I can appreciate that. And I was just having a little fun with you.
But I was simply referring to the part where you surface the boat before starting the diesels. I think some folks might be under the impression that you can run those while submerged which is most decidedly NOT the case.
What I think many people don't realize is that a reactor shutdown is likely to be a mission-over/career-ender type of deal for almost the entire officer corps onboard. It's not supposed to happen EVER. It's like forgetting your gun as you exit the helicopter.
BTW, It was "supposed to work" but didn't isn't an excuse. You (as an officer) are responsible. That's what maintenance and drills are for. Reactor shuts down and diesels won't come up? Wow. Major UNSAT. A dead-in-the-water carrier is almost as bad as running the damn thing aground.
I'm wondering how the CNO felt about that poodle-screw.
You can run the diesels underwater though. Obviously there is a limit, but surfacing the boat is neither required (sea state permitting) nor desired ("OH LOOK, A SUB!!").
DIW on a CVN is a big deal, that is true (though hardly a career killer by itself for O-gang, even the ones in Reactor Department). NR takes nuclear safety very seriously and the carrier won't sink just from loss of propulsion so the reactors will very much be configured to fail conservative if necessary.
Even on a submarine, which can flounder without propulsion and only has a single reactor, we do scram drills all the time. A scram can occur for no better reason than that reactor protection was feeling finicky that day, so the drills are designed to assume a scram will happen, and recover safely and efficiently.
On the other hand, an unplanned scram really is one of those things which may get someone disqualified from watchstanding, and possibly de-nuked completely, since those usually represent a crew that doesn't properly respect the power of the reactor.
I don't know that I'd call running with the snorkel up anything but non-submerged. Although I will give you that running at p-depth is almost the same thing. I'm sure you'll agree that anything other than underway on main propulsion is a far less preferable situation than normal ops.
BTW, I spent some time as a bubble-head, so I do understand what you're talking about here. Just keep in mind that not everything you've heard about subs is true and not everything I knew about subs is still true. A lot has changed since I was in.
But I was simply referring to the part where you surface the boat before starting the diesels. I think some folks might be under the impression that you can run those while submerged which is most decidedly NOT the case.
What I think many people don't realize is that a reactor shutdown is likely to be a mission-over/career-ender type of deal for almost the entire officer corps onboard. It's not supposed to happen EVER. It's like forgetting your gun as you exit the helicopter.
BTW, It was "supposed to work" but didn't isn't an excuse. You (as an officer) are responsible. That's what maintenance and drills are for. Reactor shuts down and diesels won't come up? Wow. Major UNSAT. A dead-in-the-water carrier is almost as bad as running the damn thing aground.
I'm wondering how the CNO felt about that poodle-screw.