Attack of the Seawolf

Murphy looked up at the sonar display above Colson’s panel. A broad, ugly, loud streak was forming on the red television monitor, the noise of the helicopter. PWIIIIING! The sonar ping seemed impossibly loud.

This close. Murphy thought, the dipper shouldn’t be able to pick out their ping from the return off the bottom. Right on top of them, and they’d be just so much bottom clutter-“Conn, Sonar, the surface force is speeding up.

Sounds like max revolutions again.”

“Colson?”

“Can’t tell without own-ship speed, sir, but when I dial in an intercept course the dots are stacking … I think that chopper just nailed down our position …”

“Conn, Sonar, up-Doppler on the surface force, thirty-five knots approach speed.”

Murphy leaned over Colson’s Pos One console and dialed in other solutions for the surface force. The only one that worked showed them coming on a direct intercept course.

“Time to intercept?”

“Two minutes, sir,” from Colson.

“Let’s clear datum, sir,” Tarkowski said, the urgency distorting his voice.

“They’ve got us pinned.”

PWIIING!

“Helm, all ahead flank and cavitate!” Murphy ordered.

“XO, man battle stations and spin up the torpedoes in tubes one through four.” They were going to have to fight their way out of this.

As Tarkowski prepared to arm the torpedoes, the deck began to vibrate with the ship coming up to thirty five knots. Murphy looked over at the ship-control team. The Diving Officer and bowplanesman were struggling to maintain depth control in spite of the odd effects of their rooster-tail wake aft and the shallow-bottom venturi force amidships. It was possible that depth control would get so difficult that the ship would leap from the water like a whale or dive into the bottom.

The control room began to get crowded as watch standers filled the room for battle stations The geo plot that had been manned by Tarkowski was now taken over by two plotters and an officer. Another officer now sat at each console of the firecontrol system where only Colson had sat before. Other manual plots were manned along the aft bulkhead of the room. Within a minute of the initial call to battle stations the room’s population had grown from eight to twenty-one.

“Attention in the firecontrol team,” Murphy said to the assembled battle stations watch standers

“It’s clear that the surface force is alerted and prosecuting us at maximum speed, close range. The ASW helicopter above has gotten our position down so there’s no longer any benefit to stealth. We’re trying to withdraw at maximum speed and I don’t care that we’re putting up a hell of a wake topside. We’re only a few moments away from being attacked. It’s my intention to put four wake-homing torpedoes out astern of our track to target the surface force and to act as evasion devices.

If they connect with one of the surface ships, that may distract them long enough for us to make good our escape. If the skimmers detect our launch from the transient noises of the torpedo shots, that alone may make them break off their approach. Any questions?”

At first there was nothing but shocked silence in the control room, broken by the sonar chief calling them over the phone circuit.

“Conn, Sonar, we’ve got a rocfeef-launch transient from the bearing to Target Two—” “What the hell?” Tarkowski mumbled, looking over at Murphy.

“Right fifteen degrees rudder! Steady course one four zero!” Murphy ordered, realizing too well what the report from sonar meant — a rocket-launched depth charge.

A tremendous splash sounded from above on the port side followed by a momentary silence. The deck rolled to port as the ship turned, the snap-roll robbing them of some of their speed but getting them away from the depth-charge splash. Murphy looked up at the chronometer. Four seconds since the splash, and nothing. He could feel his heart beating hard in his chest. The chronometer seemed to have frozen, as did the watch standers in the control room, time somehow oddly slowing down to a crawl as Murphy waited for the explosion, the crashing roar that would breach Tampa’s hull and send them to the bottom of the bay.

And the worst of it was that the ship was helpless.

Once a depth charge was in the water beside them, there was nothing he could do except hope it was a dud and buried itself in the sand of the bottom.