Submariners: Unknown World Record Holders?

Cross-posted from The Stupid Shall Be Punished:

As all submariners know, whenever we're asked how deep our submarines can go, all we can say is "in excess of 800 feet"; it becomes very second-nature for us to say this, much the same way that "in excess of 25 knots" and "I can neither confirm nor deny the presence of..." are. While not revealing exactly how much deeper than 800 feet we can go makes sense from an OPSEC perspective, it now appears that it's costing us some props from the World Record Book people.

Check out this Reuters article about how a Brit singer recently set a "verified world record" by performing an underwater concert:

Singer Katie Melua swapped the recording studio for a North Sea gas rig in her successful bid to set a new record for the deepest underwater concert, the Guinness World Record organisation said on Tuesday.
Melua and her five-member band performed two concerts of one hour each on Monday at a verified depth of 303 metres underwater to an audience made up of staff from the Statoil Troll A platform.

Doing the math, it looks like 303 meters is about 994 feet. While we don't know how deep our submarines actually go, of course, if for some reason our submarines can go enough "in excess of 800 feet" to get to greater depths than what the concert was held at, a submariner may be the rightful holder of this World Record. What is a "concert", anyway? Wouldn't someone singing a cheerful ditty like "The Ballad of the Silver Dolphins" to one of his buddies count? And if he did it at some depth below 994 feet, he could be famous now -- if the Navy would only verify it (which they won't).

Who knows how many other World Records submariners could be recognized for if not for the secrecy surrounding the Force: Most disturbing discussion of bodily functions by people being paid to work? Biggest duct tape ball that contains a person? Most disgusting nicknames for normal food items? The possibilities are endless...

posted by Bubblehead @ 10:34 PM