Re: Cause this isn't Star Wars...

On Sun, 9 Sep 2007 22:59:51 -0400, Ric Locke wrote
(in article <1m00q0lpsg4v2$.dl2rdc72snob$.dlg@xxxxxxxxxx>):

On Sun, 09 Sep 2007 08:40:33 -0800, Bill Swears wrote:

Sea Wasp wrote:
Okay, understood (scribbles notes down).

But is some of that driven by the sea spray, etc? -- i.e., you do it
because guns, like most mechanisms, really don't like salt water in the
mechanism? And thus in space this would not be an issue.

Yes, and yet again it's partially culture driven. There are effectively
zero accidental discharge incidents on board a ship where the guns are
all locked up. If the Coast Guard were to have one seaman shoot
another, or himself, with an issue weapon, it would be a shot heard
round the world in terms of funding and public outcry. You might find
in Russian sea service that the situation was other. I wouldn't know.

There are very good reasons to let people check out their weapons
between boardings, and they do (cleaning, familiarization, judgment
pistol qualification). But it is controlled, and bullets are not issued
except for boardings, and live fire exercises, which do occur (not
usually with pistols. I've seen Riot shotgun, 50 cal, occasionally
M16s. I think the range on pistols makes shooting at things off the
side impractical, and few skippers want people shooting at things aboard
ship, but that's just my guess).

Bill

Also, it's a pain in the ass.

People who haven't spent time on one generally have no concept of just
how restricted the space in a military vessel is. "Ladders" between
decks really /are/ ladders, a foot and a half wide and going up at a
sixty degree angle -- and that's on a /big/ ship. Little ones are even
worse. Hatches are typically not much wider than a big man's shoulders,
there are conduits and pipes and boxes and valves and controls and and
and everywhere, and the whole thing is moving constantly, obliging you
to fend off the walls, hatch coamings, and mechanical bits while moving
around. Sailors hate having to carry things for that reason, and having
to carry a weapon around all the time would be insufferable.

A sidearm in a holster would be constantly catching on things, and as
for carrying a rifle around, well, get yourself a six-foot length of 2x2
and carry it with you all day long. That'd be about the right size
proportions for the scale difference between ordinary doors and
corridors and what you'd find aboard ship, and the weight is less.

Anyone who's in the Chicago area might want to pay a visit to the Museum of
Science and Industry, where U-505 is displayed. Remember that several _dozen_
guys lived in that thing for weeks or months at a time. U-505 was captured
off _West Africa_, a _long_ way from home. Some U-boats did combat patrols as
far out as the Indian Ocean, and others made trips to Japan.

For those who might think that I'm being unfair by picking on a submarine,
which are notorious for their lack of space, USS INTREPID is in New York.
Last I heard she's not available to the public right now, they're renovating,
but IIRC she'll be open for business in a few months. USS TEXAS is in
Galveston harbor. USS MISSOURI is in Pearl Harbor. HMS BELFAST is on the
river in London. And, of course, HMS VICTORY is in Portsmouth. Those are an
aircraft carrier, two dreadnought battleships, a heavy cruiser, and a 1st
rate line of battle ship. Space in 'em is, errm, limited.

One of the things I've always disliked about warships as depicted in TV and
the movies (SF and otherwise) is how much _space_ most of 'em have. Some
movies get it right; _Das Boot_, for example. More of 'em are like, oh,
_Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea_ or, worse, _SeaQuest DSV_. I think I've
mentioned what subs are really like...


--
email to oshea dot j dot j at gmail dot com.

.

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