB Chohakusan Maru fails to find sub, continues to search...
PB Chohakusan Maru fails to find sub, continues to search...
PB Chohakusan Maru attacking submerged sub ....
Escort abandons search for sub

I wrote a term paper for a Naval History course back in college (in 1981 - when rocks were middle-aged) on the Navy Bureau of Ordnance and the problems with the Mk-14 and can still recall the absurdity of how the bureaucracy dealt with the issue. I wish I still had the paper.

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War Career of the USS Seal - 6/24/2010 9:17:09 PM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		The Seal left Darwin with a fresh load of food, fuel, and “iron slugs”. Her assigned patrol area was 100 miles east of Soerabaja. After a few days in the area she encountered a lone merchant and fired a spread of four torpedoes. Only one of the torpedoes exploded but it happened well short of the target. LCDR Hurd watched in horror as one of the remaining three weapons porpoised along the surface. Alerted to the threat by the premature explosion, the xAKL Tateyama Maru turned away and escaped.

LCDR Hurd sent a sitrep notifying squadron that he was returning from patrol early due to faulty torpedoes. This time the inspection team, with an O5 from BUORD, was waiting for the Seal on the pier. Once again the torpedo gang’s maintenance records were audited, and they were additionally subjected to an observed “practical exercise” involving demonstrating a torpedo load and back-haul, arming and safing a warshot, and performing periodic preventive maintenance on a Mk-14. No deficiencies were identified, and this time even the torpedo record books were clean. At LCDR Hurd’s insistence, the Seal’s remaining loadout of warshot was unloaded and replaced with torpedoes from another lot.

Returning to her previous patrol area, the Seal launched a salvo at the lead destroyer in a small task force. This time the torpedoes missed their target as the DD Sawakaze altered course to comb the wakes and race to the supposed launch point. But it was the second destroyer in the formation that made contact with the Seal and began a vigorous depth charge attack. The Seal was pursued for hours with two of the depth charges exploding close aboard. Breakers tripped, fittings began to spray water, and men were thrown against equipment and bulkheads as the little ship responded to the blows. The crew was convinced the attack was over when the pinging faded in the distance but the DD Yukaze had apparently doubled back to resume the search. Fortunately, no additional depth charges exploded close to the sub and the crew was able to effect temporary repairs (Sys 2).

Less than a week later the Seal attacked a small convoy closer to Soerabaja. While conducting an approach on xAKL Shinnan Maru, she was detected by DD Ikazuchi. Although there were a few close explosions, do damage was caused and the destroyer gave up search and returned to her convoy.

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RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/25/2010 9:24:20 AM   
Flying Tiger

 

Posts: 496
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From: ummmm... i HATE that question!
Status: offline 		this is a good read. Nice style, easy to read, enough info to keep it interesting, etc. I like the added 'big picture' details of what is happening in the wider war. Not quite 'Hibiki' just yet, but very good even so. Keep it coming!

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War Career of the USS Seal - 6/25/2010 3:26:53 PM   
brhugo

 

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Status: offline 		On 6/20/42 the Seal took another shot at a destroyer with the same result as earlier in the month. The intended victim (DD Uzuki) sighted the wakes in time to avoid them and the Seal was prosecuted by the second destroyer (DD Fuyo) in the column. It was a short-lived search; the Seal escaped easily. LCDR Hurd discussed the problem with his wardroom: was it better to attack the lead ship, or on the trailing one? The consensus was that the convoy rear was the best tactic as there would be fewer lookouts to provide early detection of the torpedo wakes.

The Seal was no more successful on 7/3 in the same waters. This time she was sighted first and forced under by the PB Chohakusan Maru. Only one near miss was of any consequence but it was worse than the previous attack (Sys 3). One broken air line would have to be brazed and the dive angle indicator was shattered. The crew improvised with a makeshift plumb bob until a permanent replacement could be obtained. But none of this compared with the near-death experience to follow at the hands of two very capable Japanese destroyer skippers.

The Seal had remained in the same patrol area far too long but the make-shift squadron headquarters in Darwin was overloaded with message traffic, the logistics associated with cycling half of the Pacific fleet’s submarine force through a single foreign tender, and COMSUBPAC’s constant demands for status reports. Based on numerous aircraft and ship sightings of an enemy submarine, the Japanese Soerabaja DESDIV dispatched DD Ikazuchi and DD Ayanami to clear the local water of this menace. Ironically the Seal was able to strike first with a four torpedo salvo at the Ayanami. All of the torpedoes missed but the battle was on and the Seal was aggressively hunted for hours.

One morbid sailor made of point of counting the number of distinct explosions during the hunt – 48. The worst exploded just forward of the bow causing many of the hull penetrations to spray water into the space. Despite skilled damage control efforts, the forward drain pump had to be run frequently to keep water below the deckplates. One torpedo tube outer door was jammed shut. Another near miss jolted the control room so badly that the primary radio was damaged beyond repair and half of the vacuum tubes in the secondary radio were shattered. The feeder breaker to an auxiliary power panel tripped and could not be reclosed leaving several loads unusable. Although not detected until later, the damage also caused leaky exhaust valves and holes in the fuel compensating line which resulted in air and oil leaks to the surface.

Perhaps thinking that they had destroyed the Seal, the Japanese abruptly broke off the attack and steamed away. After taking stock of the damage (24 Sys, 14 Flot [6 major]) LCDR Hurd decided to abort the patrol and return to Darwin for repairs. But squadron projected they would be overloaded with submarines based on the arrival date of the Seal and directed her to Broome instead.

The Seal arrived at Broome on 7/11. The port facilities there were adequate to perform most of the necessary repairs, but after divers inspected her hull it was clear that some of the work would have to be performed in drydock. All but the most difficult repairs were completed by 7/20 and the Seal pulled out of Broome for the transit to Perth where a small drydock was available. During the ship’s last day in Broome, LCDR Hurd received transfer orders for several of his senior crew members including the torpedo gang’s Chief Rayberg. The transferring crew members would remain with the boat until it arrived in Perth where they would be replaced with fresh submarine school graduates. The US was beginning to produce submarines rapidly and their green crews had to be augmented with experienced personnel. Torpedo gang’s “leading first” TM1 Gallenstein became the new LPO.

The Seal’s repairs were completed at Perth and the crew was given a shakedown period in local waters to test the repairs and train the newcomers. After a war loadout at Perth, the Seal was given patrol orders for the area off the Korean coast with Darwin remaining as her assigned replenishment port. LCDR Hurd wasn’t happy with the assignment because it meant long transits and thus less hunting, but the Seal’s earlier forays in the Java Sea had convinced COMSUBPAC to redeploy some of the fleet to routes more likely to be carrying war materials to and from the Japanese home islands.

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War Career of the USS Seal - 6/26/2010 1:56:54 AM   
brhugo

 

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Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		The Seal’s transit proved to be productive one. The sub’s track intersected that of a convoy that included the xAK Taian Maru. The Seal put a torpedo into the maru and was rewarded with an explosive hit. Through the periscope it was obvious the ship was in serious trouble – black some and gouts of flame erupted from the deck and the ship was circling. But LCDR Hurd didn’t have the luxury of watching further or following up with a second attack because the SC Ch 28 was bearing down on him. The sub chaser searched for the Seal for hours but was never confident enough of the sub’s position to drop any ordnance. The Taian Maru sank the same day.

By late September 1942 the Japanese navy had been mostly spent in the heavy fighting around the Solomons and New Guinea over the previous five months and many of their capital ships were in the yards. President Roosevelt met with his senior Pacific commanders to devise a long-term strategy for pushing the Japanese back and forcing a cease-fire. General MacArthur advised advancing along the Solomons-New Britain-New Guinea approach followed by a reconquest of the Philippines. Admiral Kimmel thought that a straightforward advance across the central Pacific followed by a strategic bombing campaign was the quickest way to force a Japanese capitulation.

But the president selected neither of these options. Someone in the State department had leaked documents proving that the administration had deliberately provoked war with Japan as a way to gain public support for the US to come to the aid of allies in Europe. Although the disaster at Pearl Harbor had NOT been part of the plan, enough voters seemed to believe that it had been that the president’s party expected to lose seats in the 1942 elections and Roosevelt’s own reelection prospects for ’44 were looking weak. The loss of the Arizona’s sister ship Pennsylvania in one of the night actions off Port Moresby had nit the nation particularly hard, and the death toll from the Pacific conflict was mounting. Roosevelt’s political advisers had convinced him to select a less risky advance from Port Moresby along the Sunda Islands to Java and then Sumatra, linking up with a hoped-for British and Indian advance through Burma into Malaysia. If this strategic goal could be accomplished, then the next step would be a recapture of Borneo. The recapture of the oil and refinery resources would also be a political payback to the oil companies who were heavy contributors to the president’s reelection campaign.

Once in her new patrol area, the Seal’s crew devised a strategy to improve the frequency of their encounters with the Japanese merchant fleet. The harbor at Pusan was known to be surrounded by a mine field. This provided protection to the ships in the harbor but forced them to enter and exit through a fairly narrow channel. By identifying the safe channel and positioning the sub near it, the Seal could wait for the ships to come to her. Since this would also be a heavily patrolled area, the Seal would have to remain at PD during daylight hours.

The Seal settled into a routine of surfacing at night to recharge air banks and batteries, then diving before dawn to begin the hunt. Days went by with no worthy targets, just the occasional shallow draft vessel that the Mk-14 was particularly ineffective against. LCDR Hurd began to suspect that the Seal must have arrived just after the arrival or departure of a major convoy.

(in reply to brhugo)
Post #: 19
RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/26/2010 2:19:20 AM   
whippleofd

 

Posts: 617
Joined: 12/23/2005
Status: offline 		brhugo:

Do you have tuber time?

Whipple

_____________________________

MMCS(SW/AW) 1981-2001
1981 RTC, SD
81-82 NPS, Orlando
82-85 NPTU, Idaho Falls
85-90 USS Truxtun (CGN-35)
90-93 USS George Washington (CVN-73)
93-96 NFAS Orlando
96-01 Navsea-08/Naval Reactors

(in reply to brhugo)
Post #: 20
RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/26/2010 4:06:03 AM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		Whipple:

What is tuber time?

Bruce R. Hugo
_______________________________

CDR (SS) 1979-Present
79-83 Penn State NROTC
83-84 NPS, Orlando
84 NPTU Ballston Spa
84-85 SOBC, New London
85-89 USS Michigan (SSBN-727B)
89-91 Naval Guided Missiles School, Damneck VA
91-99 COMSUBPAC Det 122 (USNR)
00-10 IRR+

(in reply to whippleofd)
Post #: 21
RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/26/2010 9:24:54 PM   
whippleofd

 

Posts: 617
Joined: 12/23/2005
Status: offline 		CDR:

Tuber: A derogatory term for submariners. And yep I figured you had to have it as I see some "you had to be there" stuff in your writing. It's a good read.

Whipple

_____________________________

MMCS(SW/AW) 1981-2001
1981 RTC, SD
81-82 NPS, Orlando
82-85 NPTU, Idaho Falls
85-90 USS Truxtun (CGN-35)
90-93 USS George Washington (CVN-73)
93-96 NFAS Orlando
96-01 Navsea-08/Naval Reactors

(in reply to brhugo)
Post #: 22
RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/26/2010 11:13:07 PM   
Cribtop


Posts: 3890
Joined: 8/10/2008
From: Lone Star Nation
Status: offline 		This is great, brhugo - keep it up!

Especially chilling given the foreshadowing of a tragic ending in the first post.

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Post #: 23
War Career of the USS Seal - 6/27/2010 12:55:15 AM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		Whipple,

Yes I have chronic tuber time.  It's like being clinically insane, except for the clinical part.

Being surrounded by other ex-nukes at work, including other tubers, is therapeutic but it's also like getting constantly reinfected ...

Bruce

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Post #: 24
War Career of the USS Seal - 6/27/2010 12:57:48 AM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		A few hours after nightfall on 10/17, the Seal was wracked by a massive explosion. Initially LCDR Hurd suspected that they had been sighted and torpedoed by another submarine, but when a second salvo was not forthcoming he focused his concern on the serious condition of his ship. The collision alarm had been sounded and a report of flooding had been made over the 4MC circuit. Both diesel engines had stopped and the shock had snapped the whip antenna off the sail.

Water was pouring into the ship through a crack in the hull and several fittings that had completely carried away. A mine, probably broken free of its mooring, had exploded against the port side of the ship nearly amidships. The deck had been completely torn away for 20 feet near the explosion. The Seal was well compartmented, and the watertight doors should have been able to confine the flooding to a single compartment, but pipe whip had deformed many of the penetration seals in the damaged compartment’s forward bulkhead and they freely passed water below the new rising waterline. The machinist mates managed to get one diesel restarted and the Seal tentatively began withdrawing from the area.

Casualties were heavy. Two men were killed outright and another would eventually succumb to a severe concussion. Doc Kelley was overloaded with broken ankles and arms and treated the worst of the injuries while the other sailors received first aid from their uninjured shipmates.

The situation was grim. The crew was having difficulty controlling flooding in the second compartment and the Seal was thousands of miles from the nearest friendly port. LCDR Hurd did not expect that the Seal could remain afloat long enough to get help, but he did not share this with the crew. But many of the Seal’s crew had the same fear.

System damage: 32
Flotation damage: 62 (50 major)
Engine damage: 4 (2 major)

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Post #: 25
RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/27/2010 5:10:27 AM   
Cribtop


Posts: 3890
Joined: 8/10/2008
From: Lone Star Nation
Status: offline 		Had a close friend at UT Austin (go Horns!) who went to design nuke sub engines at Groton. Before that, hower, a silly Navy rule required him to serve two tours on a sub. Problem was he was 6' 4" and was posted to an attack boat. Saw him years later and he still had the scar on his forehead at "hatch height." Kept forgetting to bend down at the doors, he said.

_____________________________


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Post #: 26
RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 6/27/2010 5:02:22 PM   
Kubel


Posts: 131
Joined: 11/4/2007
From: Canadian mosquito infested swamp
Status: offline 		Great read...fingers are crossed for the Seal and her crew.

_____________________________

Don
"Our profession should always be crowned by heroic death in battle" Generalfeldmarschall Fedor von Bock

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Post #: 27
War Career of the USS Seal - 6/28/2010 12:10:43 AM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
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Status: offline
Part II: The Ordeal of the Seal

As it became clear that the Seal was in no immediate danger of sinking, the crew focused on mitigating the damage the ship had taken. The forward drain pump was aligned to take a suction from the bilge of the compartment forward mine-damaged one, and an emergency diesel-powered dewatering pump had been rigged to augment it. The problem with the 2nd diesel was found and a work-around found, but with the Seal so low in the water any speed above 6-7 knots threatened to swamp the induction ports. The damaged diesel was smoking excessively probably due to a damaged piston ring and it was shutdown. The engineer designated the damaged diesel as “emergency use only”, apparently missing the irony.

While the crew labored to plug the leaks in the bulkhead, LCDR Hurd ordered all non-essential weight thrown overboard to regain some reserve buoyancy. All but eight of the remaining 3280 lb Mk-14’s were jettisoned; those that remained were tube loaded and could be quickly fired overboard if necessary. From the bridge LCDR Hurd watched TM1 Gallenstein carry the torpedo record books to the side; although these contributed negligibly to the Seal’s displacement, the torpedo gang LPO seemed to take great pleasure in heaving them into the water.

The Communicator drafted a sitrep to COMSUBPAC detailing the ship’s predicament and her intended destination (Darwin) for repairs. There was no request for rescue and the skipper did not add one; he reasoned that COMSUBPAC would consider this automatically. LCDR Hurd initialed the message draft but transmission had for several hours to wait until a replacement antenna could be erected.

COMSUBPAC did evaluate a rescue of the Seal’s crew. Since she was deep in enemy territory the only plausible rescue platform was another submarine. APS1 Argonaut was available and would have been ideal for this purpose but COMSUBPAC reasoned that if the Seal was going to be overcome by damage from the mine hit then the rescue sub could not reach her in time. Provisions were made to pick up all or part of the crew by flying boat when the Seal was within range, and this information was sent back to the crew along with a recommended transit route.

The navigator plotted the recommended route which was only slightly longer than his own at 3200 nautical miles (79 hexes). It would take the Seal 20 days to make this trip based on the speed they were making good. It was credible that the Seal could last this long – provided she remained undetected. But she would be any easy kill for the first ASW platform that she ran across. The ship had not attempted to submerge since the mine explosion and it was possible that the increased leakage due to the higher submergence pressure even at periscope depth could overwhelm the drain pump (the diesel pump could not overcome much submergence pressure and could not be run for long in any case with the ship bottled up.)

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Post #: 28
War Career of the USS Seal - 6/30/2010 4:02:25 AM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		Two days after the Seal was damaged by the mine, the Japanese navy rose from the dead.
An allied CV group supporting landings in the Solomons was jumped by aircraft from the Akagi and Hiyo; the Enterprise, Wasp, North Carolina, and South Dakota were torpedoed. Counter strikes damaged both Japanese carriers but both of these had been reported as sunk or seriously damages in earlier fighting. Apparently some of the battle damage assessment had been optimistic. Although all of the damaged ships survived to fight again, the two battleships had to return to Pearl Harbor to completely repair the torpedo damage and the expansion in the Solomons was on hold for months.

By 10/22/42 the Seal was 2350 nautical miles (58 hexes) from Darwin and the crew had made steady progress in plugging leaks and mitigating the flooding (Flot 55). But the combination of exposure of power, pneumatic, and hydraulic lines to the seawater environment in the flooded compartment was causing a slow but relentless degradation to the ships systems (Sys 34). But with the Seal having covered one-quarter of the distance to Darwin so far, the crew was nonetheless beginning to expect that they would make it there safely.

Unfortunately, the Japanese made the intended sanctuary at Darwin untenable. Bombing raids from enemy bases had become more frequent and the small fighter squadron at Darwin had been whittled down to nothing by the Zeros escorting the bomb-laded Bettys. As if to highlight the danger, the SS Shark was sunk on 10/23 at the pier while undergoing repairs. The Seal was redirected to Broome, news that was not taken well by her weary crew.





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Post #: 29
RE: War Career of the USS Seal - 7/5/2010 4:50:18 AM   
brhugo

 

Posts: 73
Joined: 2/2/2010
Status: offline 		As the Seal made her way slowly to Broome, the crew routine settled into periods of extreme boredom punctuated with brief periods of adrenaline rush.  Although there was little the crew would be able to do in the event of an air attack except dive to periscope depth and hope the bombs missed, the topside watch was nonetheless increased.  This had the result of increasing the number of false aircraft sightings in direct proportion and the attendant rush to battle stations, a shift of propulsion from diesel engines to the battery, and preparations to dive.  The effect of the increased submergence pressure on the damaged ship and the temporary repairs was still unknown but the potential for catastrophic failure and loss of the sub was substantial.  Miraculously, day after day passed with nothing more threatening than a false alarm.   The Japanese soon deduced that many of the bombs being dropped on Darwin were simply kicking up rubble and their attention shifted to Broome.  Broome was less equipped to defend itself from the air than Darwin had been and all of the ships transferred there the previous week were evacuated to Perth.  On November 3rd the Seal received a radio message directing her to make port in Perth, a change that added 1,350 nautical miles to her route.   Although the war in the southwest Pacific had quieted down, the Japanese and allies were vigorously engaged in Burma.  A combined British, Indian, and Australian thrust had recaptured Akyab but the allies were finding it impossible to keep the troops there supplied overland.  Unless this problem could be solved, the next phase of the operation to recapture Magwe and eventually Rangoon would be impossible.  Convoys from Ceylon and Madras to Chittagong and Akyab were being torn apart by land based aircraft.  The allies had committed most of their fighter squadrons in the theater to the air defense of Akyab and the resupply effort, but the Japanese seemed to have an endless supply of Oscars, Zero’s, and Nate’s even as the allied fighter numbers dwindled to ineffectiveness.   On 11/4/42 the Seal was still nearly 2,150 nautical miles from Perth but was closing the distance by almost 150 nautical miles every day.

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