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Steven Loomis (SaigonShipyard), IC3
to remember
Baciocco, Albert J., Jr. (Al), VADM USN(Ret).
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Contact Info
Home Town San Francisco, CA
Last Address Mount Pleasant, South Carolina
Date of Passing May 22, 2015
Location of Interment U.S. Naval Academy Cemetery and Columbarium (VLM) - Annapolis, Maryland
Vice Admiral (SS) Albert Baciocco, Jr., USN (Ret.)
Admiral Baciocco was Chairman of the Cold War Submarine Memorial Foundation,
the driving force in establishing the memorial by that name at the Patriots Point Naval & Maritime Museum.
Vice Admiral Albert Joseph Baciocco, Jr. graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1953, where he received a Bachelor of Science in engineering and later completed graduate level studies in the field of nuclear engineering as part of his training in the naval nuclear propulsion program. He served as Chief of Naval Research from 1978-1981 and as the Director of Research, Development, and Acquisition from 1983-1987. Upon retirement, he established the Baciocco Group, Inc., a technical and management consulting practice and has since been engaged in a broad range of business and pro bono activities with industry, government, and academe, including memberships on the Naval Studies Board and the Army Science Board. He has also provided his time to serving on the Boards of Directors of several corporations, both public and private. He is a Trustee of the South Carolina Research Authority, and serves as a Director of the Foundation for Research Development at the Medical University of South Carolina. Vice Admiral Baciocco has been designated a lifetime National Associate of the National Academies by the Council of the National Academies of Sciences.
Other Comments:
Vice Admiral Baciocco was born in San Francisco, California, on March 4, 1931. He graduated from Lowell High School and was accepted into Stanford University prior to entering the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland, in June 1949. He graduated from the Naval Academy in June 1953 with a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering, and completed graduate level studies in the field of nuclear engineering in 1958 as part of his training for the naval nuclear propulsion program.
Admiral Baciocco served initially in the heavy cruiser USS SAINT PAUL (CA-73) during the final days of the Korean War, and then in the diesel submarine USS WAHOO (SS-565) until April of 1957 when he became one of the early officer selectees for the Navy's nuclear submarine program. After completion of his nuclear training, he served in the commissioning crews of three nuclear attack submarines: USS SCORPION (SSN-589), as Main Propulsion Assistant (1959-1961); USS BARB (SSN-596), as Engineer Officer (1961-1962), then as Executive Officer (1963- 1965); and USS GATO (SSN-615), as Commanding Officer (1965-1969). Subsequent at-sea assignments, all headquartered in Charleston, South Carolina, included COMMANDER SUBMARINE DIVISION FORTY-TWO (1969-1971), where he was responsible for the operational training readiness of six SSNs; COMMANDER SUBMARINE SQUADRON FOUR (1974-1976), where he was responsible for the operational and material readiness of fifteen SSNs; and COMMANDER SUBMARINE GROUP SIX (1981-1983), where, during the height of the Cold War, he was accountable for the overall readiness of a major portion of the Atlantic Fleet submarine force, including forty SSNs, 20 SSBNs, and various other submarine force commands totaling approximately 20,000 military personnel, among which numbered some forty strategic submarine crews. During this period, in 1982, he served additionally as COMMANDER NAVAL BASE CHARLESTON.
Commencing in 1971, Admiral Baciocco also served ashore in senior technical and management positions within Department of the Navy headquarters in the fields of submarine warfare, antisubmarine warfare, financial management, science and technology, and acquisition. Initially assigned to the Chief of Naval Operations staff within the submarine warfare directorate, he was selected as Executive Assistant to the Assistant Secretary of the Navy (Financial Management) and so served until 1974. In 1976, he returned to the Chief of Naval Operations staff and, upon selection to Flag rank in early 1977, became the division director responsible for all matters related to Navy attack submarines and deep submergence systems, including policy, planning, and budgeting for force structure, readiness, modernization, and the supporting infrastructure.
In 1978, the President of the United States nominated and the Senate confirmed Admiral Baciocco as Chief of Naval Research. In this position, he was the responsible official and principal interface with academe for the execution of the Navy's basic research program. He also was responsible for management oversight of the government- sponsored Independent Research & Development conducted by the defense industry. Subsequently assigned additional duty as Deputy Chief of Naval Material (Technology), he established the Office of Naval Technology and effectively became the Navy's Chief Technology Officer, directing the planning and execution of the entire technology base program for the Department of the Navy, then an $800 million annual investment in basic research and exploratory development being conducted in academe, industry and government laboratories. Admiral Baciocco served as Chief of Naval Research until June 1981.
In 1983, Admiral Baciocco was promoted to the rank of Vice Admiral and appointed as Director, Research, Development, Test and Evaluation in the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations. In this position, he was the Navy Department principal for all research and development, test and evaluation, and acquisition matters. He was responsible for a budget in excess of $10 billion, directing the process and policies that governed the Navy's science and technology programs, the Navy RDT&E infrastructure, and Navy acquisition programs during a period of intense Navy buildup. He was the principal Navy interface with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and a principal advisor on issues related to technology transfer and transition, and to U. S. industrial and manufacturing preparedness as it related to national security and defense. In addition, he served as the Navy's senior military interface with NATO and other allied governments, and with the defense industry for a broad range of technology transfer initiatives and cooperative research and development programs.
"HOLLAND CLUB MEMBER" United States Submarine Veterans Inc. (USSVI). The Admiral was sub qualified, July 1956, on board the USS Wahoo SS-565. He was listed as a member of the Holland Club (50+ years Submarine Qualified). He was killed in an automobile accident on 22 May, 2015. Admiral Baciocco is currently on Eternal Patrol.
NEC 112X-Unrestricted Line Officer - Submarine Warfare
Base, Station or City Not Specified
State/Country Not Specified
Patch
USS Scorpion (SSN-589) Details
Hull number SSN-589
USS Scorpion (SSN-589) was a Skipjack-class nuclearsubmarine of the United States Navy, and the sixth vessel of the U.S. Navy to carry that name. Scorpion was declared lost on 5 June 1968 with 99 crew members dying in the incident. The USSScorpion is one of two nuclear submarines the U.S. Navy has lost, the other being USS Thresher (SSN-593), which sank on 10 April 1963 off the coast of New England.
Scorpion's keel was laid down on 20 August 1958 by the Electric Boat Division of the General Dynamics Corporation in Groton, Connecticut. She was launched on 19 December 1959, sponsored by Mrs. Elizabeth S. Morrison (daughter of the last commander of the World War II-era USS Scorpion, which had been lost with all hands in 1944), and commissioned on 29 July 1960, Commander Norman B. Bessac in command.
Assigned to Submarine Squadron 6, Division 62, Scorpiondeparted New London, Connecticut, on 24 August for a two-month deployment in European waters. During that period, she participated in exercises with units of the 6th Fleet and of otherNATO navies. After returning to New England in late October, she trained along the eastern seaboard until May 1961, then crossed the Atlantic again for operations which took her into the summer. On 9 August 1961, she returned to New London, and, a month later, shifted to Norfolk, Virginia. In 1962, she earned the Navy Unit Commendation.
With Norfolk her home port for the remainder of her career,Scorpion specialized in the development of nuclear submarine warfare tactics. Varying her role from hunter to hunted, she participated in exercises which ranged along the Atlantic coast and in the Bermuda and Puerto Rico operating areas; then, from June 1963 – May 1964, she interrupted her operations for an overhaul at Charleston, South Carolina. Resuming duty off the eastern seaboard in late spring, she again interrupted that duty from 4 August-8 October to make a transatlantic patrol. In the spring of 1965, she conducted a similar patrol in European waters.
During the late winter and early spring of 1966, and again in the autumn, she was deployed for special operations. Following the completion of those assignments, her commanding officer received the Navy Commendation Medal for outstanding leadership, foresight, and professional skill. Other Scorpion officers and crewmen were cited for meritorious achievement. Scorpion is reputed to have entered an inland Russian sea during a "Northern Run" in 1966 where it successfully filmed a Soviet missile launch through its periscope before being forced to use its high speed to flee Soviet Navy ships. Scorpion had a reputation for excellence and as a fast attack submarine it was a plum assignment for officers seeking to move up in a Navy in which submarine officers were gaining increasing clout.
On 1 February 1967, Scorpion entered the Norfolk Naval Shipyard for another extended overhaul. However, instead of the much-needed complete overhaul, she received only emergency repairs to get her back on duty as soon as possible. Operational pressures and complex and unforeseen problems created by the Submarine Safety Program (SUBSAFE) that was initiated after the 1963 loss of Thresher, meant that submarine overhauls went from nine months in length to 36 months. Intensive vetting of submarine component quality required by the SUBSAFE program coupled with various improvements and intensified structural inspections–particularly hull welding inspections using ultrasonic testing–were issues that reduced the availability of critical parts such as seawater piping. Cold War pressures prompted U.S. Submarine Fleet Atlantic (SUBLANT) officers to hunt for ways to reduce overhaul durations. The cost of that last overhaul was nearly one-seventh of those given other nuclear submarines at the same time. This was the result of concerns about the "high percentage of time offline" of nuclear attack submarines which was estimated to be at about 40% of total available duty time.
As Scorpion's original "full overhaul" was whittled down in scope, it was decided it would not receive long-overdue SUBSAFE work. Scorpion would not receive a new, central valve control system; in the event of an emergency, her crew would have to scramble around the engine room to find and manually operate large valves. Crucially, Scorpionwould not receive a fix for the same emergency system that did not work on Thresher, the submarine whose loss was the reason for the existence of the SUBSAFE program. On that sub a pipe leak at depth prompted an emergency shutdown of the submarine's nuclear reactor; powerless, Thresher could still have surfaced if the Emergency Main Ballast Tank blow system worked. It did not. (Later, dockside tests on Thresher's sister sub Tinosaproved that the EMBT system did not work at test depth; moisture in the high-pressure air flasks froze in in-line strainers as the ballast tanks were blown.) Following a dispute between Charleston Naval Ship Yard, which claimed the EMBT system worked as-is, and SUBLANT, which claimed it did not, the EMBT was "tagged out" or listed as unusable. The aforementioned problems with overhaul duration, that saw Scorpion selected for a reduced experimental overhaul program, also caused all SUBSAFE work to be delayed as well during 1967.
The reduced overhaul concept Scorpion went through had been approved by Admiral David Lamar McDonald, theChief of Naval Operations on 17 June 1966. On 20 July, McDonald also allowed deferral of the SUBSAFEextensions, which had otherwise been deemed essential since 1963.
During Scorpion's last six months of operational life, at least two sailors, Electrician's Mate Second Class Daniel Rogers and Radioman Chief Daniel Pettey, struggled to be released from duty aboard Scorpion due to the bad morale problems they witnessed. Rogers sought disqualification from submarine duty–which was then allowed–while Pettey attempted to transfer to the U.S. Army only to be released from Scorpion while in the Mediterranean just months before it was lost.
"HOLLAND CLUB MEMBER" United States Submarine Veterans Inc. (USSVI). The Admiral was sub qualified, July 1956, on board the USS Wahoo SS-565. He was listed as a member of the Holland Club (50+ years Submarine Qualified). He was killed in an automobile accident on 22 May, 2015. Admiral Baciocco is currently on Eternal Patrol. 
