Practicing For Doomsday

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For this exercise, all the missiles would be aimed at a spot in the middle of the Atlantic. For missiles aimed at countries, Freeland had top-secret notebooks full of "footprints"--the euphemism the missile men used for targets that could be destroyed.

"The firing order will be 4, 23 and 10," Freeland announced.

"The firing order will be 4, 23 and 10," the men in the missile-control center repeated like a Greek chorus. The missiles in tubes 4, 23 and 10 would be fired.

Prepping each missile was only half the job. Getting the tube that it sat in ready for launch was the other half, and just as complicated. Keeping 24 space rockets in a pristine state, ready to launch at any time on a half-hour's notice, was a monumental engineering feat. The buttons, knobs and lights on the launch-control console were divided into rows of 24. They monitored or controlled air pressure and temperature inside each tube, along with the opening and closing of the hatch and access doors for each one. Side panels on the console contained indicators for outside sea pressure and temperature, jettison switches in case a missile caught fire and had to be ejected from the sub, row after row of alarm lights, plus dozens more switches to control hydraulic valves and the pumping of gases into the tubes.

Volonino phoned Freeland with the depth at which the sub would hover for the launch. The men in the missile-control center could feel their room tilt up as the Nebraska rose. Petty Officer Kevin Jany quickly began punching buttons to pump nitrogen gas into the three tubes being used for the launch. He was forcing the nitrogen in to make the pressure inside the tubes equal to the sea pressure outside. The reason Jany had to equalize the pressure was that when the sub's heavy top hatch over each missile tube was opened for the launch, the tube would still be covered with a light blue fiber-glass dome to keep the rocket inside dry. But the fiber glass is relatively flimsy. If Jany didn't equalize the pressure, the weight of the water would crush it and damage the missile.

"Weapons, launcher," Lieutenant Ryan Hardee told Freeland when he saw that Jany had finished. "Launcher ready."

Freeland phoned the missile compartment with the time window the sub had for getting off its first salvo of nukes.

Back at the conn, one level up, Volonino was now satisfied that the first three missiles had the proper targeting instructions entered into them. He had sent Thorson and Davis down to the missile-control center with the combination the emergency-action message had for the CIP key safe. The key was one of the last electrical interlocks needed to fire the missiles. If Volonino stuck it into the captain's indicator panel and turned it, he was giving his permission for the launch.

The two officers, holding the CIP key between them, walked side by side out the missile-control center's entrance into the port passageway. They looked a little ridiculous, both holding the CIP key, walking down the passageway and back up to the conn as if they were in a three-legged race. But everything the crew did with the missiles they did in pairs, for two reasons--to make doubly sure each task was performed correctly and so each man could watch the other for security purposes.

Volonino and Petty Officer Ed Martin stared intently at the digital time readout. The second the launch window opened, Volonino pretended to insert his CIP key into the captain's indicator panel and turn it. He then flipped a training switch on the panel that sent a "training permission to fire" signal to the missile-control center.

"Phone talker, to weapons, the firing window is open," Volonino said. "You have permission to fire."

Freeland held the trigger grip tightly in his right hand and watched the lights on the fire-control console blink from left to right. Lights arranged in two short columns on the right side of the panel were the indicators for the final prepare phase. The bottom light on its second column finally flashed yellow, the signal that the prepare phase for the missile in tube 4 had been completed. Freeland now had just four seconds to squeeze the trigger.

He squeezed it.

In an actual launch, the trigger would send a signal to a gas generator, which is at the base of the missile tube and powered by a solid propellant, to fire. The intense heat from that gas generator's firing instantly flashes water into expanding steam, which forces the missile up and out of the tube. At the same time, plastic explosives laced around the light blue dome covering the top hatch detonate so its fiber glass breaks out into pie sections and doesn't damage the rocket's skin during launch.

As the missile shoots out of the top hatch, it travels up through the water in what amounts to a giant bubble, created by the nitrogen under pressure inside the tube. The missile expels the nitrogen gas as it travels up, preventing water from leaking through the bubble and touching the rocket. Because of the extreme pressure created instantly by the gas generator, the 44-ft.-long missile pops up so fast it completely clears the water. In the next instant, when its gyro senses the missile losing momentum and falling back into the ocean, a signal is sent to the first stage of its rocket to ignite. With a fiery plume on its tail, the D-5 missile is off to space.