By Philip R. Devlin
(April 9, 2023) — On April 10, 1963, the USS Thresher, while conducting deep water test dives 200 miles east of Cape Cod, lost power and imploded in 8,400 feet of water. All 129 men aboard were killed instantly. The incident remains the worst submarine disaster in history.
Powered by a nuclear reactor, the USS Thresher was on the cutting edge of attack submarines at the height of the Cold War in 1963. It bristled with the latest in sonar technology and weapons systems.
The 278-foot long attack sub shaped like a cigar was built at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in New Hampshire. Its keel was laid down on January 15, 1958, and it was launched on July 9, 1960. At the time the Thresher was the fastest and quietest attack submarine in operation; most appropriately, its motto was “Vis Tacita”—silent power. Its home base was Groton. It should come as no surprise that there were many Connecticut ties to the ill-fated submarine.
The crew of 129, including 17 civilians, left Portsmouth at 8:00 a.m. on April 8, 1963, and proceeded to a point in the North Atlantic about 200 miles east of Cape Cod for a test dive. While conducting a deep water dive of about 1,000 feet, the Thresher lost its power. Investigators of the disaster believe that a water pipe burst, sending out a stream that shorted out nearby electrical components. That bursting pipe set off a series of cascading events that caused the sub to sink slowly and irretrievably to a depth where the water pressure on its hull was so extreme that it imploded, killing the crew instantly.
The implosion probably occurred between 1,200 and 1,500 feet. The remains of the Thresher then settled on the bottom at a depth of 8,400 feet, where they were discovered by deep sea explorer Robert Ballard of Old Lyme in 1985 — on the same voyage of exploration that Ballard found the Titanic.
The incident remains the single largest submarine disaster in terms of loss of life in history. The vast majority of the crew had attended submarine school in New London; additionally, many had received training in understanding nuclear reactors from Combustion Engineering. CE’s marine nuclear propulsion training facility — known as S1C — was in Windsor, Connecticut. Most of the crew had spent time in Windsor to learn about nuclear propulsion in a submarine. (S1C was later called the Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory and was eventually decommissioned in 1993.) In fact, the Navy used to rent a home at 74 North Main Street in Windsor Locks to house their personnel as they cycled through training at S1C.
The disaster hit Connecticut especially hard. Among the dead were the Shafer brothers of Groton. Both were graduates of Fitch High School. The older of the Shafer brothers was Benjamin, born in 1926 and a member of the Fitch Class of 1944. A World War II Naval veteran, Ben had a keen interest in electronics, especially radios. The Shafer parents also had to endure the loss of another son on the Thresher —their son, John. John Shafer was a senior electrician’s mate, had graduated from Fitch in 1947, and had similar interests in electronics as his older brother.
The following men with Connecticut ties also perished on the Thresher:
Lt. Robert D. Biederman — A Hartford native and Weaver High School graduate, Lt. Biederman had just been assigned to the sub three months before the disaster. He was the superintendent for non-nuclear work.
Seaman David A. Wasel — A New Britain native, David Wasel graduated from high school there in 1959 and joined the Navy. Six of Wasel’s uncles had served in the military during World War II, so military service was a family tradition. Wasel had been assigned to the Thresher just five weeks before it was lost at sea.
Engineman 2nd Class Richard P. Brann — A Windsor Locks High School graduate of 1957, Richard Brann joined the Navy immediately upon graduation. He had served on another sub — the Wahoo — prior to being assigned to the Thresher. Besides his pregnant wife, Richard left behind his parents and two brothers on North Street in Windsor Locks. One of his brothers, Danny, the youngest of the three Brann brothers, was a childhood friend of mine.
Lt. Frank J. Malinski — Though born in New Jersey, Frank Malinski grew up in Fairfield County in the town of Stratford. He was a Fairfield Prep graduate in 1957. Malinski then attended Holy Cross College, graduating in 1961. He soon joined the Navy and became a lieutenant, taking advanced training in nuclear power.
Lt. John Smarz, Jr. — Born in Shelton, in 1929, John Smarz graduated from high school there in 1947 and joined the Navy. He studied electronics first, then he became qualified as a nuclear reactor operator. He served on one other sub before being assigned to the ill-fated Thresher.
Five of the seven Connecticut men onboard the Thresher had jobs that dealt with electrical components and the operation of the nuclear reactor. One can only imagine the central role that those five Connecticut guys had in trying to re-start the crippled sub and the fear that must have gripped them as the sub sank ineluctably to its watery grave.
Richard Brann’s role was of particular importance in trying to save the Thresher, according to author John Bentley. In his 1974 publication entitled The Thresher Disaster, Bentley notes that in his last attempt to re-start the Thresher to arrest its free fall into certain disaster, Commander John Wesley Harvey ordered Richard Brann to release a reservoir of steam. On page 43 of his book Bentley writes the following:
“Engineman 2nd Class Richard Brann, at the Steam Control Section Panel, instantly obeyed the order. Along with leading Electronics Technician Raymond Foti, Brann had been a special duty trainee…for eight months while Thresher was in dry dock. And like Foti, he knew his job thoroughly. But it was now too late. Thresher, now below crush depth and sinking ever faster, had exhausted her last hope. As the hands of the clock moved inexorably toward 0917, the Navy’s most advanced attack submarine, built at a cost of $45 million, had a life expectancy of about one minute.”
Normal atmospheric pressure at sea level for a human being is 14 psi. When the Thresher imploded, the 1500 ton torrent of water that blew into the sub raised that pressure to more than 800 psi– the equivalent of more than a ton of dynamite exploding. This implosion took less than one-tenth of a second, not long enough for the human nervous system to react; in other words, the crew never knew what hit them. Undoubtedly, the terror they felt was one of the anticipation of implosion as the sub dropped stern first through the crush depth. Subsequent deep sea explorations revealed that the magnitude of the implosion scattered debris over an area exceeding 140,000 square yards. When one considers the tremendous resistance that water exerts on moving objects, a 140,000 square yard debris field boggles the mind.
Men from 34 states, the Philippines, and Washington, D.C. perished on the Thresher. By far, the greatest number of victims came from New York — 17. Massachusetts was next with 10, followed by Maine with nine. Both New Hampshire and Connecticut lost seven of
of its native sons to the sea 60 years ago on April 10, 1963.
On April 7, 2013, at the 50th anniversary remembrance of the disaster, hundreds of people, including relatives of the lost men, attended a memorial service for the victims of the Thresher in Kittery, Maine. According to news accounts of the ceremony, a 129 foot flagpole — one linear foot for each victim — was dedicated to their memory in a village close to the sea where they all rest. Appropriately, just as the limp flag reached the top of the pole a strong wind kicked up and blew the flag straight out from the pole and toward the sea as if to salute the victims.
Nearly four months after the Thresher disaster in 1963, President John F. Kennedy, a decorated Navy war hero of World War II himself, had the honor of addressing the Naval Academy midshipmen at Annapolis. Deeply affected by the loss of the Thresher and recognizing the importance of naval service at the height of the Cold War, President Kennedy had this to say about service in the Navy: “Any man who may be asked in this century what he did to make his life worthwhile… can respond with a good deal of pride and satisfaction, I served in the United States Navy.”
