I'm not sure what they were doing out there (backside of Catalina Island), but all day Monday and Tuesday we saw the sub going back and forth, accompanied by some small "patrol" type boats. Tuesday afternoon it looked like one of the small boats made a rendezvous with him, so I'm gonna take a SWAG and say the little guys were U.S. Navy, too.
NOBODY in their right mind would get so close to a sub that they could transfer people unless they were authorized!
I don't know enough about U.S. submarines to tell what class it was, but I know to see one run on the surface for so long is unusual.
Of course out where we were, there aren't too many other ships just hanging around!
For you guys that know far more about this than I do, I added a crop from one of the better pix I took.
Have at it!
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looking aat the rudder, sail, length, freeboard, it's a Trident class boat
ReplyDeleteAt first I thought it was a Trident or SSGN, but it doesn't have the turtleback for the missiles, and the sail is too far forward. It's too big for a 688/Los Angeles class, and the sail's too far forward for that, as well.
ReplyDeleteThat narrows it down to Seawolf class or Virginia class...and again, based on the sail positioning (because the control center doesn't need to be directly below the sail for Virginia class), we in my office (admittedly, I used a collection of deductive reasoning) are putting our chips on Virginia class submarine.
Virginia... :-)
ReplyDeleteI bow to Old_NFO, a *real* Navy guy!
ReplyDeleteYeah, right :-)
ReplyDeleteNope, a t-hull.
ReplyDeleteThe rudders on the SSN's are much taller in relationship to the topside aft deck. In addition, SSN's have a natural 1 up angle while surfaced and slow (or stop). T-hull's sit at a 0 bubble.
I should know, I retired after 21 years of fast boats and for the last 10 years I've worked at a shipyard working on the boats.
T-Hull?
ReplyDeletePlease, enlighten all of us who ride targets!
t-hull = trident, i.e., SSB(G)N
ReplyDeleteAhhh....I see.
ReplyDeleteI added an enlarged and cropped picture from one of the many I took. Should give you guys a better view. It also shows one of the "patrol" boats that was playing games with the Big Guy.
Still a t-hull. Length, rudder, sail, aft topside structure. By the way I'm all of the a on posters (anon because of my employment, which is a public shipyard)
ReplyDeleteStill a t-hull. Length, rudder, sail, aft topside structure. By the way I'm all of the a on posters (anon because of my employment, which is a public shipyard)
ReplyDeleteNot a problem. I appreciate the input.
ReplyDeleteOff Catalina island is San Clemente. This is frogmans playland (Navy SEAL's). Most likely they were doing training op's. That's my best guess.
ReplyDelete