"MMC" wrote in
:

While on a four man EOD Team at Refit Site One (USS Hunley), Holy Loch
Scotland, I learned the actual value of $3.98 "K-BAR" fighting knives.
One of my secondary duties was supply and my OIC couldn't figure out
why we always order knives by the box, but was very pleased that all
maintainence, calibration, and team gear were in order whenever a
mission or inspection popped up!



Electronic calibration in the panic before an inspection is gonna cost
you big favors and markers well into the future from our shop....(c;

I remember one time the Canopus (AS) cal lab got overloaded and there was
some crazy inspection or other happening tomorrow. Strings were pulled
and my shop filled up with some sub's equipment within an hour!

I had stumbled onto a supply of votive candles (thousands) over in the
salvage yard some chaplain tossed out. So, as the astonished bubbleheads
looked on, one of the technicians wrapped a fart sack around his head to
make his turban. We stuck a white cal lab sticker on the turban where
the jewel should have gone. Someone else put a votive candle on each
piece of equipment they'd brought and lit it, putting a nice warm glow in
the lab. The guy with the fart sack turban took a brass spitoon filled
with our ship's evaporator "holy water" and sprinkled the sacred
calibration blessing, while chanting some foreign tongue he'd heard from
a Naples cabbie whos fare had split, over the equipments, instantly
putting all of them in perfect alignment...without even opening the
cases! Another cal lab concubine blew out the candles behind him and put
them back in the sacred box quite reverently. The last guy affixed the
coveted 'CALIBRATED' stickers, stamping and dating them as appropriate.

After the added "Blessing of the Bubbleheads" was performed on the
equipment carriers, guaranteeing safe passage back to the sub, a final
blessing of the local cal lab technicians was performed and we all helped
them load their gear back into their truck.

Passing their inspection with flying colors with all this calibrated
equipment, they brought the gear back for "regulation" calibration a few
days later with, of course, a deluxe ship's plaque for our bulkhead
collection and their captain's letter of commendation for our personnel
jackets, the original of which was framed and hung under the sub's nice
plaque.

The formalities of receiving over, we set out on our task to insure
accuracy of submarine equipment. We surface sailors were well aware of
how our safety was challenged should submarines' calibrations be "off a
tad", as we say in the calibration biz.

Another happy customer with fond memories of USS Everglades (AD-24).

"We Fix Subito!"