Preliminary Design by Chief Jack Lehman
The information on this page came from good friend and retired Navy hard hat diver, Jack Lehman. I first met Jack many years ago, about 2010, at an Olive Garden restaurant. He was wearing his USS Saratoga cap and we struck up a conversation. We had dinner together that night and remained friends, right up until his death in 2019.
Jack was one of the Navy hard hat divers aboard the USS Petrel. He dove to recover the H-bomb dropped at Palomares, Spain after a mid-air collision between two Air Force planes — a B-52 and a KC-135 tanker — on 17 January 1966.
In 1963 the Navy was considering a way to bring a submarine to the surface in an emergency situation. They developed the idea of using a system of balloons that could be deployed and inflated to do the job. The idea was eventually scrapped, but what follows are photos of the preliminary design drawings from 1963. You can see Jack's signature on the lower left of the title block, as he was assigned to the project.
Here is the full sheet. Too large and too faded for the scanner, each section was photographed separately and the photos processed to make them as legible as possible.
A full shot showing the five balloons they determined would be needed.
The title block of the drawing showing the 24 April 1963 date, Jack's signature, and the names of the designers and draftsmen.
The flush-deck balloon container, shown below with deflated balloon, pressure-activated hatch, air supply hose, and dye marker to be released when deployed.
A cross section showing one of the two balloons that would be deployed from storage space recessed in the side of the sail.
A section showing the deployed aft twin balloons.
