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Under the Ice with Submarine Commander Sean Flanagan
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Under the Ice with Submarine Commander Sean Flanagan
Chatting with Sandra and Sandy today is Sean Flanagan, former captain of the USS Pasadena, a nuclear powered submarine that sails in the Arctic Circle. When operating military machinery under ice caps and keels, some reaching 200 feet deep, the term ‘Cold War’ takes on a new meaning. Since 2009, the U.S. has maintained a national presence in the Arctic to protect our interests throughout the region, and Flanagan’s experience doing so is just what the trio talk about today. After graduating from high school at the age 18, Flanagan joined the Navy for what would turn out to be a very long and successful career.
On today’s episode of the Adrenaline Zone, Sean talks about life beneath the ice, the hard work that granted him such a position, underwater navigation tools, and how he and his team prepare for emergencies. Living and working on the USS Pasadena, Flanagan reckoned not only with the importance of experience, but also the lack of off duty time that accompanies the job. He closes out today’s episode with a brief story remembering a moment when things got a little hairy. So be sure to listen in to today’s special episode to learn a little bit more about life under the ice.
The Finer Details of This Episode:
- Flanagan’s early start in the Navy
- Submarine Force pipeline
- Special selection criteria
- Life below the ice
- Navigating with sonar sensors
- Preparing for emergencies
- Sailors’ off duty time
- The steep learning curve
Quotes:
“I would say operating a submarine under the ice sort of gives a new meaning to the term ‘Cold War’.”
“So that first tour for a junior officer is basically learning everything that you can about being a submarine officer.”
“By the time you get to be the captain of a sub, you've had at least three submarine tours; you probably have four because you started off as an enlisted Submariner, and then all this other training and preparation.”
“In 2009, President Bush signed the National Security Presidential Directive 66, which basically said that our role in the Arctic is to assert an active and influential national presence to protect those interests and to project sea power throughout the region.”
“It turns out that when ice forms, the different flows can kind of crash into one another, and instead of fusing together they create one that will go under the other one. That will create these long, very deep ice structures that are called ice keels. And they can go down to 200 feet deep.”
“So you've got the things over you that are coming down 200 feet and you have the ground that is coming up at you–you can be very constrained, I mean to the tune of several meters above and below you.”
“One of the things that really struck me when I was in Annapolis… was the importance of experience.”
“What I will say is that in high risk, high intensity operations, a lot of their off duty time is spent preparing for their on duty time. And then we still had to do things like laundry, eat, and clean– that kind of stuff.”
“So you have to basically do a controlled sinking and the submarine, you have to make it heavier than water. And it has to go down and it has to get deeper than all these ice keels before you can start moving forward. While you're sinking the submarine deeper, deeper, and deeper, you don't have your control surfaces. Your main engines aren't warmed up as you're doing all these things in the meantime.”
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