encore
Quick Thinking
A Navy engineer helping a communications officer prepare for his oral boards is surprised by that officer’s creative answer to a standard question during the test.
Any surface Navy officer can tell you as a junior officer aboard ship, you dread oral boards. To qualify for any watch station or career advancement, experienced officers, chief petty officers, and the CO grill you to ensure you have the requisite knowledge.
In the days of the 1,200-pound steam propulsion plant, one of the toughest shibboleths for the average junior officer was the engineering officer of the watch qualification. This board determined whether you were capable of managing the ship’s propulsion plant underway.
It generally was accepted that if you did well with the initial phase of hard questioning on plant configuration and casualties, the board then would start to ask the “standard” questions. This would indicate the examination was coming to a close and you had done well enough to be qualified. All a candidate officer had to do was relax and give the standard answers, and the board would certify the qualification.
One of these standard questions dealt with overall steam-plant efficiency. In the closed systems of Navy steam ships, you want to maintain the temperature of the water returning to the boiler from the condenser as close to its boiling point as possible, so you don’t have to expend excess fuel reheating it. This temperature differential, known as “condensate depression,” should be less than two degrees as measured at the outlet of the condensate pump.
As an engineer, I would help my fellow junior officers prepare for their big moment. Our communications officer only needed this certification to qualify for career advancement. After many hours of questioning, I knew he was ready.
On the appointed day, we gathered in the wardroom. I was inwardly proud as the communications officer breezed through the tough first part, and when the captain started to ask the standard questions, I knew the communications officer had done well. As my turn came to ask a question, I decided to throw him the bone and asked, “What is condensate depression?”
As soon as I asked the question, I could tell something was wrong. His face turned ashen, and he looked at me as though I had spoken to him in Greek. Then, just as suddenly, the color returned to his face, and he said without missing a beat, “Condensate depression is what happens to the chief engineer when he runs out of condensate.”
Even the stoic captain could not help but burst into laughter, and the quickwitted communications officer received his qualification. MO
— Robert Morabito is a retired Navy commander. He lives in Ellwood City, Pa. For submission information, see page 6.
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84 MILITARY OFFICER APRIL 2012
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