Black Oil

This installment is a copy of a post from a year ago. It should be included in my midshipman cruise stories,. i have had numerous comments from, dare i say, old sailors about that post. It should be, and now is included in my sea tales.

Long before Navy ships became sophisticated power chains of today, most Navy ships were fueled by black oil. Black oil was just a step above crude oil. Environmentalists would probably have heart attacks just looking at it.

It was the fuel for ship’s boilers after coal and before “Navy distillate,” a cleaner burning oil. i have a number of sea stories about black oil and Navy distillate. This story is about black oil before that other stuff became the Navy’s fuel of choice. It was a thick, viscous, and clinging substance: think of B’rer Rabbit, B’rer Fox, B’rer Bear, and the “Tar Baby.”

In the summer of 1963, the USS Lloyd Thomas (DD 764) was on exercises in the Atlantic OP areas (operational areas). i was a third class midshipman. We were en route from Sydney, Nova Scotia to Bermuda and were refueling from an old Navy oiler. It was the time of black oil.

During the refueling operation, i was assigned to the “DASH” deck aft. i don’t think the sailors topside who weren’t on the refueling teams were wearing service dress whites as in the Goodrich photo, but they could have been. We were in our dungarees (far and away the most impressive, most effective, and most appreciated working uniforms for sailors ever) and in kapok life jackets. We didn’t wear hard hats but we did have on battle helmets.

Ray Bean, a member of the Facebook group, “US Navy Gearing Class Destroyers” posted some rather amazing photos of the USS Goodrich (DD 831) refueling that same year. Ray’s photo here shows the after refueling station on the DASH deck, just forward of the after gun mount:

The refueling hoses were secured to the post in the middle of this photo and the end was placed in a fitting which was a fuel line to the ship’s tanks. The hose was tied off with what we called a “pigtail” to keep the hose in the fitting.

On this particular evolution, the deck seaman in charge of securing the “Pigtail’ did not do a good job. When the refueling began, the force of the black oil through the refueling lines broke the pigtail. Black oil hit that sailor dead on, carrying him back into the lifelines in the upper left hand corner of the DASH deck as shown in the photo. He collapsed in the corner completely covered with the oily goo.

The disaster was reported to the captain on the bridge. He sent his executive officer back to the station to take handle the catastrophe. By the time the XO got to the station, the pigtail had been secured and fuel was being pumped into the tanks. But this old exec was proud of his self-importance. Seeing the fuel was pumping, he raged about cleaning up the mess. He pointed to the gunky mess in the corner and demanded to the officer in charge to get rags, clean the mess up, and to throw that oily mess overboard.

The officer in charge then said, “But sir, that’s Seaman Jones.”

The XO, startled, mumbled something about cleaning everything up and meekly went back to the bridge.

After we cleaned up the seaman, we all laughed.

A Mid-Watch Lesson

It was summer school for me in 1968. Andrew, Rob, and i discovered The Tavern, the Black Pearl, and other delights. i was liking my liberty as an ensign. But the learning curve was almost vertical.

Another lesson came one week night when i had the duty. i was assigned the mid-watch (midnight to 0400) as the Officer of the Deck, in port, (OOD). A second class petty officer was my petty officer of the watch (POOW), and a seaman striker from radio was the messenger. It was a cool, comfortable evening and we were tied up pier side, not nested out with one or two other destroyers between us and the pier. We were port side to.

The watch had been very quiet. Liberty had ended at midnight for the crew. It was about 0200 when a very drunk seaman reeled across the brow to the quarterdeck. When i told him he would be put on report for unauthorized absence, the drunk young man went ballistic. He was cursing and threatening me. i was attempting to determine how i should handle the sailor without getting either of us in trouble when the POOW called the duty master at arms.

The duty master at arms arrived several minutes after the call. He was a first class gunners mate. He had on his dungarees but with a tee shirt rather than the chambray shirt. The left sleeve was rolled up to hold his pack of cigarettes above his massive arms.

Without much more than a polite recognition of the officer, me, he put his arm around the shoulder of the sailor and moved him aft. He said, “Sailor, let’s go have a talk in the paint locker.”

The next morning, i slept as last as i could and still partake of the morning mess. After the mess i walked to the forecastle for divisional quarters at 0750 and colors at 0800. The seaman was in first division and was in the second ranch. Chief Jones was laughing. The culprit looked like he might have been through a meat grinder. One eye was black and bruises were showing wherever there was skin.

The MA gunners mate had taken care of the problem. i don’t think the young man was ever UA again and never caused a problem on board because of drinking. The report chit disappeared before making it to the legal officer.

It was an awakening for me. The underground system for discipline at the sailor level worked well, but all of us would have been before a court martial today.