"Hot racking"

[Ed Rotondaro]

Hi:

Here's a chance for all your current and former sailors to educate us. Does the USN still "hot rack", i.e. have two sailors share a bunk? I believe that subs still do this, but is this done on larger surface combatants? C'mon Scott this is your chance to show off.;)

[Scott Chisholm]

Hi:

Here's a chance for all your current and former sailors to educate us. Does the USN still "hot rack", i.e. have two sailors share a bunk? I believe that subs still do this, but is this done on larger surface combatants? C'mon Scott this is your chance to show off.;)

Ed,

What do you actually mean by "share"? :eek:

Yes, on some ships you may find yourself with more people than racks. This is particularly true during "Middie Season" - Midshipman Summer Cruises where the smaller ships will not have sufficient racks in Officer's Country for the Middies. They usually get bumped to Chief's Berthing, but we will seldom put First Class Mids (Seniors) in Enlisted Berthing as their First Class Cruise is intended for them to exercise authority as an officer.

I spent my First Class Cruise sleeping on a cot in a two-man stateroom.

[asnrobert]

On the missile subs I served on, it was rare. On the Georgia, we sometimes had more crew than bunks, but they would put makeshift bunks in the missile compartment- usually in lower level (which is where I slept on my first patrol). On one of the older boomers I served on, I recall a couple of the junior sailors slept alongside the torpedoes, just like on the the old WW2 boats, but that was only on one patrol. Occasionally if we had a bunch of observers on board, some of the enlisted crewmen would hot-bunk. Basically they would have three men assigned to two bunks, with the three men all on different watches so that one man was on watch and the other two bunks available to the two men off duty.

[Ed Rotondaro]

On the missile subs I served on, it was rare. On the Georgia, we sometimes had more crew than bunks, but they would put makeshift bunks in the missile compartment- usually in lower level (which is where I slept on my first patrol). On one of the older boomers I served on, I recall a couple of the junior sailors slept alongside the torpedoes, just like on the the old WW2 boats, but that was only on one patrol. Occasionally if we had a bunch of observers on board, some of the enlisted crewmen would hot-bunk. Basically they would have three men assigned to two bunks, with the three men all on different watches so that one man was on watch and the other two bunks available to the two men off duty.

Robert and Scott:

By Hot racking and sharing, I was inquiring if a sailor on duty would return to his bunk that was recently inhabited by another sailor who was off duty. Apparently this was more of the nrom on WWII ships due to increased crews for AA/Radar etc.:)

[asnrobert]

Robert and Scott:

By Hot racking and sharing, I was inquiring if a sailor on duty would return to his bunk that was recently inhabited by another sailor who was off duty. Apparently this was more of the nrom on WWII ships due to increased crews for AA/Radar etc.:)

Also on WW2 subs, due to limited berthing space. And yes, when a sailor went off duty, the bunk he slept in had been vacated by the sailor going on duty. It would still be warm, hence the term "hot bunking." ;)

[Scott Chisholm]

Ed,

I did a paper for one of my Naval Sciences courses back at A&M comparing US and Soviet ship designs. There were five areas I looked at: endurance, habitability, hull/armor, weapons, and electronics.

I seem to remember that in 1982 the ranking for the USN were, from most important to least important: endurance, habitability, electronics, weapons, hull/armor.

The Soviets were: weapons, hull/armor, electronics, endurance, habitability.

Mind you, these are 28 year old memories....

In any event, the point I am trying to make is that in the early 80s the Soviet design philosophy was the same as our had been in WWII.

That paper came back to me in spades during my first deployment. The Soviets used to maintain an anchorage in international waters off the coast of Oman in the North Arabian Sea. We, being the ultra-sexy CGN, would steam through their anchorage (hey, it's international waters!) and take photos of their ships. One day, a brand new SOVREMENNY DDG was anchored and I got photos of the crew taking salt water showers on the fantail:

159

That photo was taken in August 1988. Notice, that the arrangement was not an "Oh my! The showers are broken! Let's rig a make-shift shower!" Time and effort went into that rig, which implies they intended to use it more that once.

[john964]

Ed,

I did a paper for one of my Naval Sciences courses back at A&M comparing US and Soviet ship designs. There were five areas I looked at: endurance, habitability, hull/armor, weapons, and electronics.

I seem to remember that in 1982 the ranking for the USN were, from most important to least important: endurance, habitability, electronics, weapons, hull/armor.

The Soviets were: weapons, hull/armor, electronics, endurance, habitability.

Mind you, these are 28 year old memories....

In any event, the point I am trying to make is that in the early 80s the Soviet design philosophy was the same as our had been in WWII.

That paper came back to me in spades during my first deployment. The Soviets used to maintain an anchorage in international waters off the coast of Oman in the North Arabian Sea. We, being the ultra-sexy CGN, would steam through their anchorage (hey, it's international waters!) and take photos of their ships. One day, a brand new SOVREMENNY DDG was anchored and I got photos of the crew taking salt water showers on the fantail:

159

That photo was taken in August 1988. Notice, that the arrangement was not an "Oh my! The showers are broken! Let's rig a make-shift shower!" Time and effort went into that rig, which implies they intended to use it more that once.

Scott, I know waht you mean, when I was in we had a port visit to san diego by a couple of russian ship and they had tours of the non secret areas mostly the weather decks and some messing and berthing areas but the thing, I remember most was how much the spaces stank of sweat and other things:eek::eek:

[Ed Rotondaro]

:D
Ed,

I did a paper for one of my Naval Sciences courses back at A&M comparing US and Soviet ship designs. There were five areas I looked at: endurance, habitability, hull/armor, weapons, and electronics.

I seem to remember that in 1982 the ranking for the USN were, from most important to least important: endurance, habitability, electronics, weapons, hull/armor.

The Soviets were: weapons, hull/armor, electronics, endurance, habitability.

Mind you, these are 28 year old memories....

In any event, the point I am trying to make is that in the early 80s the Soviet design philosophy was the same as our had been in WWII.

That paper came back to me in spades during my first deployment. The Soviets used to maintain an anchorage in international waters off the coast of Oman in the North Arabian Sea. We, being the ultra-sexy CGN, would steam through their anchorage (hey, it's international waters!) and take photos of their ships. One day, a brand new SOVREMENNY DDG was anchored and I got photos of the crew taking salt water showers on the fantail:

159

That photo was taken in August 1988. Notice, that the arrangement was not an "Oh my! The showers are broken! Let's rig a make-shift shower!" Time and effort went into that rig, which implies they intended to use it more that once.

Scott:

This is why we won the Cold War! Now if we could just convince the bad guys in the Middle East that material comforts matter, we could round them all up and serve a few Starbucks and settle that mess. I gotta go to bed.