# Sailor Feared Lost at Sea Found Hiding in the Ship's Engine Room **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [June 16, 2017, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139 "2017-06-16T19:09:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/1 "2017-06-16T19:09:37Z")
[Petty Officer Third Class Peter Mims](http://www.military.com/daily-news/2017/06/15/shiloh-sailor-believed-lost-at-sea-found-alive-on-ship.html), serving aboard the USS Shiloh, was feared lost at sea. Extensive search, labeled missing, then they find him hiding in the engine room. He’s been transferred to the Ronald Reagan for a medical evaluation. My daughter, an Army medic, is serving on an Army vessel over near Japan. The engine room gets HOT. Stifling. Mims hid down there for a week. According to [Why I’m Not Re-elisting](https://www.facebook.com/WINR1/) on Facebook, (scroll down a bit to see the post) former crew members of the USS Shiloh say the captain discourages the crew from seeking help for mental health issues. There’s a lot more going on here. ---
**Author:** ![Tranquilis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tranquilis/32/3639_2.png) [@Tranquilis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tranquilis)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/2 "2017-06-16T19:56:47Z")
Yeah, the word is spreading pretty fast through the grapevine that the CO of the USS Shiloh is a serious old-school martinet. One wonders how long before he’s sacked for cause. Kind of amazing that a “Capt. Bligh” like that can manage to make it in today’s Navy climate. ---
**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:** [June 16, 2017, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/3 "2017-06-16T20:07:24Z")
For what it is worth, the “engine room” probably varies in temperature quite a bit. Some areas are much better ventilated then others. Even on my vintage 1955 Carrier the machine rooms had areas that weren’t bad at all. I know around the generators was comfortable enough. The USS Shiloh is gas turbine and launched in 1990 so I imagine the machine room probably isn’t too bad. As to hiding in a machine room to dodge work or fake a death, that I can’t imagine. ---
**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:** [June 16, 2017, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/4 "2017-06-16T20:14:42Z")
For a week? Someone else in the crew was probably smuggling him food and water. I can’t picture him going without for that long, and if he tried to sneak out to the galley, he’d probably have been caught. ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/5 "2017-06-16T20:19:17Z")
How big is a missile cruiser? Could the engine room just have been where he was found? Maybe he was hiding in different places? ---
**Author:** ![StGermain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stgermain/32/2868_2.png) [@StGermain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StGermain)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/6 "2017-06-16T20:28:31Z")
Someone should’ve told him you wait to go AWOL until _after_ you get into port. StG ---
**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:** [June 16, 2017, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/7 "2017-06-16T20:31:17Z")
The ship is fairly big at over 550’ and the crew size is only around 400. He could have secreted food and water and maybe stayed hidden. There were places on the USS Ranger I could have easily hidden for a week if I wanted to. Of course that ship was far larger but we also had 5000 men at sea. Though places I would have hid would not have been an engine room, but rather voids and spaces for servicing the air system. I wonder if he was caught going to or from a head (bathroom). ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/8 "2017-06-16T20:32:37Z")
Googled it…the USS Shiloh is 567 feet long and has a crew of about 300. In comparison, my daughter’s vessel is 174 feet long with a crew of about 20 or so, I think. ---
**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:** [June 16, 2017, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/9 "2017-06-16T20:37:20Z")
> [@ivylass](#): > > Googled it…the USS Shiloh is 567 feet long and has a crew of about 300. > > In comparison, my daughter’s vessel is 174 feet long with a crew of about 20 or so, I think. You’re right about the length, I was going from memory but your numbers seem very light for the crew unless they’ve automated a lot on the ship. Wiki is close to my estimate of 400, they show 33 officers, 27 Chief Petty Officers, and approx and 340 enlisted. What kind of ship is your daughter on? Merchant Marine? It doesn’t sound like a US Navy vessel. ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/10 "2017-06-16T20:39:59Z")
She’s on a [Runnymede Class Landing Vessel](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runnymede-class_large_landing_craft). ---
**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:** [June 16, 2017, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/11 "2017-06-16T20:41:47Z")
> [@ivylass](#): > > She’s on a [Runnymede Class Landing Vessel](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runnymede-class_large_landing_craft). Cool, until this thread, I did not realize the army had any ships still. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/12 "2017-06-16T21:04:08Z")
This could be an NCIS episode. Maybe it will be next year. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/13 "2017-06-16T21:15:26Z")
JAG: Captain, will you tell the steps you took to find Mims? Captain: I instituted a phase one search. JAG: Describe a phase one search. Captain: It’s a painstaking, thorough attempt in and around the ship to find a man who’s presumably injured and unable to respond. JAG: It presupposes, does it not, that a man wishes to be found? Captain: I beg your pardon? JAG: If you start a search for a man, you assume, don’t you, that he wants to be found? He’s not hiding? Captain: Yes. JAG: On a ship of this size, could a man evade such a search? Captain: Possibly. JAG: Gentlemen, I submit to you that PO 3 Mims is not dead! * * * I read the pinhead comments on the linked article. Good to see that some traditions in the Navy still exist. Traditions like homophobia and bigotry, contempt for “liberals” and their panty-waist ways, and general butt-headedness. Not. ---
**Author:** ![Tranquilis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tranquilis/32/3639_2.png) [@Tranquilis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tranquilis)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/14 "2017-06-16T21:49:06Z")
> [@ivylass](#): > > How big is a missile cruiser? Could the engine room just have been where he was found? Maybe he was hiding in different places? Whilst the vessel is quite large, moving about the hull without being detected is rather hard. Water tight compartmentation reduces the number of transit points, which are used by anyone needing to move from compartment to compartment. One glimpse, and he’s busted. On top of that, the engineering spaces are amongst the largest, most complex, and have the greatest numbers of obscure dead zones of any in the hull. > [@What\_Exit](#): > > You’re right about the length, I was going from memory but your numbers seem very light for the crew unless they’ve automated a lot on the ship. They have. Gas Turbine plants are _far_ less manpower intense (and MUCH cooler and cleaner!) than oil-fired spaces. Modern weapons systems don’t need enarly as many crew to handle munitions, as many steps are automated, and there are only two main gun mounts. The missile systems are amost entirely ‘hands off’ out to sea (save for Preventative Maintenance, which is a religion in the Nav). ---
**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:** [June 16, 2017, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/15 "2017-06-16T22:02:07Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > I read the pinhead comments on the linked article. Good to see that some traditions in the Navy still exist. Traditions like homophobia and bigotry, contempt for “liberals” and their panty-waist ways, and general butt-headedness. > > Not. Funny in a way, 30 years ago the homophobia was extremely bad, I’m pretty sure far worse than today. But there was little bigotry on the ships back then. Seriously, very little. We had a very mixed crew and no bigotry I could recall at all. It was more about department rivalry if anything. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/16 "2017-06-16T22:15:06Z")
I recall two mental health issues on my submarine – this was mid 2000s: 1st guy: He was in my division at the time (A Gang – auxiliary mechanics). A huge young sailor who was actually pretty friendly and smiled a lot, but would turn on a dime and make really weird and disconcerting threats to sailors (not me – he was always normal with me) who he got angry at. I don’t remember the specifics, but it was horror movie stuff about blood and skinning and stuff like that. After a series of threats (all to other fellow junior sailors – he never threatened a Chief or senior petty officer from what I recall) he was masted (Captain’s Mast is non-judicial punishment that the ship Captain administrates) and booted off the submarine. I don’t know what happened after that. I remember that we had the biggest, toughest Chief present for the Mast just in case he flipped out, but he was actually quiet and mildly apologetic throughout. 2nd guy – almost the opposite, he was also in my division (Sonar, this time – junior officers frequently change divisions). He was a skinny, young looking and very shy guy. He just couldn’t hack being away from home and in a strange place and culture with its own demands – I don’t know how he got through boot camp. He cried quite frequently. When the Chief informed me about his problems, I sat down with him privately, with the intention of having a “fatherly” sort of chat with him. As soon as I asked him about his home life growing up, and high school, he burst into tears and couldn’t continue. He wasn’t Masted, but he was removed from the crew. Someone hiding in the engine room (if he really was hiding rather than incapacitated or something) reminds me of that 2nd guy. But there’s no place to hide on a submarine, pretty much literally – I can’t think of a single person-sized space on the ship that wouldn’t have someone walk through at least daily, if not usually far more often. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/17 "2017-06-16T22:37:15Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > JAG: Captain, will you tell the steps you took to find Mims? > Captain: I instituted a phase one search. > JAG: Describe a phase one search. > Captain: It’s a painstaking, thorough attempt in and around the ship to find a man who’s presumably injured and unable to respond. > JAG: It presupposes, does it not, that a man wishes to be found? > Captain: I beg your pardon? > JAG: If you start a search for a man, you assume, don’t you, that he wants to be found? He’s not hiding? > Captain: Yes. > JAG: On a ship of this size, could a man evade such a search? > Captain: Possibly. > JAG: Gentlemen, I submit to you that PO 3 Mims is not dead! I thought you were quoting Star Trek’s “Court Martial” for a moment there (and suspect that JAG was riffing on that episode). > **[Court Martial (Star Trek: The Original Series)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Court_Martial_(Star_Trek:_The_Original_Series))** > > "Court Martial" is the twentieth episode of the first season of the American science fiction television series Star Trek. It was written by Don M. Mankiewicz and Steven W. Carabatsos, directed by Marc Daniels, and first aired on February 2, 1967. > In the episode, Captain Kirk stands trial on charges of criminal negligence after jettisoning an occupied research pod during an emergency. > The USS Enterprise is at Starbase 11 for repairs after an ion storm. During the storm, Captain James T. Kirk w... ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/18 "2017-06-16T22:45:59Z")
[They were, pretty much word for word.](http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/15.htm) ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/19 "2017-06-16T22:49:16Z")
> [@John\_DiFool](#): > > [They were, pretty much word for word.](http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/15.htm) Yep, that’s exactly where I cut and pasted the relevant scene. Just changed the names [del]to protect the innocent [/del] to make it generic for the current incident. ---
**Author:** ![Nawth\_Chucka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c57346/32.png) [@Nawth\_Chucka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nawth_Chucka)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2017, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139/20 "2017-06-16T23:18:16Z")
It sounds familiar; in early 2000 a FOAF did this on his ship, I think he hid in a maintenance room. He was prone to panic attacks and anxiety but it wasn’t till they were underway that he realized he wanted completely out of he Navy. Same as in the OP, they thought he’d gone (literally) overboard till he was so hungry he came out after 3-4 days IIRC. Mustered out and changed his name sort of - writes it backwards now. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sailor-feared-lost-at-sea-found-hiding-in-the-ships-engine-room/789139.md?page=2)