Operation Ivy Bells, page 2
August 2014
Ed Offley is author of Scorpion Down: Sunk by the Soviets, Buried by the Pentagon – the Untold Story of the USS Scorpion, and several books about the Battle of the Atlantic, most recently The Burning Shore: How Hitler’s U-boats Brought World War II to America.
Foreword to the Second Edition
The first edition of Operation Ivy Bells became a bestseller. Since then Dr. Williscroft has written several more novels. He found that inserting sub-chapter headings made the action easier to follow, so when Fresh Ink Group proposed to produce a revised second edition of Operation Ivy Bells, we decided to follow that example.
Each chapter contains one or more sub-headings that indicate the location of the action: Inside Halibut and where the sub is, divers on the sea floor at some location, divers on land at some location, etc. Hopefully these changes will make Operation Ivy Bells even more enjoyable.
Remember that Operation Ivy Bells is also available as an ebook and audio book.
Fresh Ink Group
Guntersville, Alabama
July 2019
USS Halibut (SSN-587) Organizational Chart
Cast of Characters
Submarine Development Group One (SubDevGruOne)
Commander Dan Richardson – Ex skipper of USS Pigeon; Heads Submarine Development Group One activities
Personnelman 1st Class Jerry Peterson (Pete) – SubDevGruOne staff
John Craven – Brains behind the Project
Marine – Marine guard at SubDevGruOne HQ
Test Operations Group (TOG)
Lieutenant J.R. McDowell (Mac) – Officer-in-Charge (OIC) (Narrator)
Master Chief Hamilton Comstock (Ham) – Master Saturation Diver – Came from Experimental Diving Unit and Man-in-the-Sea Program
Chief Jack Meredith – Master Saturation Diver (Understudy) – Ex SEAL – left to become saturation diver; ex Man-in-the-Sea Program
Petty Officer 1st Class James Tanner (Jimmy) – Saturation Diver; qualified Dive Console operator – Sonar Tech
Petty Officer 1st Class Melvin Ford (Whitey) – Saturation Diver; qualified Dive Console operator – Electronics Tech
Petty Officer 2nd Class William Fisher (Bill) – Saturation Diver; qualified Dive Console operator – Battlefield medic turned saturation diver
Petty Officer 2nd Class Wlodek Cslauski (Ski) – Saturation Diver; qualified Dive Console operator – Quartermaster
Petty Officer 2nd Class Jeremy Romain (Jer) – Saturation Diver; qualified Dive Console operator – Submariner (Engineman) turned saturation diver; Graduate of earlier saturation dive class
Petty Officer 2nd Class Harry Blackwell – Saturation Diver; qualified Dive Console operator – Submariner (Auxiliaryman) turned saturation diver; Graduate of earlier saturation dive class
USS Elk River
Lieutenant George Franklin (Frankie) – OIC Saturation Dive Unit
Master Chief Ray Harmon – Master Saturation Diver
Dr. Joseph Lemwell (Doc) – Saturation Doctor
Chief Paul Struthers – Master Saturation Diver Trainee
Sailor – Deck hand
Horse & Cow
Bartender – At The Horse & Cow
Snorkel Patty – At The Horse & Cow
USS Halibut Deck Gang
Seaman José Roscoe – Topside Watch, Lookout/Helmsman/ Planesman
Seaman Rocky Faust – Topside Watch, Lookout/Helmsman/ Planesman
Seaman Matthew Scott (Scotty) – Topside Watch, Lookout/ Helmsman/Planesman
Seaman Charlie Todd – Topside Watch, Lookout/Helmsman/Planesman
Seaman Stacy Fisher – Topside Watch, Lookout/Helmsman/ Planesman
Seaman Lyle Dunlap – Topside Watch, Lookout/Helmsman/ Planesman
Seaman Gene Magor – Topside Watch, Lookout/Helmsman/Planesman
Soviet Whiskey Submarine
Unknown Soviet Officer – Commanding Officer
Soviet Salvage Operation
Sergyi Andreev – The Soviet Diver
USS Richland AFDM-8
Lieutenant Commander Roger Leach – Commanding Officer
Chief Warrant Officer Tommie Bridger – First Lieutenant
Lieutenant Junior Grade Odis Weldy – Engineer
Ensign Bennie Poley – Operations Officer
CHAPTER ONE
At 1,000 feet depth off Point Loma
I hung motionless in the frigid water a few yards from the spherical Personnel Transfer Capsule a thousand feet below the surface. It was pitch black, except for two beams of light emanating from the PTC that terminated in white circles on the sandy bottom a hundred feet below. In the crystal clear water there was virtually no diffusion. I felt motion beside me and turned to see a flood of bubbles rising from Harry’s plunge through the PTC hatch.
We each had a hundred feet of umbilical snaking back into the PTC, where Bill, the third member of our party, kept the slack out of our umbilicals and stood by to help in the event of an emergency. I put a finger in front of my mask indicating silence. Harry gave me a thumbs-up. We started drifting downward, not paying any attention to our depth. After all, we were saturated to a thousand feet; down was good.
“Red Diver, what are you doing?” Master Chief Ray Harmon was having a conniption topside. As the Sat Dive Unit’s Master Saturation Diver, he was running the dive under Lieutenant George Franklin, the Officer-in-Charge.
“Checking something out, Control, just checking something out.” I increased my descent and Harry followed suit. I could hear my distorted voice in my earphones.
“Red Diver!” It was the Master Chief again.
“Red Diver, aye.” I needed to delay him for just another twenty seconds.
“Return to one-thousand feet NOW!” He was pissed.
“Say again, Control, say again.” I needed just another ten seconds.
“Lieutenant McDowell, get your ass back to the PTC…NOW!” Oops, that was Franklin, and he was really pissed.
“Roger that.” I scooped a handful of sand and stuffed it in my leg pocket and looked up at the PTC. It appeared as a lighted jewel against velvet black. Our activities near the bottom had stirred up some detritus, and the water around us sparkled with light flickering off tiny silt particles – an alien, fairytale world.
I gave Harry two thumbs-up, and we slowly ascended, our umbilicals snaking above us, live serpents in the frigid water. Inside the PTC, Bill recoiled the umbilicals to take up the slack. It took us less than two minutes to get back to a thousand feet; our total excursion had lasted no more than four minutes. I pointed to the expanded metal work bin attached to the outside of the PTC. Harry pulled out the make-work project for this training dive, and we started screwing screws and turning bolts.
And that’s when it happened!
My first impression was a flashing shadow through one of the light beams, a flicker just below my threshold of awareness – something big and fast.
“What the fuck was that?” Harry squeaked, his voice distorted by helium and electronic descrambling.
“Green Diver, report!” That was the Master Chief.
“Jeezus…” Harry dropped down three feet and grabbed my left fin. I felt him trying to pull me toward him, toward the hatch. “Mac…the hatch!” Harry’s desperation came right through his squeak. Then he jerked and let go. “Kee…rist!”
“Red Diver…what’s going on down there?” That was Franklin.
Off to my right, a green phosphorescent shape flicked into and out of existence. A pink one materialized to my left. Suddenly, from right in front of me, something bright blue hit my faceplate with the force of a sledgehammer.
Everything went black. I don’t mean I passed out…everything went black, literally. I reached up and discovered a really large thing covering my entire helmet. It was smooth and spongy, and it was undulating. I heard a scraping, grinding noise against my faceplate. Something wrapped itself around my left arm, jerking my hand away from the pulsing mass. I pulled my arm back and felt a rush of cold water enter my suit at the wrist. A tear…whatever it was had torn a goddamn hole in my suit! What the hell can tear a hole through compressed, nylon-reinforced neoprene? That shit’ll stop a knife!
That’s when I noticed that I still held a ten-pound steel wrench in my right hand. You don’t move things fast underwater, but I put as much force into my haymaker as possible. The wrench sunk into the mass attached to my helmet, and in a flash, it was gone. I could see again. Several feet ahead of me I could make out two elongated hooded shapes arrayed vertically in the water, pulsing green to pink to blue. Large, almost human eyes as big as my hands gazed at me.
“Control, Red Diver…we got some kind of company…three or four giant squid, I think…” I looked down at Harry, backed up warily against the PTC just below me, dive knife glinting in his hand. I could see a big tear in the left shoulder of his hot-water suit. “Harry…you okay?”
“Yeah…what the fuck! Squid? You’re shittin’ me!” He waved his knife. “One of those fuckers took a chunk outa my suit!”
“You or just the suit?” I asked.
“Just the suit…I think. No blood in the water.”
“Mac…” It was Franklin. “You guys get back into the PTC ASAP!”
“Working on it, Control…” One of the creatures hit the top of my helmet hard. Tentacles draped down the entire length of my body. I could distinctly feel razor-sharp sucker teeth dig into my suit. “Harry,” I yelled, sounding like a compressed Donald Duck through the helium and electronics, “get this fucker off me!”
I felt Harry come up between me and the PTC and repeatedly stab the creature’s carapace. With that, my personal squid apparently had second thoughts, as it unwrapped itself and disappeared. The other two with their changing color patterns continued to hang about ten feet away, large unblinking eyes evaluating me. It seemed as if they were communicating by color and pattern. Suddenly, the right one went dark, dropped its tentacles straight down, and began to undulate. Two thin, suckerless tentacles danced around the creature in a meaningless pattern. I transferred the wrench to my left hand and pulled my knife from its sheath on my right leg. Then, in a blinding white flash, the eight-foot squid whipped to horizontal and propelled itself tentacles first directly at my chest. As it approached, its tentacles rolled back, forming an eight-legged basket filled with a thousand sucker teeth. In the center, I could see a mouth as large as my helmet surrounded by a ring of razor teeth reflecting the squid’s phosphorescent pulses.
I jammed the wrench as hard as I could directly into the gaping maw and left it there. I grabbed an upper tentacle with my left hand and sliced. It was like cutting tough leather. I sawed frantically while the squid grabbed at my hand and knife with two other tentacles while keeping a grip on me with the rest. After what seemed like an hour, but actually was less than a minute, I held the detached writhing tentacle in my left hand. I tossed it away, still squirming like a snake. With the tentacle out of the way, I could see the large, human-like eye, fully six inches across staring at me malevolently. I plunged my knife into the orb – once, twice, a third time. That did it! The two thin tentacles whipped around frantically, and the giant disappeared into the darkness along with its pulsating companion.
“Harry, where are you?” I was concentrating on the water in front of me, preparing for another attack.
“Right below you, Mac. Let’s get the fuck outa here!”
A very long minute later I followed Harry through the hatch opening, and Bill pulled me all the way in.
“Everyone down there okay?” That was Franklin again.
“Control…PTC,” Bill responded, “divers are back inside. Everyone seems to be okay.”
Just then, the smooth water surface in the circular opening began to boil.
“Shee…it!” Bill shouted, as two thick tentacles darted through the surface and began whipping around the PTC interior. “Fucker’s trying to get in the PTC!” Bill’s distorted voice in my earphones matched his lip movements. His face registered not so much panic as total shock.
“Or pull us out,” Harry added.
Bill and Harry grabbed their knives, slashing into the writhing appendages. I reached over the opening and grasped the hatch in both hands, pushing for all I was worth. I looked down into the six-inch eye of the invading monster as I swung the hatch down. I sensed intelligence, driven by pure malevolence. The last thing I saw before I dogged the hatch was a half-sliced-through tapered tentacle tip, as it slipped back into the frigid water around us.
Harry removed his helmet and gave Bill a gloved high-five. From across the dogged hatch, I gave them both two thumbs-up and pulled off my own helmet and gloves. Then I grabbed a Ziploc baggie from my personal kit to fill it with my trophy sand, but when I felt my leg pocket for the sand, it was gone. Chalk up another one to the monsters.
“Control…this is Mac.” I was sure they could hear the relief in my distorted voice. “To hell with the rest of this dive. Just bring us home!”
CHAPTER TWO
Point Loma Submarine Base
About six months earlier I strolled up a hill on the Submarine Base at the foot of Point Loma on San Diego Bay, past a brilliant flower bed of red and purple ice plants toward a row of off-yellow clapboard two-story buildings. They were typical government buildings dating from World War II, carefully maintained, but showing their age.
Several uniformed sailors were out and about. One saluted as he stepped into the narrow street to pass me.
“G’morning, Sir!”
I saluted back and watched him hurry up the street. The warm summer sun glistened off his white trousers and short-sleeved white shirt. He was medium sized but well built, and he walked with a swagger. Over his left shirt pocket, he sported several ribbons, and above them a silver First-class Divers Pin. He turned toward the building labeled: Submarine Development Group One – Headquarters.
My destination.
I followed him up the broad entrance stairway through the door and paused to let my eyes adjust. He stepped around a desk, passed through a swinging gate in a light oak railing, and flashed his ID to an armed Marine guarding an ordinary looking door in the opposite wall. The Marine punched a code in an unobtrusive keypad mounted to the wall beside the door.
A soft click and the door swung inward, revealing an office with several desks and a hallway leading back into the building. The sailor stepped through the door, and it swung closed behind him. He obviously was part of the operation behind that door. The Marine resumed his parade-rest stance before the door.
“May I help you, Sir?”
The Yeoman Second Class looked up at me from his desk as the door closed. I removed my sunglasses and handed him my orders.
“Oh, Lieutenant McDowell. We’ve been expecting you.”
I handed him the envelope containing my records. I had just completed forty-eight weeks of deep sea diver training and was reporting for duty at the U.S. Navy Saturation Diving School.
It was a dream come true. As a boy growing up in Germany, I had thrilled at exploits of the deep-diving bathyscaphe Trieste and its successor in plumbing the deepest depths of the world’s oceans. The names Alvin and Sea Cliff were as familiar to me as the Starship USS Enterprise (yeah, I was a Trekkie, of sorts). And I practically lived in Sealab with Alan Shepard.
So here I was, ex-Sonar Tech, ex-sub sailor, just another surface puke – but I was about to join the ranks of the elite corps of saturation divers. This was heady stuff.
The class work was easy, not so much because I was smart, but because I had covered this material one way or the other either in the previous year in diving school or while getting my degree in marine physics. My classmates were all enlisted types, but one hell of a group of sharp guys. Without a degree in anything, most of them had no trouble at all keeping up with me.
We spent most mornings in class and most afternoons either working out, gaining hands-on experience with the Mark 2 Mod 0 Deep Diving System on the venerable support vessel USS Elk River moored next to the submarine piers, or both.
We had to learn the diving system inside and out; every valve, switch, pipe, and wire. It’s not particularly difficult to do, but it does take time. The system consists of a thirty-foot-long pressure chamber called the Deck Decompression Chamber or DDC that contains a lock for entrance and egress, a small lock for passing in food or medical supplies, four bunks, lavatory facilities, and emergency equipment. The Personnel Transfer Capsule or PTC mates to the DDC and can transfer a maximum of four divers to the underwater working site. The umbilical that supports the PTC and supplies communications and power is called the SPCC – Strength-Power-Communications Cable.
I said the guys were able to keep up with me in the classroom work. I should have also noted that I barely kept up with them in physical training. Where did these guys come from? I thought I was in good shape – after all, I had just completed forty-eight weeks of some of the most difficult physical training I had ever undertaken. These guys didn’t break a sweat after three miles running with full gear. They got my attention.
Training lasted twelve weeks. I ate, slept, dreamed, talked, thought Mark 2. By the tenth week, I had that system nailed. And that’s when it – the system, not the giant squid – nearly nailed me.
Elk River – Off Point Loma
We were out on a local practice site, about eleven-hundred feet deep, basically a hole in the ocean bottom a couple of miles off Point Loma. The idea was that we would anchor over this hole, cinched into a four-point moor. For you landlubbers, you anchor four large buoys to the corners of a rectangle, roughly centered over your spot – in our case the hole. Then you cinch your vessel to each of the buoys, and loosen and tighten the lines until you are directly over the hole. Anyway, we would saturate to one-thousand feet and then lower down near the bottom for some real time experience.
Okay – more details for you non-divers. Even if you’re reading this in the International Space Station, the air you’re breathing is about twenty-one percent oxygen and seventy-nine percent nitrogen. As you dive, your equipment supplies you with compressed air that matches the pressure of your surroundings, and this increases by about one atmosphere’s worth every thirty-three feet. So at a thousand feet, air enters your lungs at about thirty atmospheres or 450 pounds per square inch or psi, as we call it.
