A Year Under Water (Richard Levinge)

Wed, Apr 17th 2019 at 8:00 pm - 10:30 pm

Speaker's Friend: TBA
Vote of Thanks: TBA


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A Year Under Water (Richard Levinge)

Why a year? Because that is the time he actually spent under water in submarines.

After a brief history of submarines starting with the Nautilus in 1800, they didn’t really become viable until the early 1900’s. Those early boats were unreliable and mortality rates were high, I’m not sure that made their crews brave or insane.

Richard served on two nuclear boats, Resolution and Splendid. Apparently there are now 30 decommissioned subs lurking in storage waiting for someone to work out how to safely dispose of their nuclear elements.

When on HMS Splendid he gave us an insight into their risky lives when she fired a wire guided torpedo  at a practice target only to find it missed, circled around and started to come directly for Splendid.

He gave us an insight into life underwater, the companionship, discomforts and humour necessary to survive months of isolation. They must be a special breed of mariner, but I’m still not sure whether they are brave, mad or a combination of both.
 
Martin Odell

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