Navy bans smoking on submarines

Navy bans smoking on submarines

Until the start of the new year, smoking was still allowed below deck on Navy submarines. But the Navy announced last spring that it wanted to ban smoking on all subs.
The reason was simply to protect non-smokers from secondhand smoke.

Vice Admiral John Donnelly, commander of Submarine Forces for the Navy, cited tests on secondhand smoking when making the announcement, Defense.gov reports. Donnelly says the only way to eliminate the risk to non-smoking sailors is to ban all smoking on subs.

The Navy says about 40 percent of sailors on subs smoke and recognizes it is going to be very difficult for many of them to quit while they're deployed.

http://www.federalnewsradio.com/?nid=150&sid=2220424

I would be more worried about 2nd hand torpedos....

and we want to make it worse????

:argh:

...I thought it would have been banned years ago!! Common sense would have dictated it. Can't keep recirculating bad air!!

and a bit about sub life in general.

For the most part, subs ventilate when they can. They hold an enormous volume of air and do change it out pretty often based on operating conditions.

The air on a sub is constantly going through scrubbers and burners to clean it up, not to mention various precipitaters that remove particulate matter.

There are already far more dangerous things in the air than smoke being recirculated on a sub. If the Navy was serious about the health of their sailors they would work on them first instead of using it as justification for an anti smoking campaign enforced by the command.

Now we get to the root of the problem. Why do so many sub sailors smoke? It's not a matter of not knowing that it is bad for them.

Long working hours, not enough sleep and irregular sleep times contribute a lot to large amount of smokers. Stress is a drug a hell of a lot stronger than cigarettes. When you see men in their early twenties getting ulcers on a regular basis, or being two pot a day coffee drinkers, there are bigger problems than smoking.

Removing the cigarettes removes a symptom of the overall problem, not the source.

Former submarine sailor

"Long working hours, not enough sleep and irregular sleep times contribute a lot to large amount of smokers."

I'm very familiar with the above. But I've never smoked a day in my life. I'll admit though, I don't know a lot about how the air is recirculated aboard a sub, but I would imagine recirculating the same air if you were submerged for a long period of time would not exactly be healthy. No matter how many times it's scrubbed.

My boat was old, but we had a great ventilation system. No problem with secondhand smoke.

I agree with you about the health aspects. My crew indulged in far too much geedunk and booze and never exercised. If one of them smoked, it was only one of many unhealthy habits they already had.

Sid

I assume sub duty is still voluntary. So is smoking.

That is no longer is the case. Once you are on a sub, you are in the program, barring medical disqualification, for the rest of your career.

Other than the initial volunteering for the program before the sailor knows what he has gotten into, it is no longer voluntary.

He's been waiting to go in since last Fall. Had he "selected" another job his wait time would have been much longer.

Got to make decisions quick and rush head first into everything.

to not go on one ;)

Welcome news.

smoking in the garage experiment.

:D

It was before smoking was banned in federal buildings. Our open office was 60-40 Navy-Civilians. If I went out right out after work, it was assumed I was a smoker, I reeked of smoke. The odor would cling in my thick hair (which I still have, and because of it I still don't want to be around smokers on a day-to-day basis). My clothes also stank to high heaven every day. I've known some submariners...even other Navy considers them as a strange lot.

on edit: From my knowledge, I don't get where non-smoking on a sub is a bad thing. Sailors in positions in this country, in buildings or boats, they have known non-smoking is the rule several years or a decade or so. Submariners did not know that the rule would eventually catch up to them?

There are a LOT of electronics on a submarine, and cigarette smoke will damage them.