Posted on: Sunday, September 2, 2001

Jinx fear haunts Greeneville

By William Cole
Advertiser Military Writer

The destroyer USS William D. Porter was a "hard-luck" ship, having accidentally fired a live torpedo in 1943 at the battleship Iowa while President Franklin D. Roosevelt was aboard.

So was the submarine USS Scorpion, which had chronic hydraulic problems with its stern and sail planes before being lost in the mid-Atlantic in 1968 en route to the Canary Islands.

The USS Kamehameha, the first nuclear submarine to be given a Hawaiian name, was lumped in with the bunch in the mid-1960s, when the need for repeated repairs earned it the derisive nickname "Kamie-ha-ha."

Equal parts superstition and circumstance tarnished these ships' reputations, affecting morale, and, in some cases, motivating sailors to want to serve elsewhere.

The question is, with news that the USS Greeneville briefly ran aground Monday in Saipan, is the already-notorious sub joining the bad-luck club?

"I don't know the nickname of it now, but I don't think it will end with 'ville,' " said former Navy submariner Bill Daves of Hale'iwa. "Two accidents is enough in the lifetime of a ship."

Sherry Sontag, co-author of submarine spying bestseller "Blind Man's Bluff," said morale aboard the Greeneville probably has not rebounded since the 360-foot Los Angeles-class fast-attack submarine rammed and sank a Japanese fishing training vessel Feb. 9 off Diamond Head, killing nine men and boys.

"It's not going to be better because of this (latest mishap)," Sontag said. "Nobody likes to be involved with a less than perfect voyage."

The Greeneville received minor scrapes along its keel and to its rudder after Cmdr. David S. Bogdan determined it was unsafe to enter port in Saipan in rough seas and reversed course, the Navy said. A "red sounding" from the fathometer indicated shallow water under the hull.

In the Navy, where lore and superstitions run deep, bad reputations and nicknames are easy to come by as a result of accidents like those involving the Greeneville — despite the fact that the sub,commissioned in 1996, had no history of mishaps.

"You've gone from this boat being a star to it now being jinxed, and it will be interesting to see if it can ever shake it," Sontag said.

Bad luck certainly seems to have dogged some ships. Until its sinking in 1945, the destroyer William D. Porter was hailed in port with the greeting, "Don't shoot, we're Republicans!"

On Nov. 14, 1943, the Porter was part of a convoy escorting the battleship Iowa. On board was Roosevelt, who was heading to the Big Three Conference in Tehran with Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin.

Just east of Bermuda, the Porter accidentally fired a live torpedo at the Iowa, mistakenly believing it was practicing a drill. With FDR watching from his wheelchair at the Iowa's railing, the torpedo detonated behind the battleship.

Banished to the Aleutians, the Porter later accidentally lobbed a 5-inch shell into the front yard of the American base commandant.

Daves, who served on several nuclear-powered subs based out of Pearl Harbor in the 1960s and 1970s, recalls that the ballistic-missile submarine Kamehameha was the butt of jokes when it arrived in the Pacific in the mid-1960s.

"It wasn't a runner," Daves said. "It was always being repaired."

But the Kamehameha redeemed itself, serving until early August as the oldest attack submarine in the U.S. fleet after undergoing a conversion in 1992 to deploy special forces.

The Greeneville may have a similar fortune.

Sontag said that if it is confirmed that Bogdan followed procedure and that the latest Greeneville mishap occurred out of consideration for safety, the matter will be looked upon as minor.

The sub's "momentary grounding" caused minor scrapes, and sheared off a support leg and bolts on an outboard motor fairing used to maneuver the sub, the Navy said. The Greeneville was being repaired in Guam and the incident is being investigated.

"Subs scrape bottoms, bang into mountains, and do all sorts of things. It happens," Sontag said. "Unless the facts change, all you've got is a captain who made a move to avoid endangering his sub and crew."

Sontag said, "There are a lot of captains who scrape bottom and survive."

However, that may not make life any easier for Bogdan, 39, who took over command of the Greeneville in April.

"It's going to be hard for this guy to win for awhile, no matter how good of a captain he is," Sontag said.

Reach William Cole at wcole@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-5459