New in the Archives

In a collection of material recently donated to the museum (which is still being fully cataloged by Mike Hopper, our Curator), an interesting couple of items were found.

This picture is of USS Tullibee (SSN-597). While designated as an attack submarine, Tullibee was a unique submarine. the three fins that you can see in this picture are part of the PUFFS Sonar array, an attempt to use a passive system to provide sufficiently detailed data about a target that a torpedo could be fired without ever using active sonar or even raising the periscope.

As designed, Tullibee featured a very quiet turbo-electric power plant. Tullibee was also the first submarine to feature a spherical sonar array in the bow (a feature that necessitated moving the torpedo tubes back and angling them outward - a feature still used today).

The collection also included an undated "Welcome Aboard" booklet, which featured general information about the submarine construction and capabilities. Both of these will be placed on our website soon and will be available for researchers to download.