U.S. Navy submarines are built tough. That may not be your first impression when seeing this picture, but here are some amplifying facts:
688 class fast attack submarines (the "Los Angeles" class) are 360 feet (109.73 meters) long, 33 feet (10.06 meters) in diameter, displace 6,900 tons (7011 metric tons) submerged, can travel in excess of 30 knots (34+ miles per hour, 55.5+ kph). SAN FRANCISCO was traveling at top speed when she struck the planet Earth (in the form of an undersea mountain) head on. Oh, she was over 500 feet underwater.
That's about 7,000 tons, traveling about 35 mph, hitting solid mountain and stopping instantly. And after that tremendous blow, she surfaced and drove over 350 miles under her own power to her home port, and stayed afloat an additional two weeks before being drydocked. And due to the rock-solid construction of this submarine, and the training and response of her crew, it was able to survive this collision (one of the worst collisions by a U.S. Navy ship ever) with only one casualty. I can absolutely guarantee that surface vessels (with much lighter construction) would have sunk. So would the submarines of many other nations.
We engineer our subs to a degree that is sometimes almost ridiculous...at least until something like this happens. Then you begin to realize just what all that steel is there for.
I've served on subs for nearly 14 years. I've had some people ask me if, given what happened to SAN FRANCISCO, I'll be scared to return to them when I'm off Limited Duty. My answer...I'd be more apprehensive about serving on a surface ship. Our subs are tough, their crews are tougher. SAN FRANCISCO, by her very presence in drydock, cheated Davy Jones and proved just how tough submarines and submariners are.
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