A Dartmouth Lifelong Learning class is focusing on the third vessel that will carry the name USS Vermont, a submarine set to be commissioned in April. Photo by Ellie French/VTDigger
At a meeting of Vermont submarine veterans over the summer, Hank Buermeyer had an idea.
The commissioning of the USS Vermont was just months away, and he didn’t think that should go unnoticed. Buermeyer wanted to teach a class about the boat to Vermonters, to give the state a little appreciation for the submarine that was poised to set sail under its name.
After reconnecting with David Battie, an old Navy friend he hadn’t seen in 30 years, the pair decided to put together a course with the Dartmouth Lifelong Learning program that will culminate with a trip to Groton, Connecticut to watch the commissioning in person in April.
The class of 40 gathered in December at Hotel Coolidge in White River Junction for the first lecture. Chaz Phillips, who is set to be the commanding officer of the ship, traveled from Connecticut for the occasion.
“It’s important to make sure that we can outreach with the people that are in Vermont, because this is their ship,” Phillips said. “We want to make sure that they know about the ship, that they can take pride in the ship, and that they can make sure that the crew is dedicated to representing the state.”
The decision to name the boat after the Green Mountain state was made in 2014. It will be the third USS Vermont in history. The first was laid down in 1818, but not commissioned until 1862, at which point it was too outdated to be used, and the second was an early 1900s battleship that was used in several interventions in Central America, and as a training ship during World War I.
The new USS Vermont will be the first of a new class of submarines deployed by the U.S. Navy, Phillips explained. In its anticipated 33-year life span, the boat will need just three major maintenance periods (lasting approximately two years each), rather than four. As such, the boat will be able to deploy 15 times, rather than the 14 of its predecessor.
And to prepare for that launch, the Vermont Commissioning Committee is looking to raise $240,000 for the commissioning event, and to purchase gifts to the boat.
“When you put a bunch of 20- to 30-year-old guys together on a boat, and they’re from all over the country, they kind of get a little bit disoriented,” said Gary Frymyer, a member of the commissioning committee. “Having a namesake state build a relationship with those guys … is a very important process. And we take that very seriously and work hard to accomplish it.”
When it’s at full force, the boat will man 129 sailors, including 17 officers, Phillips said. No women will be on board, though the Navy is beginning to allow female officers on ballistic missile submarines. Phillips said in a few years, they plan on opening that up to crewmembers as well.
The vessel is 377 feet long (about the length of a football field), can dive 800 feet underwater, and travel at speeds of 25 knots or more (almost 30 miles per hour). It will also house 12 tomahawk missiles.
Phillips said in a pinch, the advanced scuba gear on board allows their sailors to escape from up to 600 feet of depth without getting the bends from the changing pressure.
“Your body is not actually adapted to send all that nitrogen throughout your body,” he said. “So you have the ability to actually be able to ascend from 600 feet — but you have to do it quickly.”
On board, Phillips said, they have mechanisms to purify their own water and create their own oxygen.
“As long as the equipment is working properly, food is the only thing that limits us,” Phillips said.
Phillips gave his prepared lecture while answering a constant peppering of questions from the students, many of whom were Navy veterans themselves. The questions ranged from the pedestrian to the super technical. Should you call submarines boats or ships? Boat is the more traditional term, but as the subs get more advanced, “ship” has become much more common.— Do you stop for marine life? Yes, fish and whales are detected with sonar. Do the crew’s cell phones interfere with the boat’s technology? Not as long as they don’t connect to the ship’s functions.
The boat has been in the water since April, but is still having its final touches put on, Phillips said. Once complete, it will go through two phases of testing, the first involving things like deep dives and high speed runs, and the second being a more exhaustive phase where the crew will test every piece of equipment on board to make sure it’s operating correctly.
After that, the boat will go through one last round of fixes before getting inspected by the Navy, and certified for its first deployment.
Phillips said that starting to roll out the new fleet of submarines is a big deal for the Navy, especially as the competition from abroad increases.
When he first enlisted in 2002, Phillips said the United States’ submarine force was one of the country’s major “asymmetric advantages” over its competitors. But now, he said, with a constant stream of technological advancements from countries like Russia and China, that’s no longer the case.
Phillips said this is an era of “great power and competition,” but that boats like the USS Vermont will be what’s leading the way in the next military era for the United States.
“When the USS Vermont goes out and does peacetime missions, we will be also training for combat in this era of great power and competition,” he said. “So that if we are called upon to go fight in the nation’s war, we will be ready — because the submarine force will be relied upon heavily in any sort of campaign that may happen in the future.”
