wktaylor
Well-Known Member
This actually happened to my Dad and I in the late 1960s.... when I was about 15-YO...
During the summer of ~1967(?) dad was teaching me to fly in our old [1950s] C182. One summertime-weekend [Saturday?] he recruited me to sit in the right seat as an observer [time-building], while he practiced some 'under-hood IFR' along the SoCal coastline(**).
We took-off from Orange County CA 'muni' and headed to the coastline then turned south to fly a heading almost exactly along the ragged coastline... dotted with cliffs and beaches and small coves... from Laguna Beach CA toward San Diego. It was a pretty 'CAVU Day' with 'no traffic in sight', so I started sightseeing the coastline [2000-ft?] below. We came up-to [another] small rocky-cliff-cove with a narrow pristine white beach sand-shelf [~100-yds wide?] that fell-off sharply into the 'dark ocean depths' in the middle. As we passed-over the cove, I took a second 'long-look' at the 'white-beach-sand' and the 'dark drop-off into the depths'... in the middle of the beach... which had a perfectly odd shape: the blackness was smooth, rounded and 'bullet-shaped' ~1/4 the width of the beach. The round shape started ~100-yd into the ocean from the beach/waves junction... then just disappeared into the darker ocean depths, over less-than 100-yds. 'How very odd'!?
Then it dawned on me, while taking a third hard-look-backwards that, the 'black-shape' seemed to be moving backwards and shrinking in size... into the dark ocean drop-off. Whaaa? That's when I yelled... 'Daaaad... I think that I just saw the front a submarine sitting underwater in that cove we just flew over'!!!
In one smooth move he took off the 'IFR hood' and was eye-to-eye very serious looking. He asked me 'what did you see'? AND I told him. To my shock... he went to full-power and did a really hard-bank to the left... so hard, I was caught off guard by the Gs [something he NEVER did that in the old 182]. He turned us ~180-deg... to put that area of coastline to his
During the summer of ~1967(?) dad was teaching me to fly in our old [1950s] C182. One summertime-weekend [Saturday?] he recruited me to sit in the right seat as an observer [time-building], while he practiced some 'under-hood IFR' along the SoCal coastline(**).
We took-off from Orange County CA 'muni' and headed to the coastline then turned south to fly a heading almost exactly along the ragged coastline... dotted with cliffs and beaches and small coves... from Laguna Beach CA toward San Diego. It was a pretty 'CAVU Day' with 'no traffic in sight', so I started sightseeing the coastline [2000-ft?] below. We came up-to [another] small rocky-cliff-cove with a narrow pristine white beach sand-shelf [~100-yds wide?] that fell-off sharply into the 'dark ocean depths' in the middle. As we passed-over the cove, I took a second 'long-look' at the 'white-beach-sand' and the 'dark drop-off into the depths'... in the middle of the beach... which had a perfectly odd shape: the blackness was smooth, rounded and 'bullet-shaped' ~1/4 the width of the beach. The round shape started ~100-yd into the ocean from the beach/waves junction... then just disappeared into the darker ocean depths, over less-than 100-yds. 'How very odd'!?
Then it dawned on me, while taking a third hard-look-backwards that, the 'black-shape' seemed to be moving backwards and shrinking in size... into the dark ocean drop-off. Whaaa? That's when I yelled... 'Daaaad... I think that I just saw the front a submarine sitting underwater in that cove we just flew over'!!!
In one smooth move he took off the 'IFR hood' and was eye-to-eye very serious looking. He asked me 'what did you see'? AND I told him. To my shock... he went to full-power and did a really hard-bank to the left... so hard, I was caught off guard by the Gs [something he NEVER did that in the old 182]. He turned us ~180-deg... to put that area of coastline to his
side of the '182.
In little-over a minute we re-crossed over that same cove... and the white sand NOW fell-off uniformly across the width-of-cove into the deeper ocean... BUT the water/sand in the center of the cove was heavily stirred-up and had a 'boiling look'.
He immediately called ATC, as we started circling around the cove. He calmly reported to the 'controller' [~as I recall] "we had just past-over a submerged submarine, nose-into a coastline cove/beach... at our location [now circling, altitude]... [but it was] 'no longer insight... may have backed-into the ocean.'
ATC controller responded 'say again Cessna' with a sound in his voice that sounded more like 'say what???'. All radio talk on frequency stopped while Dad and the controller had 'an awkward talk'. The controller finally confirmed he would pass Dad's PIREP to 'their military contact, immediately... reporting this sighting: 'submerged-sub sighted on the SoCal coastline location XX', PIREP.
'We' never heard anything more about this... but I did learn many years later, that Subs... 'ours' and theirs'... play this very dangerous game of stealthy approach to each others coastlines for reconnaissance. I always guessed/hoped that this was 'one of ours, practicing'... that simply 'got caught/sighted/reported' by a random small aircraft flying overhead'.
NOTE1(**). Up/into the early 1970s, along this particular 'isolated stretch' of the SoCal coastline, there was virtually NO human development from Highway1, to the ocean.
The end.
NOTE2 Maneuvering-forward a long slender submarine with a single pusher prop... AND backing-up in shallow water, submerged... is a real test of seamanship for the command crew.
NOW... Your experiences...?
In little-over a minute we re-crossed over that same cove... and the white sand NOW fell-off uniformly across the width-of-cove into the deeper ocean... BUT the water/sand in the center of the cove was heavily stirred-up and had a 'boiling look'.
He immediately called ATC, as we started circling around the cove. He calmly reported to the 'controller' [~as I recall] "we had just past-over a submerged submarine, nose-into a coastline cove/beach... at our location [now circling, altitude]... [but it was] 'no longer insight... may have backed-into the ocean.'
ATC controller responded 'say again Cessna' with a sound in his voice that sounded more like 'say what???'. All radio talk on frequency stopped while Dad and the controller had 'an awkward talk'. The controller finally confirmed he would pass Dad's PIREP to 'their military contact, immediately... reporting this sighting: 'submerged-sub sighted on the SoCal coastline location XX', PIREP.
'We' never heard anything more about this... but I did learn many years later, that Subs... 'ours' and theirs'... play this very dangerous game of stealthy approach to each others coastlines for reconnaissance. I always guessed/hoped that this was 'one of ours, practicing'... that simply 'got caught/sighted/reported' by a random small aircraft flying overhead'.
NOTE1(**). Up/into the early 1970s, along this particular 'isolated stretch' of the SoCal coastline, there was virtually NO human development from Highway1, to the ocean.
The end.
NOTE2 Maneuvering-forward a long slender submarine with a single pusher prop... AND backing-up in shallow water, submerged... is a real test of seamanship for the command crew.
NOW... Your experiences...?
