Life of a Submariner
On Sunday 10th March, about 50 of us gathered to hear Mike Curtis give an interesting talk about life below the waves rather than on the surface as we normally are.
Mike spent quite some years as an officer on Diesel Electric Submarines. I was amused by his definitions – a boat is a submarine and a ship is either a ship or a target! These submarines have the advantage of being peaceful places far away from the turbulence of the surface. However, they are by all accounts rather smelly places, the Diesel gets everywhere and there is definitely not enough water for washing. So I can only imagine what it must have been like toward the end of an 8 week tour! Mike talked with passion about the teamwork, either you all come back to the surface or no-one does – that must make you work together and put aside anything that does not work for the common good – this seems a good lesson for life.
A few people commented afterwards that although they had doubts that they would find submarines interesting but they really enjoyed his presentation. Mike has more nautical talks in his repertoire so maybe we will see him again.
– by Kevin Brown