Evening star., 1960-05-10
TRITON
Submarine Travelled
MogeIIon's S Course

the first question: What had /
the voyage Of the Triton
proved?
The United States. Capt. |
Beach said. always has believed
in complete freedom of the
seas. Such freedom means, he
said, that ships can go any,
where for purposes of trade and
to visit other lands.
Capt. Beach said the Triton
normally cruised at a depth of
about 80 feet.
Asked about the maximum
depth at which the sub travelled,
the skipper chuckled and with
security in mind shot back:
ASK me another"
Fruit Goes Quickly
Life below seas for that
length of time was not without |
humor. the captain disclosed. !
He reported that the Triton's
supply of fresh fruit lasted only |
about three weeks but the po-
tatoes amazingly lasted 70 days. |
And when the sub surfaced |
of the Delaware coast this
morning, there still were some |
olives aboard.
A few days before completion |
of the voyage. Capt. Beach re-
ported with a smile, he and |
some of the other officers got |
to talking about how good the |
olives would look in a martini. |
So they put out some glasses, |
put an olive in each, and filed |
the glasses with "a lot of cold |
water" Capt. Beach said.
He added: THE effect was
wonderful"
AS for morale during the long
undersea voyage, Capt. Beach |
reported there seemed to be
general agreement aboard that |
it dropped some toward the end
Of the trip.
But he added that he felt |
that was only natural because
the mission had been COM
pleted.
Movies Shown
AS for recreation, Capt. /
Beach noted that this was a
Shakedown cruise for the
Triton. Thus the men did not /.
have much time for recreation.
The Triton had about As
motion picture features aboard, !
Capt. Beach reported, and each
of the films was shown about
three times.
1t got to a point, the skipper
grinned, where selection of the
film to be shown had to be
put to a vote.
BY coincidence the Navy had |
a writer as we'll as a much
decorated submariner as skip
per of the Triton. After World |
War II submarine service in
the Pacific, Capt. Beach wrote
Run Silent, Run Deep" a
novel about submarine shippers
that has been made into a
movie.
He used his writing talents
to turn out the 80-page mar
lrative account of the Triton's
voyage in language not nearly |
so technical as a regular Navy |
ships log would be.
She's No Boat"
Incidentally, Capt. Beach
emphasized in his account that |
the Triton should mark the
end of an era in which sub
marines have been called
boats" American submariners
have called their vessels boats"
ever since 1900 when their |
first 54-foot long sub was in
deed a boat" Capt. Beach |
commented. But with Triton
having the size and horsepower
of a cruiser, he said she sis
no boat" and her crew has re-
solved always to refer to Triton |
as a ship"
The Triton, 44712 feet long, |
is the first submarine powered |
by two atomic reactors-one |
for each of her two propellers. |
She was launched on August |
10, 1858 and commissioned on
November 10, 1859. After
some delay in preparing for
her shakedown cruise sched-
uled for Northern European |
waters, Capt. Beach was sum-
moned to Washington for
conference on February 4, when |
he received his orders to make