bad things that I experienced on Philly

I wrote this post to put on bubbleheads blog but am posting it here to keep the clutter down over there.

I saw some bad things happen on the Philly, and not the operational or nuclear kind (RB was XO for a part of this). These were the kind of things that were personnel related that created an environment that led to failure. I will use my ENG as an example. He was so lazy that I could not get him to come to the engine room for records review, and when I had the RCA deliver the material history and data notebooks for their monthly review, we “operated” out of WRSR 1 for a week. He didn’t care, I mean really didn’t care, not one bit. He was more concerned with making plans for his post naval career and getting rack-time. The CO noted the missed review on a quarterly review/command monitor. This sounds like an issue to be taken care of behind the Wardroom door, but whatever action was taken, it failed. The eventual solution was for me to take the associated records and the RCA to WRSR 1 and physically block the ENG in until he had “reviewed” them. In this time period, the department Chief’s had several meetings with squadron (CMC) about issues in the department. Our squadron counterparts knew this was happening and we were told by them and by the CO that firing him (the ENG) was not an option because there were no replacements out there for him.

The command climate/philosophy issue was this: don’t do anything that might discredit the CO or get him undue attention from outside the command (good or bad).

OK, so here’s the disclaimer: I gathered this data from talking to men who had served with the CO in several commands and its all second hand. I hesitate to blog on it, as it may sound like a character assignation attempt, however; I’ve been retired long enough that the sting has almost left and I have forgiven him for the injuries (real and imagined) that he inflicted on me.

The story goes like this: the CO was the ENG on the Memphis when the microprocessors were installed. His following assignments at the squadron level and his XO tour had set him on the fast track to the “line locker.” He had initially negotiated orders to a boomer that was finishing an Availability with some “missile work.” The idea was that he was only going to sea for two patrol cycles after the yard and then off to NAVSEA. The PCO who was scheduled for Philly didn’t pass tactics in PCO school. Allegedly, he found out what a huge pain in the butt that a DDS boat is, both operationally and logistically and didn’t want the hassle. So, as he was already at the parent squadron, he got the Philly and just wanted to “get thru it.”