Sub crew recalls Nearly four decades ago, the nuclear submarine USS Kamehameha steamed into Pearl Harbor on her maiden voyage.
the Kamehameha
The nuclear sub was inactivated
and will be sent to Washington
state to be recycledBy Gregg K. Kakesako
gkakesako@starbulletin.comIt was given a warrior's welcome, complete with marching bands and a reception at the governor's mansion, Washington Place.
Retired Navy Cmdr. Rick Elster and Howard Grover were "plank owners," or members of the Kamehameha's original crew, which commissioned the 425-foot submarine in 1965. They recalled surfacing several months later off Diamond Head, and a day later, the crew marched in a Kamehameha Day parade and attended a reception hosted by the governor.
"The state gave us all kinds of stuff," Elster said. "There were coffee cups with the crest of Hawaii on it and so many other things."
Yesterday, they returned to Pearl Harbor to pay their respects to the oldest ship in the submarine force and participate in the inactivation of the last Benjamin Franklin-class nuclear sub.
Built at the height of the Cold War, the Kamehameha with its arsenal of ballistic missiles patrolled the seas and served as a strategic deterrent to the Soviet Union's might.
The Navy plans to cut up the Kamehameha's hull for recycling in Bremerton, Wash.
"I have mixed emotions," said Grover, who organized this week's reunion of 35 former crew members and their wives. "The Kam is a big and wonderful part of my life."
Pointing to his silver dolphins he still proudly wears on his vest along with other Navy patches and service chevrons, Grover said, "This pierces your heart and pierces your soul."
Grover, 58, was only 21 and the youngest electrician when he reported to the Kamehameha in 1965.
"There's a special camaraderie belonging to a submarine crew since you go through so much," he said. "I grew up on the Kamehameha. After five patrols I was one of its veteran members."
He remembers a cold and dreary San Francisco morning in January 1965 when Sen. Daniel Inouye helped launch the Kamehameha from Mare Island.
"The senator was right," said Grover, referring to Inouye's speech yesterday. "It was very, very cold."
In remarks yesterday, Inouye recalled suggesting to President Kennedy in 1963 that the Navy should name one of its newest nuclear submarines after King Kamehameha, who unified the islands.
"Kamehameha was an extraordinary leader," Inouye said. "He was a master of land and sea warfare."
In tracing the sub's history, Adm. Thomas Fargo, Pacific Fleet commander, said the Kamehameha conducted 63 patrols as a ballistic missile submarine in the Atlantic Fleet before it was converted in 1992 to support Navy SEAL special operations and sent to Pearl Harbor.
Special shelters were built and installed on top of the submarine and served as garages from where divers and special equipment could be launched while the Kamehameha was submerged.
Cmdr. Ed Seal, the Kamehameha's current skipper, said "the Kamehameha very much demonstrates the ability to take a submarine and convert it from one mission, strategic deterrence, to another, special warfare.
After more than 25 years of satisfying deterrence, the submarine has performed outstandingly in a whole new role."