women on subs

1530 Views 50 Replies 14 Participants Last post by watcher, May 5, 2010

ET1 SS

Discussion Starter · May 2, 2010

News reports that one of my old boats, the USS Alaska SSBN 732 is to be the first to welcome onboard female crewmembers.

One senior chop officer and two JOs, will go into a 3-person officer stateroom.

No design modifications to the submarine are required. This 'costs' nothing, since the subs were already designed for this purpose.

The crew has had to make a sign to hang on one door, this sign was the entire modification required. The crew used a previously existing 'Blowing Sanitarys' sign and painted over it.

Training starts now and will take approx 15-months before the first group of females will be ready to report onboard.

Navy to allow women to serve on submarines - Military- msnbc.com
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/36854592/ns/us_news-military/

Navy News Service - Eye on the Fleet
http://www.news.navy.mil/view_photo...WIDO9A&usg=AFQjCNGThOVLLJ6TrAjD6Q78O9yHtqFZRg

1 - 20 of 51 Posts

deaconjim

· #2 · May 2, 2010

You know, as a former submariner, it goes against my grain to see this happening. I have to admit though, that I can't come up with a serious argument for not allowing women to serve aboard submarines.

There are of course, some privacy issues that will have to be addressed, and some that the crews will most likely just have to live with. When I was stationed aboard a sub that was in the yards undergoing overhaul, there were female yard workers everywhere including the berthing areas. We had to go about our business regardless, and to my knowledge no one has any permanent emotional scars from the experience.

ChristyACB

· #3 · May 2, 2010

LOL...I'm permanently scarred from one of the HT's walking in my stateroom head while I was taking a shower to do a monthly plumbing check.

No matter what you do, surface or sub, we all have to make accommodations. I'm totally excited for it!

It's is hard to get nuke qualified folks, you need to be really smart and dedicated to get through the school, particularly the officer one. So many super candidates have to be passed over because they are female (me included in 1996, I thought the officer designator guy was gonna cry). This will makes things cheaper in the long run since they can choose the top folks, regardless of sex, and have far fewer drops in the schools after they've already spent a big chunk on the education.

deaconjim

· #4 · May 2, 2010

ChristyACB said:
LOL...I'm permanently scarred from one of the HT's walking in my stateroom head while I was taking a shower to do a monthly plumbing check.

No matter what you do, surface or sub, we all have to make accommodations. I'm totally excited for it!

It's is hard to get nuke qualified folks, you need to be really smart and dedicated to get through the school, particularly the officer one. So many super candidates have to be passed over because they are female (me included in 1996, I thought the officer designator guy was gonna cry). This will makes things cheaper in the long run since they can choose the top folks, regardless of sex, and have far fewer drops in the schools after they've already spent a big chunk on the education.

There were females in my nuke school class, but they stopped accepting them after that class because there were no non-combatant nuclear ships at the time, so the only billets the females could fill were the shore duty billets that they guys would have gone to after their sea duty rotation. The ladies were just as capable of handling the academic requirements as the guys, and they were also quite capable of doing the job while working in the power plants.

ET1 SS

Discussion Starter · #5 · May 2, 2010

deaconjim said:
There were females in my nuke school class, but they stopped accepting them after that class because there were no non-combatant nuclear ships at the time, so the only billets the females could fill were the shore duty billets that they guys would have gone to after their sea duty rotation. The ladies were just as capable of handling the academic requirements as the guys, and they were also quite capable of doing the job while working in the power plants.

Females filling shore-duty billets has been a problem for years.

When I completed my first sea-tour, my detailer told me that there were no shore-duty openings due to females taking them. So I stayed on sea-duty. It seemed dumb to have females in my rate if they can not go to sea and they can only fill-up the shore-duty billets.

After my second sea-tour, when I had 9 years in uniform, I had 7 years at sea [2 in school]. I was again told that there were no shore-duty billets available due to females.

I spotted an ad for Law Enforcement billets, I was able to go outside of my rate and do shore-duty as Navy Police.

Doing Navy Police work I was exposed to an entirely different side of the Navy. Lots of females who go from shore-duty to shore-duty, and never go to sea. They can do an OUTUS tours and get counted as if it was sea-duty. I did 3 years of Law Enforcement shore-duty and I went back to sea.

At my 17 year mark, I was again told by my detailer that there was no shore-duty billets open. He advised me to stay at sea. I had 12 years at sea at that point, if I had stayed in my rate I would have completed a 20-year career with one shore-duty tour.

I went back to Law Enforcement for my twilight tour.

During my last tour I did OUTUS Law Enforcement, my last supervisors [an E7, an E8, and an E9] were all filled with females who were junior to me. By being minority females they made advancement every time they took the test. The normal prerequisites of sea-time and in-rate qualifications were waived for them. Among my supervisors only one had ever been to sea. The E9 had spent 6 months at sea before getting pregnant. With the exception of that one E9 female who had done 6-months at sea, they had all been rotating between OUTUS shore-duty and CONUS shore-duty.

See less See more

deaconjim

· #6 · May 2, 2010

ET1 SS said:
Females filling shore-duty billets has been a problem for years.

When I completed my first sea-tour, my detailer told me that there were no shore-duty openings due to females taking them. So I stayed on sea-duty. It seemed dumb to have females in my rate if they can not go to sea and they can only fill-up the shore-duty billets.

After my second sea-tour, when I had 9 years in uniform, I had 7 years at sea [2 in school]. I was again told that there were no shore-duty billets available due to females.

I spotted an ad for Law Enforcement billets, I was able to go outside of my rate and do shore-duty as Navy Police.

Doing Navy Police work I was exposed to an entirely different side of the Navy. Lots of females who go from shore-duty to shore-duty, and never go to sea. They can do an OUTUS tours and get counted as if it was sea-duty. I did 3 years of Law Enforcement shore-duty and I went back to sea.

At my 17 year mark, I was again told by my detailer that there was no shore-duty billets open. He advised me to stay at sea. I had 12 years at sea at that point, if I had stayed in my rate I would have completed a 20-year career with one shore-duty tour.

I went back to Law Enforcement for my twilight tour.

During my last tour I did OUTUS Law Enforcement, my last supervisors [an E7, an E8, and an E9] were all filled with females who were junior to me. By being minority females they made advancement every time they took the test. The normal prerequisites of sea-time and in-rate qualifications were waived for them. Among my supervisors only one had ever been to sea. The E9 had spent 6 months at sea before getting pregnant. With the exception of that one E9 female who had done 6-months at sea, they had all been rotating between OUTUS shore-duty and CONUS shore-duty.

If women are going to be a part of the service, they need to play by the same rules. The military is one place where everyone should be treated the same.

EasyDay

· #7 · May 2, 2010 (Edited)

ET1 SS said:
Females filling shore-duty billets has been a problem for years.

When I completed my first sea-tour, my detailer told me that there were no shore-duty openings due to females taking them. So I stayed on sea-duty. It seemed dumb to have females in my rate if they can not go to sea and they can only fill-up the shore-duty billets.

After my second sea-tour, when I had 9 years in uniform, I had 7 years at sea [2 in school]. I was again told that there were no shore-duty billets available due to females.

Concur. But, in defense of the females, we had a heck of a time GETTING to sea due to lack of billets. I do understand that the men often had to go overseas to get on dry land because so many CONUS billets were filled by females. Don't blame the women. They didn't develop the billeting structure.

I joined the Navy to go to sea. Boy, was I disappointed when I found out how few female, sea-going billets were available. I was ecstatic when they started allowing women onboard combatants!! Turns out that I loved it at sea as much as I thought I would.

I spotted an ad for Law Enforcement billets, I was able to go outside of my rate and do shore-duty as Navy Police.

Doing Navy Police work I was exposed to an entirely different side of the Navy. Lots of females who go from shore-duty to shore-duty, and never go to sea. They can do an OUTUS tours and get counted as if it was sea-duty. I did 3 years of Law Enforcement shore-duty and I went back to sea.

Yep, it was overseas shore duty and counted as sea duty for ROTATIONAL purposes only. They HAD to give women some way to get into the rotation. Again, don't be bitter... it wasn't the women's fault.

At my 17 year mark, I was again told by my detailer that there was no shore-duty billets open. He advised me to stay at sea. I had 12 years at sea at that point, if I had stayed in my rate I would have completed a 20-year career with one shore-duty tour.

I went back to Law Enforcement for my twilight tour.

During my last tour I did OUTUS Law Enforcement, my last supervisors [an E7, an E8, and an E9] were all filled with females who were junior to me.

No, they had less time IN than you, but were NOT junior to you. Rank gives seniority. I know that's a hard pill to swallow. I can assure you that, as a Chief, it's tough to listen to some Ltjg who's been in less than 2 years think they know everything, and don't have the good sense to consider the 15-20 yrs experience of their "juniors". But it is what it is.

By being minority females they made advancement every time they took the test. In YOUR rating maybe. So maybe your rating should have been one that was closed to women. Many were, back in the day.
The normal prerequisites of sea-time and in-rate qualifications were waived for them.
Sea-time, yeah, again, no fault of the women. But, in-rate quals? I don't believe it. Among my supervisors only one had ever been to sea. The E9 had spent 6 months at sea before getting pregnant. With the exception of that one E9 female who had done 6-months at sea, they had all been rotating between OUTUS shore-duty and CONUS shore-duty.

Once the first onload of women showed up on carriers, I was pleased to see that there wasn't the whining from the women that I had somehow envisioned. Quite the contrary. The women jumped into the quals, getting surface and air qualified on their own time. They had not had much opportunity to get their quals prior to this time, and it was a detriment to their careers. The majority turned out to be hard workers, doing what had to been done everyday... while many guys turned out to be the whiners. Go figure!

EasyDay

· #8 · May 2, 2010

As far subs... yep, women should get that opportunity, but I do see quite a few issues that would need to be sorted out, mostly for enlisted, as they don't get "staterooms".

I know when I would do installs on subs, the gear was so close together that if a sailor had to get past me, we would do a full "body rub" (I mean shoulder to toes) to let him past. The decision to be made at that point was: Should I face the gear and let them rub my back and heiny, or turn around so they across rub my front? And should he turn his back to me or his front? Oh, such silly dilemmas that for a group of adults should not even matter, but it does, you know? I'm one to suck it up and move on, but I can see where some may not want to "feel" that guy from shoulder to toes. Do I need to ask why the same guy came through 3 or 4 times? LOL

See less See more

Ross

· #9 · May 2, 2010

Good news I would say. Canada was there in 2001 with no serious problems I've read about.

ET1 SS

Discussion Starter · #10 · May 2, 2010

EasyDay said:
Once the first onload of women showed up on carriers, I was pleased to see that there wasn't the whining from the women that I had somehow envisioned. Quite the contrary. The women jumped into the quals, getting surface and air qualified on their own time. They had not had much opportunity to get their quals prior to this time, and it was a detriment to their careers. The majority turned out to be hard workers, doing what had to been done everyday... while many guys turned out to be the whiners. Go figure!

In my limited exposure to sailors of the target fleet I did observe that they commonly confuse Rank with senority, thinking that a higher pay-grade gives you senority.

That is not how things work in the combatant fleet.

ChristyACB

· #11 · May 2, 2010

ET1 SS said:
Females filling shore-duty billets has been a problem for years.

When I completed my first sea-tour, my detailer told me that there were no shore-duty openings due to females taking them. So I stayed on sea-duty. It seemed dumb to have females in my rate if they can not go to sea and they can only fill-up the shore-duty billets.

After my second sea-tour, when I had 9 years in uniform, I had 7 years at sea [2 in school]. I was again told that there were no shore-duty billets available due to females.

I spotted an ad for Law Enforcement billets, I was able to go outside of my rate and do shore-duty as Navy Police.

Doing Navy Police work I was exposed to an entirely different side of the Navy. Lots of females who go from shore-duty to shore-duty, and never go to sea. They can do an OUTUS tours and get counted as if it was sea-duty. I did 3 years of Law Enforcement shore-duty and I went back to sea.

At my 17 year mark, I was again told by my detailer that there was no shore-duty billets open. He advised me to stay at sea. I had 12 years at sea at that point, if I had stayed in my rate I would have completed a 20-year career with one shore-duty tour.

I went back to Law Enforcement for my twilight tour.

During my last tour I did OUTUS Law Enforcement, my last supervisors [an E7, an E8, and an E9] were all filled with females who were junior to me. By being minority females they made advancement every time they took the test. The normal prerequisites of sea-time and in-rate qualifications were waived for them. Among my supervisors only one had ever been to sea. The E9 had spent 6 months at sea before getting pregnant. With the exception of that one E9 female who had done 6-months at sea, they had all been rotating between OUTUS shore-duty and CONUS shore-duty.

I'm wondering if it has been a while since you retired. That isn't much of a problem anymore since we go everywhere except subs.

And in my designator...at this time females are taking sea billets at a rate nearly double of the males and we're being held back from taking back to back ones so the guys can get off their duffs in time to get the mando tour before their next ranking board.

Considering that before females were "officially" allowed to go to sea, many others and myself used to get TAD orders to ships for 89 days..the max allowable by law. Then they would pull in, people had liberty...except us...as we processed orders off the ship and into whatever facility was there. Then, 25 hours later, we get another set of TAD orders for 89 days out to the ship again.

Guess how many deployments we did that way without getting Sea Service ribbons?

When I see the reality...that women make up about 30% of the force and do about 31% of the sea time, I get really annoyed with the whole "females took my billet" thing.

Some rates they did get restricted and subs is one of those areas. Bad planning on their part, but that isn't the whole navy.

See less See more

ChristyACB

· #12 · May 2, 2010

ET1 SS said:
In my limited exposure to sailors of the target fleet I did observe that they commonly confuse Rank with senority, thinking that a higher pay-grade gives you senority.

That is not how things work in the combatant fleet.

We don't have a recognition of a non-rank related seniority in the United States Navy.

You have rank. Period.

If you are the same rank as someone else, then the person who has the lower lineal number is senior and has seniority. (Enlisted by Date of Rank and if the same, then date entry in the service).

Seniority is NOT recognized outside a rank structure. If I had a sailor walk in with 25 years and try to pull that he had seniority on me, I'd have him. And he'd be in basic petty officer education again.

And please don't pull combatant thing. My first combatant ship was an FF...not and FFG..an FF. They never had women except us permanent TAD'ers and we lived next to diesels in racks that were cut down to 5 feet to fit the space. I've been combatant since January 1987.

ET1 SS

Discussion Starter · #13 · May 2, 2010

ChristyACB said:
We don't have a recognition of a non-rank related seniority in the United States Navy.

You have rank. Period.

On subs that I served on a lower pay-grade crewman was commonly in charge of higher pay-grade personnel whenever the crewman is fully qualified and had senority over that higher pay-grade sailor.

This was very common during my Active Duty career [1976 to 2001].

Do not confuse rank with senority.

Ideally in time everyone gets fully qualed and this does not happen as often. However in real life it did happen fairly often.

I have been in charge of sailors who were higher in pay-grade then I, and I have worked for crewmen who were held lower paygrades than I did.

I do understand that from your perspective in the target fleet, this might not have been very common.

See less See more

deaconjim

· #14 · May 2, 2010

ET1 SS said:
On subs that I served on a lower pay-grade crewman was commonly in charge of higher pay-grade personnel whenever the crewman is fully qualified and had senority over that higher pay-grade sailor.

This was very common during my Active Duty career [1976 to 2001].

Do not confuse rank with senority.

Ideally in time everyone gets fully qualed and this does not happen as often. However in real life it did happen fairly often.

I have been in charge of sailors who were higher in pay-grade then I, and I have worked for crewmen who were held lower paygrades than I did.

I do understand that from your perspective in the target fleet, this might not have been very common.

This is not something limited to the submarine service. I have worked in one place where a chief was working for a second class in a shore billet.

FourDeuce

· #15 · May 2, 2010

deaconjim said:
If women are going to be a part of the service, they need to play by the same rules. The military is one place where everyone should be treated the same.

You mean they should quit the tradition they've had for years of allowing women to do less than men on the Physical Fitness tests for more points? Are you suggesting true equality? I don't think many women in the military would be in favor of that much equality.:cowboy:

deaconjim

· #16 · May 2, 2010

FourDeuce said:
You mean they should quit the tradition they've had for years of allowing women to do less than men on the Physical Fitness tests for more points? Are you suggesting true equality? I don't think many women in the military would be in favor of that much equality.:cowboy:

No, I don't have a problem with recognizing the physical differences between men and women, as long as the women are okay with always recognizing those differences and dealing fairly with the consequences.

What I'm saying is that, if women want to serve in very close quarters with men on a submarine, they need to recognize the effect of space limitations and close working conditions. They will have to work in very hot, cramped quarters with smelly men who have been away from civilization for extended periods of time. They talk dirty, get mad and yell at you, tell socially inappropriate jokes, and behave in ways that aren't acceptable in normal society. The women may occasionally get a view of a man in his underwear or less, and they might occasionally find themselves in a similar circumstance.

The working hours are long, the conditions are miserable, and the work is hard and dangerous. There are no weekends, days off, or time to relax in the sun. There are no port holes so you can look outside. Personal downtime is a priviledge, not a right. Quite often it's not even possible. If it gets to be too much for you, it is perfectly acceptable to hate it, but that's about all you can do. They aren't going to surface and let you off. You can volunteer on, but you can't volunteer off of submarines.

It's not sexual harrassment, it's part of life on a submarine. It has been that way since the first sub went into service, and it won't change just because the ladies have arrived. If they want to be there (and it is an all volunteer force), they need to get used to the idea and deal with it.

See less See more

SpaceCadet12364

· #17 · May 2, 2010 (Edited)

Yes, some of us sailors ended up taking overseas billets when we went into the Navy....as its been pointed out, for ROTATIONAL purposes only it counted as sea time. No sea pay.

And, not all women "shirk" sea duty, or hard work. I would say, odds are pretty even that both males and females do about the same amount of shirking to get out of having to do whatever.

And, just to let you know...in addition to a couple of tours of that "rotational sea duty", I pulled actual sea time during my 20 years. One tour on an ARS (rescue and salvage boat), and my retirement duty station was a CVN (nuke aircraft carrier). I guess you could say I did the long and the short of it....an ARS is about as small as you can go as a ship and it can still cross the oceans, and of course most should know how big an aircraft carrier is. For those of you who have not experienced life on a carrier, it is not as daunting as you would expect. Once you learn your way around and how to get from point A to point B......it starts to feel kind of small, in a way. Like a small town, around 5000 people or so on average. Just all encased in a limited area, lined with metal.

And I did complete my surface warfare quals, thank you very much! Also had a GQ station in one of the fire lockers on the carrier.

What most of it boils down to, is how emotionally mature BOTH males and females are. There are some that are perpetually stuck in adolescence, and act that way. It does take two to tango. And just as it can be sometimes out in the civilian world, sometimes there are supervisors that will attempt to take advantage of their position of authority over subordinate personnel......guys and gals.......its unacceptable in either scenario (military and civilian), unfortunately it can happen anyways.

See less See more

SpaceCadet12364

· #18 · May 2, 2010

deaconjim said:
No, I don't have a problem with recognizing the physical differences between men and women, as long as the women are okay with always recognizing those differences and dealing fairly with the consequences.

What I'm saying is that, if women want to serve in very close quarters with men on a submarine, they need to recognize the effect of space limitations and close working conditions. They will have to work in very hot, cramped quarters with smelly men who have been away from civilization for extended periods of time. They talk dirty, get mad and yell at you, tell socially inappropriate jokes, and behave in ways that aren't acceptable in normal society. The women may occasionally get a view of a man in his underwear or less, and they might occasionally find themselves in a similar circumstance.

The working hours are long, the conditions are miserable, and the work is hard and dangerous. There are no weekends, days off, or time to relax in the sun. There are no port holes so you can look outside. Personal downtime is a priviledge, not a right. Quite often it's not even possible. If it gets to be too much for you, it is perfectly acceptable to hate it, but that's about all you can do. They aren't going to surface and let you off. You can volunteer on, but you can't volunteer off of submarines.

It's not sexual harrassment, it's part of life on a submarine. It has been that way since the first sub went into service, and it won't change just because the ladies have arrived. If they want to be there (and it is an all volunteer force), they need to get used to the idea and deal with it.

Deaconjim, most of what you said applies to surface as well as submarines. The only difference being that on a surface ship, you can usually get to access the outside and sunshine occasionally........that is, if your job allows it, some jobs even on a surface ship you tend to go to the shop pull your (usually 12 hour) shift, get some food, then head to berthing to try and sleep amongst all those other people that may be smelly or loud or coming and going because its not like all shops run on the same shift pattern or the same times. And, that sleeping time is dependant on drills, qualification requirements, working parties, compartment cleaning, etc etc etc.

I think what would potentially bother me the most, is those ones that you might catch sight of in their undies that have the bodies of those that just would not look good in typical swimwear, there are some things that even eye bleach wont make go away!

So, people will have to make sure they are wearing more than just their underpants when on cruise/patrol. In an emergency though, I think that the sight of someone in their underwear is the least of one's worries.

See less See more

ChristyACB

· #19 · May 3, 2010

ET1 SS said:
On subs that I served on a lower pay-grade crewman was commonly in charge of higher pay-grade personnel whenever the crewman is fully qualified and had senority over that higher pay-grade sailor.

This was very common during my Active Duty career [1976 to 2001].

Do not confuse rank with senority.

Ideally in time everyone gets fully qualed and this does not happen as often. However in real life it did happen fairly often.

I have been in charge of sailors who were higher in pay-grade then I, and I have worked for crewmen who were held lower paygrades than I did.

I do understand that from your perspective in the target fleet, this might not have been very common.

Please don't try to school me, I've been doing this for 24 years.

What you are talking about is positional authority.

That is the same as a gate guard e-3 who is picking his nose at the gate has over the admirals trying to get through the gate. Don't mistake Positional Authority as the keeper of our gate as making that seaman somehow senior, in any possible way, to the admiral. Yes, that gate guard can take him down, but he can't do anything other than what his orders for that position require.

It is the same as a cop and a mayor. Positional authority says he can come in and question and even arrest a mayor, but if that cop mistakes his positional authority for seniority or anything like that and starts yapping at a city council, then he's toast and out of line.

As for watch standers, that is called Positional Authority by Qualification. It means that the LT may be in charge of a CDR for teaching them a watch, and has the responsibility to ensure his UI doesn't blow anything up and even countermand a UI because the qualified watchstander is ultimately responsible. But that LT can't tell the CDR to get down and give him 20 while they are on watch unless their watch is learning how to get down and do 20.

You are making a huge mistake. You were never senior, nor superior, nor any other s work implying greater rank or position. You had a responsibility to pass on your knowledge and remain accountable for your watch and had, therefore, the same positional authority as the gate guard. Narrowly defined and not extending even one hair beyond it.

See less See more

ChristyACB

· #20 · May 3, 2010 (Edited)

FourDeuce said:
You mean they should quit the tradition they've had for years of allowing women to do less than men on the Physical Fitness tests for more points? Are you suggesting true equality? I don't think many women in the military would be in favor of that much equality.:cowboy:

Well then, I suggest we add the qualifying test to the PT test.
While standing bent at 90 degrees with the crown of the head against the wall and the back straight, lift a chair that is resting against the wall directly below the head up by 6 inches, then try to stand. The chair should weigh no more than 10 pounds.

Added: People are already confused and yes, it works we just tested it. Stand 3 feet from the wall, facing it. Have a bar stool or chair that has a high enough seat that it is comfy. Sit it down in front of you against the wall. Bend at the waist 90 degrees with a nice flat back and rest the crown of you head on the wall. Grip the chair and lift it 6 inches. Now try to stand. Guys can't.

No man can do it. Physically impossible since the muscles are wired wrong.

BUT hey...if we can do you should too, right?

See less See more

1 - 20 of 51 Posts

This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.