Through the Conning-Tower Hatch — A Daring Idea
“It was on Tuesday morning that Goodheart obtained permission from Herbert to go out through the conning-tower hatch and to carry news of the disaster to the world outside. No one in the sunken vessel knew anything of the work of salvage which had begun within a few minutes of the K-13’s fatal last dive. To the officers and men of K-13 it seemed that they were isolated and already dead to the human family. The risks of the issue from the conning tower were beyond experience, but the attempt at any rate was accepted by the gallant Goodheart as a sacred duty. If he could get out alive, then the survivors of K-13 would no longer be dead to the world and might conceivably be saved. If he were killed, well, he would be killed in the way of business. While it was Herbert’s plain duty to stick to his ship, it was equally Goodheart’s duty to clear out and to be jolly quick about it. So he argued, and Herbert, a man of the same fine quality, accepted his arguments as palpably sound. Nothing remained except to devise means and methods of exit.
“It was decided to go forth by way of the conning-tower hatch and to use high-pressure air from the bottles to speed the passage. I have explained how one part of the conning tower was humped. The general idea was for Goodheart and Herbert to climb up into the conning tower and to take station together under this hump, where they had head room to stand upright. They would then close the lower hatch which gave upon the control room and have nothing between them and the upper outside water except a bolted sheet of steel. The density of the air cooped up with them would be roughly two atmospheres (twenty-eight pounds to the square inch) and the water pressure outside about thirty-one pounds. If, then, the sea-cocks were opened the water would flow in not too furiously and would fill the lower part of the tower, but would be prevented by the imprisoned air from rising very high in the hump. There the men could stand in extreme discomfort, no doubt, and under severe pressure, but, nevertheless, alive and active. Then those inside would turn on high-pressure air in large quantities so as to expel the water and to give Goodheart a handsome lift from behind when he sought to be gone through the upper hatch. Herbert went with Goodheart to help him and to wish him Godspeed in his passing, but with no intention of following in his path. His place was with his men. It was a path both tortuous and full of unknown dangers. Above the conning tower was a chart-house, of which the roof opposed a formidable obstacle to a vertical ascent. There was a large manhole in this roof, but, unluckily for Goodheart’s bold scheme, it was not cut directly above the hatch. This inclination of the passage out caused Goodheart’s death.
“DIED A MOST GALLANT OFFICER”
“The two officers made their way to the conning tower, secured the lower hatch, then through the opened sea-cocks in rushed the water, but standing in security under the hump the heads and shoulders of the men remained uncovered. A moment later, according to plan, the high-pressure air from below was driven in and the bolts of the upper hatch withdrawn. ‘Good-bye, sir,’ said Goodheart; I’ll try now,’ and stooping under the open hatch he was carried forth. Those were his last words, for, missing the aperture above, he was caught under the roof of the chart-house and drowned.
“There died a most gallant young officer, to whose memory, months afterwards, a posthumous award was made of the Albert Medal in gold. The powerful air, forced in by the pressure from the bottles, continued to surge into the conning tower, driving the water before it and tearing the helpless Herbert from his retreat under the hump. He was whirled out in the center of a column of air and water, carried safely through the manhole in the roof of the chart-house and clear of the mast stays, and delivered at the surface like a scrap of wreckage. He went up with both hands before his face, and declares, according to my authorities, that he breathed all through his ascent. He was picked up immediately and insisted upon giving all possible information and guidance to the salvors before accepting any of their kind offices for himself.