Torpedoes at 3 O'clock

1705 hrs and the S S Julia steaming due East at 12 knots. Visibility good and a fresh breeze blowing steadily from WSW, hastening us to Murmansk, the hold full of munitions. The starboard lookout, Jimmy O'Donnell, picks his nose and yawns, only another five days with luck. Suddenly he spots the creamy wake, 800 yards out.
"Torpedoes at 3 O'clock!"
The captain's head swivels. Simultaneously he bellows into the voice tube "Hard a'port and full steam! Torpedoes at 3'Oclock. Full emergency. Repeat. Hard a'port and full steam! Torpedoes at 3'Oclock. Full emergency. This is not a drill. This is not a drill."
Down in the engine room Jock McTavish drops his ten day old copy of the Halifax and Nova Scotia Recorder. He wrenches the main steam inlet to full, something he has only done three times in his thirty years service at sea. The gauges shoot into red and the klaxon sounds. The four stokers shovel as though their lives depend on it, which is the truth. The ship judders and leans to starboard. On the bridge the captain watches the wake - coming in at 50 knots. The ship turns slowly to port, groaning and cracking. At the starboard for'ard lifeboat the Coxswain, Seamus O'Riley, holds his breath, he should, he reflects, have stayed on the family farm. Slowly the wind hisses out of him and the torpedo sweeps past 30 yards out.
The terror has begun ....

Torpedoes at 3 o'clock

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