# Naval Warfare (modern): Do people off duty during a battle just lie in their bunks or does everyone have something to do? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 7, 2026, 9:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464 "2026-02-07T09:32:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2026, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/21 "2026-02-08T16:07:01Z")
When we did weapon tests and/or flight ops we weren’t as a whole in GQ, or even a heightened sense of readiness except for the departments directly affected. I just missed it, but apparently when the USS Ranger was in the Persian Gulf, my friends were stuck in a state of heightened readiness. The Fire Control Techs and Gunnersmates were on watch more often. Machine Rooms had more men on shifts. Flight Crews and support were on duty much more often. But you slept in your rack and did your normal job otherwise. Hopefully that addressed your query? ---
**Author:** ![minor7flat5](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/minor7flat5/32/258_2.png) [@minor7flat5](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minor7flat5)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2026, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/22 "2026-02-08T22:04:20Z")
“TweeeeeeeeEEEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeet” “General Quarters, General Quarters, all hands man your battle stations. Up and forward on the starboard side, down and aft on the port side!” _clang_ _clang_ _clang_ … That’s pretty much how it went on the Nimitz. Everybody had a battle station. For all of the regular working watch stations (main engine watch or reactor operator, for example) you would have guys who were good at that, not the noobs, who were assigned that watch station as their battle station. So the “GQ Main Engine Watch” would relieve the current random possibly noob main engine watch so he could go wherever he was assigned during battle stations. No slacking allowed! Everything would be shut, so there would be no moving about the ship either. If it lasted hours, they would obviously need to make adjustments, but if it were lasting hours there are worse things to worry about. I’m assuming that there might have been a few guys peeing into the bilge in a pinch. ETA: > [@msmith537](#): > > Maybe my question is how does a Navy ship distinguish from “general quarters” to just normal combat operations? The most obvious difference would be they would “set condition Zebra throughout the ship” I think they have changed the nomenclature over the years, but when I was in, all of the hatches and doorways were labeled “X” for X-ray, “Y” for Yoke, and “Z” for Zebra. X fittings and doors were _always_ closed, even in port. The others would be closed as higher levels of readiness were set. A “Z” door would likely be a main thoroughfare in the center of the ship, closed only when in “lockdown” while at GQ. When Zebra was set, it was not possible to move throughout the ship. Maximum watertight integrity was achieved when Zebra was set. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2026, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/23 "2026-02-08T22:14:59Z")
> [@minor7flat5](#): > > I think they have changed the nomenclature over the years, but when I was in, all of the hatches and doorways were labeled “X” for X-ray, “Y” for Yoke, and “Z” for Zebra. If nothing else, they probably changed the name of those last two conditions to “Yankee” and “Zulu”. Did anyone ever refer to welded-in-place bulkheads as “W hatches”, because they never opened? ---
**Author:** ![gnoitall](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bb73d2/32.png) [@gnoitall](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gnoitall)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2026, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/24 "2026-02-08T22:28:16Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > they probably changed the name of those last two conditions to “Yankee” and “Zulu”. I don’t think they have. Google tells me that documents even from just ten years ago still use the non-NATO alphabet codewords for those material condition calls. ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2026, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/25 "2026-02-08T22:37:53Z")
The pipe audible here, [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ps62VTIatnI&t=124s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ps62VTIatnI&t=124s) at about1:26, is “Hands to dawn action stations, hands to dawn action stations, assume NBC State One, Condition Zulu” ---
**Author:** ![gnoitall](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bb73d2/32.png) [@gnoitall](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gnoitall)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2026, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/26 "2026-02-08T22:39:35Z")
Ok. I wonder when that happened, and what prompted it? ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2026, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/27 "2026-02-08T23:03:12Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > If nothing else, they probably changed the name of those last two conditions to “Yankee” and “Zulu”. Nope. It’s still the WWII nomenclature, X-ray\* Yoke and Zebra. “Why,” sounds like a good question to ask Drachinifel. Perhaps it’s to make it distinctive from the NATO alphabet – if all you hear on the 1MC is “yoke” you’ll still know to close that hatch over there. Perhaps it’s to carry on the navy’s unofficial motto – _Two-hundred years of tradition unhampered by progress._ > [@minor7flat5](#): > > When Zebra was set, it was not possible to move throughout the ship. Maximum watertight integrity was achieved when Zebra was set. If GQ (not an active battle) lasted for hours a handful of Culinary Specialists will be released to make “horse cock” sandwiches to be distributed to the rest of the crew. They will undog a hatch, pass through, and dog it immediately behind them \*Okay, that’s the same. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Bredin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@John\_Bredin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Bredin)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/28 "2026-02-09T01:04:41Z")
> [@minor7flat5](#): > > “General Quarters, General Quarters, all hands man your battle stations. Up and forward on the starboard side, down and aft on the port side!” > > _clang_ > _clang_ > _clang_ > … > > That’s pretty much how it went on the Nimitz. There’s a movie called _Final Countdown_ from 1980, set and filmed on the Nimitz with most of the “extras” being actual Nimitz crew, and there’s a scene where general quarters is sounded. It started exactly exactly like that, after a whistle was blown into a microphone. Edited to add: [here’s the general quarters scene](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yy5KGv8vlXE) (and the next scene, recovery of an aircraft in trouble) so nobody has to hunt for the movie or flip through it to the scene in question. So there’s a cinematic depiction that people who know can tell the rest of us if it’s (or was in 1980) accurate. But from what I’ve read, I suspect it was. That is, the Navy participated to the hilt in making the movie and, except for those scenes and elements directly related to the sci-fi concept of the movie, it’s accurate to naval and naval aviation practices of the time. ---
**Author:** ![minor7flat5](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/minor7flat5/32/258_2.png) [@minor7flat5](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minor7flat5)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/29 "2026-02-09T01:11:40Z")
> [@John\_Bredin](#): > > There’s a movie called _Final Countdown_ from 1980, set and filmed on the Nimitz with most of the “extras” being actual Nimitz crew, and there’s a scene where general quarters is sounded. They showed that movie on the cable TV system every time we left port and when we arrived port. They played the theme song from the movie as our “emergency breakaway” theme song when we did an emergency breakaway drill to complete underway replenishment (all ships have a theme song for that particular exercise). The tile may have changed color (stacked 11 layers deep in places, going well beyond the max of … 5? …it impressed me more to know there was a max allowed number of layers than to know about the 11-deep we chipped up.) but the interior of the ship was the same. ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/30 "2026-02-09T01:14:18Z")
Accurate enough, a few minor oddities, but the general idea is right. I’m surprised they filmed on the Nimitz, the Navy usually used conventional carriers as stand ins for the Nimitz and The Enterprise. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Bredin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@John\_Bredin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Bredin)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/31 "2026-02-09T01:18:45Z")
Well, except for one or two times that someone reports the reactor is running normally, the movie doesn’t show or mention anything have to do with Nimitz being a nuclear ship. The movie makers were interested in the aircraft, not the boiler room. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/32 "2026-02-09T01:22:19Z")
Fair enough. ---
**Author:** ![minor7flat5](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/minor7flat5/32/258_2.png) [@minor7flat5](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minor7flat5)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/33 "2026-02-09T02:29:39Z")
> [@John\_Bredin](#): > > The movie makers were interested in the aircraft, not the boiler room. And the Navy wouldn’t have let them. If you were an airdale (flight deck guy) on the Nimitz, you would not have been allowed to enter the machinery spaces. Not only because you wouldn’t have been issued a dosimeter, but also because the Navy was always tight lipped about the reactor side of things, even if the technology is ages old. In fairness, I certainly wouldn’t have been allowed in many other parts of the ship. It was absolutely the Nimitz. I remember seeing our diminutive library in one scene. ---
**Author:** ![Francis\_Vaughan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/francis_vaughan/32/3093_2.png) [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/34 "2026-02-09T03:02:39Z")
> [@What\_Exit](#): > > The backbone of the US Fleet at least is still carriers, Fair point. Although it brings to mind the amusing question. If the US airforce is the world’s largest airforce. What is the second largest? Answer being the US Navy. Carriers are not in so much favour elsewhere. (Here in Oz we have two LHDs, which were based on a carrier design, but are only capable of carrying helicopters. They make for fabulous support vessels and in times of natural disasters in our region, a seriously useful capability.) Aircraft carrier task forces implement force projection. Which is great when you are the big dog around and the carrier fleet provides the pointy end of foreign policy. Which suggests which countries will be interested in carriers. Carriers depend upon their attendant frigates and destroyers for protection. Whether you would ever send a carrier anywhere near a symmetric threat is not clear. They swiftly get into the too valuable to risk category. Guided missiles make engagements a very arms length affair. Very much IMHO, but if the world ever stumbled into a real conflict (rather than gunboat diplomacy types of engagement, with wildly asymmetric forces), things will be very different to that any sort of conventional doctrine would predict. I suspect that carriers will become liabilities rather than assets and would end up providing support activities way back from where the action was. I also suspect that the doctrines of why and how we might escalate into conflict are similarly outdated. ---
**Author:** ![ASL\_v2.0](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asl_v2.0/32/3525_2.png) [@ASL\_v2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ASL_v2.0)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/35 "2026-02-09T03:18:25Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > He thought his shift was the one that the attack would begin on, but it was delayed and the missiles were launched in the next shift when he was asleep in his bunk. Launching cruise missiles hundreds of miles inland at an opponent that doesn’t have the ability to shoot back won’t rate the same heightened level of offensive and defensive posture as being in actual combat (or even fighting a large fire). Ships at sea typically operate at what is called condition IV or condition III. Condition I (General Quarters) is what most people think of as “battle stations.” Condition II is typically set for individual warfare areas as needed while the rest of the ship is mostly unaffected. So, for example, launching TLAMs would be done at “Condition II Strike” for strike warfare. Maybe some people have their watch rotations shifted around to accommodate and absorb the need to pull the entire strike team from their normals watches (those who have them, anyway—many don’t, as they spend most of their time doing maintenance otherwise), but it’s largely transparent to the rest of the crew. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/36 "2026-02-09T03:24:19Z")
> [@Francis\_Vaughan](#): > > Fair point. Although it brings to mind the amusing question. If the US airforce is the world’s largest airforce. What is the second largest? Answer being the US Navy. And the third-largest is the US Army. > [@Francis\_Vaughan](#): > > Very much IMHO, but if the world ever stumbled into a real conflict (rather than gunboat diplomacy types of engagement, with wildly asymmetric forces), things will be very different to that any sort of conventional doctrine would predict. Which of course depends on the nuclear elephant in the room. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/37 "2026-02-09T14:17:04Z")
> [@What\_Exit](#): > > Accurate enough, a few minor oddities, but the general idea is right. > > I’m surprised they filmed on the Nimitz, the Navy usually used conventional carriers as stand ins for the Nimitz and The Enterprise. It seems the US Navy parked the last conventionally powered CV (_Kitty Hawk_ CV-63) in 2009. Maybe they could use some of the helicopter carriers to stand in for the big ones, at least for some interior shots. But I bet that for about the last 15 years and also going forward here from 2026, any carrier footage is shot on a nuclear ship. Unless they’re shooting on a museum ship. Which again might work for interior shots, but not the flight deck nor even hangar deck. ---
**Author:** ![ASL\_v2.0](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asl_v2.0/32/3525_2.png) [@ASL\_v2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ASL_v2.0)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/38 "2026-02-09T14:26:41Z")
There’s always [the French aircraft carrier _Foch_](https://youtube.com/watch?v=KaKXvEXUIMc) (links to the scene from _Crimson Tide_ where we learn the US Department of Defense wanted nothing to do with the film). ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/39 "2026-02-09T14:42:00Z")
I was talking about in the 80s though. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464/40 "2026-02-09T14:58:14Z")
Gotcha. I wasn’t sure of which era any of us were talking bout. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/naval-warfare-modern-do-people-off-duty-during-a-battle-just-lie-in-their-bunks-or-does-everyone-have-something-to-do/1027464.md?page=3)