Memories of Spinax

Glenn L. Duncan

I do not remember the name of the ET, but he was headed aft to pick up some parts in the stern room, stepped into the forward engine room and down the hatch by the stills. The watch retrieved him and he stood there stunned for a moment, then said oh! I remember, took a step and went down the hatch a second time.

I'll always remember Mr. cool, Joe Falardo. The Spinax took a large down angle, if not 45 degrees it was close, during a trim dive enroute from Norfolk to Bermuda. Smith, the OOD, hit the control room and stood there dancing from one foot to the other as the bow fell off rapidly. Joe pulled his way into the control room from the forward battery, braced himself on the Aux Gyro and said, "for Christ sakes Smitty do something". You could hear things falling throughout the boat, due to the large angle, when Smith finally turned and said "blow buoyancy, blow main ballast". I blew bow buoyancy and due to the angle and oil or water that came out of the waterway, lost my footing but hung onto the Bow Buoyancy blow valve handle. As I was struggling to get to the main ballast blows, Sexy Rexy Pettigrew leaped through the after battery hatch, slid to the manifold and blew the main ballast tanks. As I recall, the CO came on the 1 MC and said "OK we have held reveille, clean up the mess and get back into your bunks" or words to that effect.

The Spinax always had jokes about the married pukes in New London and their stories they told to get ashore "my wife, my kids, my dog, my car, etc". After we arrived in San Diego I met a young lady and one night before a duty weekend I remained overnight. She had a german shepherd that was pregnant. During the night the shepard pulled my blues off the counter and had her pups on my blues. I got up in the morning and took one look at my blues and gagged. I did a quick wash to remove the residue and donned the wet blues and headed for the landing. When I reported onboard one and a half hours late I told my sad tale to Joe Falardo the duty officer. His comment, between loud gaffs, was, "Duncan, after New London I thought I had heard every story there was, but yours takes the cake".

Joe Averi was a good fellow shipmate and when I showed an interest in radar operations he willingly showed me how to operate the radar in the stern room. Then he showed me how to do maneuvering plots. One night I was headed for my bunk in the after room Joe said he had to go to the head, I said I would hold down the fort. I soon picked up a contact and reported bearing and range to the bridge. Since it was the only contact I began a plot. Being very proud of my ability I reported the contact course, speed and CPA (closest point of approach) to the bridge. When Joe Falardo, the OOD on the bridge responded, I could hear laughter, then, the first question was, "who is in CIC". I reported that Averi had to make a quick head call and Duncan was holding down the fort. The next response from the bridge was " very good Duncan, only problem is you just reported an island moving at 12 knots". Back to the training board for me, I had neglected to put our speed vector into the plot.

I received a write up of the Spinax history some time ago and it reported the Spinax went to Hawaii for local operations. Didn't know Siberia was local to Hawaii. However, I'll never forget the Northern trip thanks to Gordon Phelan and the tin can, screw, and washer saxophone he made during the trip, and standing lookout through the storm we passed through after we passed the Aleutian Islands.