Sub sighting!

We had an interesting experience leaving the Cumberland Island anchorage recently. We had just pulled up the anchor and were headed towards the main channel when my wife noticed a CG boat in the distance that seemed to be headed our way. I soon realized they were headed directly for us so I pulled the throttle back and waited for them to arrive.


I had my VHF tuned to 16 but never got a radio call, and when I went to the stern one of the Coasties asked how to pronounce our boat name (Bijou). Maybe that’s why we didn’t get a radio call. ?

They warned us that a big Navy nuclear ballistic sub was planning to come through the channel soon and head out to the Atlantic, and we needed to cross the channel quickly and stay about a mile out of the way once we crossed. So we headed across the channel and on our way to Fernandida on the ICW. A few minutes after crossing the channel my wife asked if we could stay and watch the sub make its appearance, and since we really didn’t have a schedule I said sure why not. So I circled back and anchored in about 20’ of water in what seemed like a safe distance away from the channel, with the incoming tide keeping me perpendicular to the channel. We got some video:

https://youtu.be/ArS1LxN3WPQ

If you look closely at the beginning of the video you can see a large Nordhavn with her bow pointed into the bank at the top right of the video. The CG spent about an hour clearing out the channel for the sub’s departure, warning all boats to stay away, but about 10 minutes before the sub appeared this Nordhavn came out of the ICW coming from Fernandina and crossed right in front of the sub and all the escorts. To say the CG was agitated would be an understatement. I guess the Nordy captain didn’t have his radio on maybe, but he sure wasn’t paying attention to the smaller CG boat next to him. We could hear the CG announce over loudspeakers to STOP NOW! Finally a larger CG boat joined and forced the Nordhavn out of the deep channel and bow in to the bank. It was a little crazy, and one smaller CG boat near us that had its bow gun manned and ready announced to the gunner to keep his head on a swivel and be alert. They were tense!

Well the sub finally passed along with a pretty big escort ship that seemed to be kind of a shield for the sub maybe? It seemed to have some large metal screens on deck to block the view of the sub, but maybe my imagination was getting away from me. I could see the wakes from the bigger ship approach us, but because I was anchored up I couldn’t maneuver away from them. And because of the tide we were perfectly beam to these pretty decent sized waves. My wife and sister were sitting in the forward seating area of the boat and I told them to hang on. I ran down to secure some things in the galley, but I was too late because crap was flying everywhere. I’ve been waked before pretty bad in the ICW by big sport fish and other big boats, but OMG nothing like this. And it went on for quite awhile. The girls somehow hung on up top and we were all fine, but I wanted to rely my error to the TF folks about anchoring up like I did. Problem was I couldn’t circle around to wait on the sub because the CG specifically said to not point the bow of our boat at the sub at any time. Guess I should have just quickly pulled anchor and gotten out of there.

WOW!

Cheers,
Mrs. Trombley

Very cool!

I'm not sure why the Navy relocated the sub base from Charleston to the St Mary's river. No one checks with me.
When I was on a sub in Spain, once out of the harbor, was a straight shot to the ocean. Alas, they close the Spanish facility too. All those shore side bars closed and the young ladies were left unemployed.

It is best of boaters keep a distance from the sub and escort vessels. They will run into you to prevent you from approaching the sub. It's not that the escort and RIBs dont care, the sub costs more than your boat.

If you have common sense to stay away from large freighters and container ships, you should have more than enough sense to stay away from submarines.
Alas, some boaters are idiots.
A shot across your bow just might encourage one to turn on their VHF radio and turn away. Also, the RADAR must be on when underway with a RADAR watch posted at the RADAR. A RADAR guard zone should have picked this up too. In this case on the 1/4 mile range?
I am happy they forced the Nordhavn into the bank. I hope they 'stuck' good.

OldDan1943 said:

It is best of boaters keep a distance from the sub and escort vessels. They will run into you to prevent you from approaching the sub. It's not that the escort and RIBs dont care, the sub costs more than your boat.

If you have common sense to stay away from large freighters and container ships, you should have more than enough sense to stay away from submarines.
Alas, some boaters are idiots.
A shot across your bow just might encourage one to turn on their VHF radio and turn away. Also, the RADAR must be on when underway with a RADAR watch posted at the RADAR. A RADAR guard zone should have picked this up too. In this case on the 1/4 mile range?
I am happy they forced the Nordhavn into the bank. I hope they 'stuck' good.

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The Nordhavn didn’t get stuck. As soon as the sub passed it continued on its merry, oblivious way. We were trying to be super careful, but I think I was also too close to the action.

cardude01 said:

The Nordhavn didn’t get stuck. As soon as the sub passed it continued on its merry, oblivious way. We were trying to be super careful, but I think I was also too close to the action.

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You may have been too close but you anchored. You were not a threat, what they want to prevent is a USS Cole type incident.


As an aside I have seen loaded LPG ships with the same type of escorts, in Port Aransas and the Port of Corpus Christi. If one of them goes up it would be a huge deal. Again, they are trying to avoid a Cole incident.

Thanks for the video, Dude. The subs moving in and out of Kings Bay are always awe-inspiring. Makes me feel proud to be a part of a country that can create and sustain such incredible technology, even though I hope they are never used for their intended purpose.

Wow that Nordie looked close. Good thing it wasn’t a bad guy.

Reminds me of going into Pearl Harbor, destination: Iroquois Lagoon. I was just lollygagging, only doing about 3 kts, and Pearl Harbor Patrol calls me up and asks me to expedite departing the channel due to traffic behind me. I hadn't been paying attention, and there was a 688, Los Angeles class Fast Attack boat right behind me! About 150 yards back, and closing! No escort, nothing. We expedited our departure into Iroquois Lagoon.

We were going down the west coast from Seattle to LA. We saw an antenna zip uphill fairly close to us. Never saw the sub the antenna was attached to though.

I was helping my son deliver his new to him Cal24 sailboat. We were motoring. The USS Dallas (made famous in the movie Hunt for Red October), came out of Port Orchard Channel accompanied by a line haul tug and a tractor tug and two fast patrol boats. One of the patrol boats was at all times maneuvering to be between us and the sub. Both guns on the patrol boat were manned. They did not make radio contact for quite a while and as they were moving slowly and turning it was hard to figure out their course and therefore find a course to avoid them - our course changes always seemed to put us right in front of them. Eventually we managed to head away and they steamed out towards Seattle for about 25 minutes. So we continued heading in to Port Orchard only to find them heading back in behind us! At first they said we should maintain course and speed (ahead of them) but they continued to gain on us, perhaps not realizing how slow we were, until they were very close and we had to leave the channel and stop to allow them to pass. At all times we were blanketed by a patrol boat. We were hailed twice and I spoke with them on the radio once. In the second picture it has turned around and is coming up behind my son at the helm. We later learned this was the last voyage of the USS Dallas before returning to Bremerton for scrapping. Apparently a lot of senior naval figures were on board for the ceremony.

We have come across boomers at least two times in Puget Sound. They come out of Bangor Trident Base, near Silverdale on the Kitsap Peninsula. Each time they were escorted by at least two CG fast boats and another two Navy security boats. I made sure to not alter my course towards them, even slightly. Both times the CG fast boats zipped around moving other recreational boats out of the path of the sub. I gave them a WIDE berth. I believe the reg is 500 yds minimum. The boats were armed and the crews professional. Even a manned machine gun on the fore decks. Nothing to mess with. All I kept thinking was, God bless, America!

When Ma Duce talks, people listen. Or was that run like hell!

High Wire said:

When Ma Duce talks, people listen. Or was that run like hell!

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She is one baaad mother!

Much easier path for the boats out of KB now a days

OldDan1943 said:

I'm not sure why the Navy relocated the sub base from Charleston to the St Mary's river. No one checks with me.
When I was on a sub in Spain, once out of the harbor, was a straight shot to the ocean. Alas, they close the Spanish facility too. All those shore side bars closed and the young ladies were left unemployed.

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When I look at the dredged channels to/from KB SubBase I chuckle a bit thinking about the forty or so turn maneuvering watch we had back in the early 80's when the base had a club, a church and a gym. The old wooden Army ammo pier that supported the tender and the boats that couldn't double raft off of her and dirt parking lot was ground zero for the largest population of no-see'ums in the world. Granted, the run down the Copper River from the Weapons Station in Goose Creek out to sea was no joy ride either. Life was so much simpler then - the only boat that would 'escort' us in the Fortyone for Freedom Fleet was the pilot boat, and maybe a few of the wives/girlfriends in someone's fishing boat to give us our last view of "fun" as a send off.

We were in our RV at the state park once a while back, outside roaming about with my 1st cup of coffee very early one morning and climbed up on the roof of the RV to check the view over the dunes and I saw a very strange looking boat coming in form sea....as it got closer it turned out to be the combined silhouette of the escort and a sub like that. That escort seemed to maintain station between me and the sub almost the whole time it passed

Hey, you think it is exciting to see them pass by, you should be on the inside of the boat. LOL
Each patrol was always the same on the inside of the sub. LOL

We always knew the name of the port from which we departed but, there was twice we did not return to the same port.

I was with my father bringing a Betram 42 sport fisherman from the Bahamas to Ft. Lauderdale through Port Everglades. Cruising 35 knots.

As we were crossing the Gulf Stream I pointed out to my father that a hill, 6-8' tall and two hundred yards wide was being us, and not going away. Like we were almost surfing it.

At the sea buoy a beer keg broke the surface, spun 360 degrees, then shot up followed by the torsos of sailors lighting cigarettes.

Fifteen minutes later the sail was exposed.

We saw on the news they had been running a drill trying to detect the sub coming into Port.

It had come into Port under a fast noisey sport fisherman in the middle of the day in crystal clear water. Hidden under our boat and in the wake shadow.

Soo bad ass.

In San Diego, the sub base is close to the harbor entrance, so we do not have much interplay with them. However we do have interesting moments when those big gray things with the flat decks come and go.

Could you imagine toodling along in your little family trawler and see THAT breach the water line?

toocoys said:

Could you imagine toodling along in your little family trawler and see THAT breach the water line?

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As a sub sailor, I would sound my horn, step outside the pilot house and salute.
Perhaps they would return the salute.
Alas, it is not super easy to dip my colors to them. Not easy for them to dip their colors either.

The subs were long gone by the time I cruised Mare Island Strait. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mare_Island_Naval_Shipyard

markpierce said:

The subs were long gone by the time I cruised Mare Island Strait. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mare_Island_Naval_Shipyard

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What have they done with the dry docks and maintenance buildings?

Who is occupying all those beautiful old mansions?

Most of the buildings were circa 1940s including the hospital.

I was stationed there in the middle 60s for Part A of the nuclear power school.

OldDan1943 said:

As a sub sailor, I would sound my horn, step outside the pilot house and salute.
Perhaps they would return the salute.
Alas, it is not super easy to dip my colors to them. Not easy for them to dip their colors either.

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I'd be too busy trying to pull my draw's back up to stand upright....

OldDan1943 said:

Who is occupying all those beautiful old mansions?

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My only clear memories of Mare Island are the launching of a "H-K" submarine...and the shi**y 1/2 quonset hut my family of five lived in.

localboy said:

We have come across boomers at least two times in Puget Sound. They come out of Bangor Trident Base, near Silverdale on the Kitsap Peninsula. Each time they were escorted by at least two CG fast boats and another two Navy security boats. I made sure to not alter my course towards them, even slightly. Both times the CG fast boats zipped around moving other recreational boats out of the path of the sub. I gave them a WIDE berth. I believe the reg is 500 yds minimum. The boats were armed and the crews professional. Even a manned machine gun on the fore decks. Nothing to mess with. All I kept thinking was, God bless, America!

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I grew up on Hoods Canal where Bangor is located, long before the canal was populated much. In those days all US Navy ships of any type, including Subs, would cruise to Bangor and unload all ammo and explosives before going into either Keyport Torpedo Station or Puget Sound Naval Shipyard. Bangor later became the location for the Polaris Missile Facility Pacific. At the time my Dad owned 126 acres on Hoods Canal 2 miles from the Bangor and it was there I had my first boat at 12. Spent many a day watching Navy ships of all kinds cruise the canal to and from Bangor. Biggest reason I joined the Navy was watching those ships pass by and seeing all the men man the rails in dress uniforms. In those days there were no escorts of ships by CG or Navy patrol boats.

AlaskaProf said:

My only clear memories of Mare Island are the launching of a "H-K" submarine...and the shi**y 1/2 quonset hut my family of five lived in.

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I am told, the San Diego navy base is either all civilian GREATLY reduced its navy presence.

Charleston is 'gone', Mare Island is 'gone', San Diego is 'gone'. Not many dry docks left.

OldDan1943 said:

I am told, the San Diego navy base is either all civilian GREATLY reduced its navy presence.

Charleston is 'gone', Mare Island is 'gone', San Diego is 'gone'. Not many dry docks left.

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Been boating in San Diego for over twenty five years...if the Navy presence is "reduced" you can't prove it by me. If anything it has increased, with a new carrier added.

ancora said:

Been boating in San Diego for over twenty five years...if the Navy presence is "reduced" you can't prove it by me. If anything it has increased, with a new carrier added.

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Fantastic.
I'm sure the ladies working on the strip appreciate that.