Fleet Plan of the Day
- Details
- Brad Williamson
- LAS VEGAS 25 - 680
The USS WILLIAM H. BATES (SSN 680) West reunion for 2025, LAS VEGAS 25, is coming together and we need your action and feedback.
First, the critical information.
WHEN: 5 - 8 MAY 2025 - only 167 days away as of today!
WHERE: Tuscany Suites & Casino, Las Vegas, NV
WHO: You, of course, and as many SSN 680 shipmates as we can convince to join us!
Early May should allow us to miss the searing southern Nevada heat. The hotel is located off the strip, so we won’t be bombarded by the bulk of the tourist traffic, but within a relatively short walking distance (15 minutes) for those who wish to take the unique sites, sounds, and smells of Las Vegas in all its glory, and ground transportation is available for those longer trips.
We are not planning activities for this reunion expecting that, given the wide range of entertainment available, group activities will emerge spontaneously. That doesn’t rule out a reunion dinner and the traditional tolling of the bell ceremony, but we will await your feedback before we get carried away.
So, what to you need to do?
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- Details
- Brad Williamson
- LAS VEGAS 25 - 680
Back in June we first announced REGROUPEX 25 as the next USS WILLIAM H. BATES (SSN 680) reunion.
What I expected was not what turned out. Things got complicated.
It had been over seven years since our last REGROUPEX reunion. The bell has tolled for some of those who were with us in Orlando in 2017. All of us are seven years closer to ‘shipping our own oars’. Yet there are still things to do, sights to see, places to go, and sea stories to be told.
Time and tide wait for no man, it is said, and we cannot afford to miss an opportunity for shipmates to gather. Deliberation over the where, when, and what regarding a reunion led us to an unexpected conclusion - that one is not enough!
As a result, 2025 will bring us not one, but two reunions.
The first, to be held in early May, will be organized simply, much in the fashion of REGROUPEX 09 and will take place in Las Vegas, NV, just off the strip and the excitement that is Las Vegas!
Designate contact LAS VEGAS 25!
- Details
- Brad Williamson
- POD - Fleet
Cold War Boats has recently assumed responsibility for the USS HADDO (SSN 604) website.
Ralph Stroede, the current USS HADDO webmaster, graciously allowed us to capture all of the content of the old usshaddo.com website, and import it into the SSN 604 site at coldwarboats.org, provided we allow him to retire as webmaster!
Until we get the usshaddo.com domain name transferred and redirected, the new USS HADDO site can be found here: either https://ssn-604.coldwarboats.org or https://ssn604.coldwarboats.org.
Read more: USS HADDO (SSN 604) Site Transferred to Cold War Boats!
- Details
- Brad Williamson
- POD - Fleet
- Details
- Brad Williamson
- POD - SSN 680
“The Dink List has grown to unacceptable proportions!”, the COB bellowed at the assembled mass of non-quals in the Crew’s Mess. “There will be no liberty until that, that, that damn list”, his finger pointing at the wrinkled paper taped to the bulkhead, spittle flying from his lips, “is EMPTY!”
At least that’s how I remember it! Your experience may have been either more or less fun.
Our dink list is a bit different, but just as unacceptably long. It represents all the Bates shipmates registered at coldwarboats.org whose email addresses are no longer valid, as indicated by our ‘bounce’ tracker.
If you recognize a name here, and have a way of tracking them down, please do so, post haste, and get them to update their email, street address, and phone number on the website.
And don’t forget to let them know that, until they do, they are missing out on much, including planning for REGROUPEX 25!
- Details
- Brad Williamson
- REGROUPEX 25 - 680
It’s been seven years since our last reunion. In 2017, the last time we met in Orlando, the consensus was that we ought to be getting together every three years or so.
2020 came and went, with the lockdown and isolation squashing our reunion hopes fast than you can say “liberty ports confirmed through Hobart!”
2023 looked like a possibility, but the Navy was still restricting access to bases and boat tours, and before we knew it, 2024 was on us like a Sturgeon-class stretch hull on a Victor III - undetected, unexpected, and soon to vanish.
So here we are.
Miles Bradley poked us awake, as surely as a messenger yanking back the rack curtains. Ron Squiers and Scott Elder joined in the conversation, all starting with Miles’ question, “Any more reunions?”
The answer was a resounding yes, and now more than ever, which is how it must begin.
REGROUPEX 25 will be the next USS WILLIAM H. BATES (SSN 680) reunion. At the moment, we don’t know where, and we don’t know when, but we do know how.
That how depends on you…telling us what you think, volunteering to help, making your voice and support heard. After all, it’s you we do this for!
- Details
- Brad Williamson
- POD - Fleet
The USS GUITARRO (SSN 665) website at coldwarboats.org has been launched, and already has a few photos, a Commissioning Booklet from 1972, and a couple of interesting postal covers in the Ship’s Post Office.
The site is ready for fitting out - all it needs is your submissions of photos, stories, and artifacts. It can be found here: https://coldwarboats.org/the-boat-665/uss-guitarro-ssn-665/quarterdeck-665
Guitarro was a Sturgeon-class submarine, and boasted an impressive service career during the Cold War. She played a major role in developing tactics for prototype combat systems deployed to the Pacific submarine fleet, in particular the Submarine Towed Array Sensor System (STASS) along with its BQR-20 series digital sonar displays. In the mid-1970s, Guitarro also installed the first digital submarine combat system (BQQ-5 sonar and Mk-117 fire control system) and participated in the development of submarine-launched Harpoon and Tomahawk cruise missiles.
Despite her accolades, she is remembered for her pre-commissioning sinking at the pier during fitting out at Mare Island Naval Shipyard on 15 May 1969. Lack of oversight and communication between civilian construction testing groups resulted in a complete flooding of the boat, a rapid unrecoverable sinking, leaving her resting on the bottom showing nothing but sail.
