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(More customer reviews)USS Scorpion's sinking remains a controversial topic more than 35 years later. But the focus has always been on the ship and not on the crew, all of whom perished aboard the submarine.
Stephen Johnson deftly weaves the personal stories of crew members with that of the ship itself. Scorpion was a cranky, failure-prone submarine and her crew had to work doubly hard to keep her in service. The never-ending failures and breakdowns caused at least one crew member to transfer off the ship, though his guilt haunted him for the rest of his life.
Along the way we see that the Navy hadn't learned its lesson from the sinking of the Thresher just five years earlier. Though Scorpion had been back-fitted with several "SUBSAFE" modifications, her emergency-blow system remained inoperable due to design defects for the rest of her brief life. The Navy seemed more interested in holding repair costs down, rather than the safety of a nuclear warship and her crew.
Johnson's style is subtle and understated, and is thus more effective at conveying the human tragedy of the sinking than the semi-hype of Sherry Sontag/Christopher Drew ("Blind Man's Buff") or John Craven ("The Silent War").
Those looking for a definitive explaination of the sinking may be disappointed -- as with many technical failures, there are far more questions than answers.
Intriguing, sobering, ultimately very sad, and very worthy. A tribute to those who died beneath the restless sea. Highly recommended.
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