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Almost immediately the word came from the Maneuvering that there was "flooding in the after room" followed by "fire in the after room".
I immediately left the conning tower and headed for the maneuvering room. As I passed the air manifold they were starting to blow. I got to the after battery before the hatch was shut. Looking in the forward engine room I could see there was no flooding or sign of fire. I entered the room and did the same in the after engine room. There was smoke in the maneuvering room, but they said the was no more coming into maneuvering. I told them I was coming in. When I got there they were still putting air in the after room to slow any flooding. About that time we were well on our way to the surface. Lt Corrigan proceeded topside to the after room hatch and cracked it open. The pressure in the room forced much of the smoke out of the room and we could see there was very little flooding.
We opened the hatch and entered. First one in was Doc MacDonald who took charge of the rescue. From there it is hard for me at this date to say exactly who did what except there was absolutely no panic, every body knew exactly what to do and did it. Also, every bit of rescue equipment worked perfectly. The chief electrician claimed that he was the only physical casualty as I had stepped on his hand and broke a finger.
While there was an investigation no blame was ever assessed. As near as we could tell the events were as follows:
1. There was not enough impulse air built up to eject the fish at
200 ft.
2. As soon as the poppet valve opened sea pressure slammed the
fish back in the tube and broke the breech door where the
holding screw penetrated/
3. The force of the water in the tube threw a stream of water into
into the maneuvering room
4. While the torpedo had an overspeed trip the propeller shafts were bound up in the breech door and could not get up to speed so the torpedo kept running til it ran out of fuel
This is a nutshell from memory 42 years later. This is the best I can do for now
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