Talk:USS Pampanito

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Towards the end of this article, a "clean sweep" is defined as "all torpedoes shot", which is wrong. What a "clean sweep" means is all targets in a particular convey encountered have been sunk. Also, it is implied that the Pampanito archived this on her last patrol, which is untrue, no matter how you define "clean sweep" (her last patrol was uneventful as far as targets are concerned). The article should state or imply that the broom attached to the periscope shear (which signals "clean sweep") is in place to show a decoration popularly affixed to those submarines returning to their home port which had achieved the total destruction of a convoy (a clean sweep). It is a museum, after all, they have license to expand or embellish their display for historical reasons. Pampanito might have returned to port with a broom in the shears after one of her war patrols but certainly not the last one, and the definition of it is wrongly given in this article.

Just saying.

Thanks for the inspiration! It transpires that the article was wrong, but you're not entirely right, either. Please see the new article "clean sweep (naval)." ➥the Epopt 22:36, 30 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

See:

• http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/01/08/BAG6RNEJJI1.DTL

As time allows, we should incorporate this info into the article.

Atlant 17:28, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This is a nice article, with a good amount of references. The references could be improved somewhat, say with finding a reference for the ship having appeared in a movie, and not having been out of the Golden Gate for 50 years. But overall it is a good article, with a nice pic, with lots of information in infoboxes. I'd like to help bring it up to Good Article status. Beforehand, what should be fixed up? What I would do:

1. obtain the NRHP Inventory/Nomination document and photo set about the ship, which is often a 10-20 page document written by a historian and various editors, which is definitive about the reasons for NRHP/NHL designation and which is a great source for many specific statements throughout the article. For most NHLs, this document is available on-line at the National Park Service, but for this one it has to be requested and sent by postal mail. I will put in the request now.
2. otherwise try to use in-line citations (footnotes) to support statements throughout the article
3. put in specific quotes, where appropriate, from the DANFS source into the article, and remove the general DANFS disclaimer

Comments? Suggestions? Sincerely, doncram (talk) 20:01, 12 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding the DANFS summary, have a look at USS Texas (BB-35), which is a GA. The DANFS disclaimer still exists, but the individual information is also cited using the regular citation system. The DANFS tag should stay regardless. -MBK₀₀₄ 02:26, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I was hoping to develop the article so that it was not necessary to display a general DANFS disclaimer. If the text is merely paraphrased, adapted slightly from the DANFS source, then I agree that a general DANFS disclaimer must stay. doncram (talk) 20:09, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I find that the DANFS-adapted text is only in one section of this article, and it occurred to me that a section-specific DANFS tag would be appropriate and better. Not finding one, I created a template "DANFSsection" to implement this. This template has now been discussed and criticized in the talk page of WP:SHIPS, by the way, and it seems not to be as obvious an improvement as I thought, or at least not to have obvious applications elsewhere. However, in this article, I think that its use works to calibrate readers' expectations appropriately about the authorship of the wording in the article. And applying it to just one section should help clarify for readers and subsequent editors that the statements outside that section are not supported by the DANFS text, and need to be evaluated on their own merits. doncram (talk) 20:09, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

New question, relating to trying to make the DANFS sourcing proper. The DANFS material supports all the material in the one section, I believe, except for the stricken date at the very end which is from another source, Friedman. The footnote for the Friedman source, appearing at the end, could appear like it means to cover more than just the last fact. I've just seen a different treatment of DANFS material, in an article up for Featured Article, in which the DANFS source is footnoted at the end of each paragraph in which DANFS material appears. So 30 paragraphs in that article are footnoted. It does not use the DANFS section template, which is a new draft and just being tested here. Would it be excessive/appropriate to remove the DANFS footnote from the section-leading DANFS notice, and add the DANFS footnote to each paragraph? I guess i could try it and we could see. doncram (talk) 04:07, 14 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It is still there, as it was when I saw the sub for the first time years ago. You can see it if you examine the infobox pic and also in Image:383sail.jpg. As for a closeup shot - I don't see right now how that would fit into the current article given the space taken up by infoboxes on the right; inserting it somewhere into the left would give the text a squeezed feeling, which I personally try to avoid for aesthetic reasons. A Commons gallery could be set up to document the sub photographically; I have a lot of pics I took when I recently visited, practically went nuts shooting the thing. --BrokenSphere^{Msg me} 20:05, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hey, it would be great to have a commons category about this ship, which could be linked to from this article. And, I would like to add a close-up of the broom. I will have more material to add to the article in a few weeks, and it will evolve in other ways, so I don't think it is a problem for the article to be "picture-heavy" for a while. As I indicated in my edit summary marking the clean sweep statement for "citation needed", I do like the anecdote. I even like the complication about what is the definition, evolving, of what is a clean sweep. It seems to be an educational and/or entertaining point that the museum is making, that this ship is entitled to post a broom, and I agree it is interesting and thus I think we could/should cover it. It would be nice to have a quote or source from the museum about it, to write about it. But a photo making it clear that a broom was posted, on some recent date, is enough of an anchor to use in writing something short about it. Thanks for watching and adding! doncram (talk) 20:18, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, i tried adding Image:383sail.jpg to the article. I think it works. The image description says something about it depicting masts and sails, but I don't know what is meant by sails, so I don't include that in the thumb description. And, the image description is not clear on date of photo, just the upload date, so I am going out on a limb to assert the pic is from March, 2003. I wonder because it includes a Christmas tree. Are Christmas trees attached to ships throughout the year? Or is this likely a picture from December 2002? Hmm now maybe the Christmas tree also has to be explained. Maybe it is just a tree, not a Christmas tree, put up for some other purpose. Anyhow, I think that some statement from the museum is really needed to explain the broom. The broom relates to the entire career of the ship, or to its 4th tour, or to what? doncram (talk) 20:30, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

We can always reevaluate how the pics work out after further changes.

There is a Commons category, which you can see linked to in the external links section. The template for that is {{Commonscat}}. BrokenSphere^{Msg me} 20:57, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In modern (post-WWII) submarines, that superstructure sticking out of the hull of the sub is called the "sail". For WWII-era subs, like Pampanito, that area of the boat was called the conning tower. However, the picture was most likely captioned with someone more familiar with modern subs. TomTheHand (talk) 21:40, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm starting to upload the usable pics I took of the boat when I toured it last February. It looks like the folks who have taken pics of the sub so far didn't get on it, so this will provide more detailed views of the inside and deck. --BrokenSphere^{Msg me} 15:49, 17 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The NRHP Inventory-Nomination for the Pampanito, prepared by Harry A. Butowsky and dated May 1985, cites somewhat different statistics for the ship than are given in the infobox of the article. The Nomination text reports:

• Length 312 feet
• Beam 27 feet
• Displacement 1,500 tons
• Submerged displacement 2, 415 tons
• Speed: 21 knots surface/10 knots submerged
• Armament: Ten 21" torpedo tubes (6 forward, 4 aft), twenty-four torpedoes (mark 14 and Mark 18s used), one 4" 50mm deck gun, two 20 mm guns.
• Fuel capacity: 118,000 gallons
• Cruising radius 22,000 miles (vs. range 11,000 nm stated in the infobox)
• Test depth: 600 feet (vs. 400 feet stated in infobox)

Not sure what to make of the difference in the last two items, especially. doncram (talk) 08:10, 25 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm confident that Friedman and Bauer are more accurate. TomTheHand (talk) 12:15, 25 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Do you have the Friedman reference available, to verify that the infobox statement that the range is 11,000 nautical miles, is what Friedman reports, and see if he reports it as "range" or as "cruising radius"? Another source is the factsheet of the Pampanito museum, the National Maritime Museum Association, which states the ship has an 11,000 mile cruising radius. Butowsky's sources include an undated brochure of the National Maritime Museum Association. Maybe the issue is what is a "cruising radius"? I would guess that the term means 1/2 of the range, that is to say it is how far out you can go and still get back. Since Butowski reports the 22,000 mile cruising radius, perhaps the museum's own understanding and reporting of the ship's cruising radius/range has been changed/corrected over time. I would be inclined to believe that whatever the museum says now is most likely to be accurate. And yet another way to check on this fact would be to see if its stated range is comparable to that stated for other ships of its class, but i have not checked any. doncram (talk) 23:35, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The fact sheet of the museum states that the Operating depth of the ship is 400 feet. That would be consistent with the Test depth of the ship being deeper, say 600 feet, as Butowsky reports. I wonder if Friedman reports only the operating depth, but since the Ships infobox reports Test depth, someone entered the operating depth into the Ships infobox instead. Can someone check what Friedman says about this item, too? doncram (talk) 23:48, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, Butowsky's sources are (i am abbreviating them only slightly):

• Blair, Clay Jr. Silent Victory--The U.S. Submarine War Against Japan. Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1975.
• Hoyt, Edwin P. Submarines at War--The History of the American Silent Service. New York: Stein and Day, 1983.
• Middleton, Drew. Submarine--The Ultimate Naval Weapon--Its Past, Present, and Future. Chicago: Playboy Press, 1976
• National Maritime Museum Association. USS Pampanito (Information brochure). San Francisco: National Maritime Museum Association, no date.
• O'Kane, Richard. Clear the Bridge. New York: Bantam Books, 1981.
• Roscoe, Theodore. United States Submarine Operation in World War II. Annapolis: United States Naval Institute, 1965.

Butowsky includes a footnote to the museum brochure after his tabulation of facts, so it would appear that the museum brochure in particular was his source for all of the limited number of facts that he gives and which I listed above. doncram (talk) 23:48, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Friedman reports that the "Surface endurance" of the Balao-class is 11,000 nautical miles at 10 knots. Elsewhere in the book he equates surface endurance to cruising radius. Therefore the above figure from Butowsky is completely contradicted by Friedman. Friedman reports that the test depth is 400 ft. Test depth and operating depth are synonymous; you may be thinking of crush/collapse depth, which is deeper. I am also not inclined to believe that the museum's web site is more accurate than Friedman, which is a serious academic source. TomTheHand (talk) 00:46, 27 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that Butowsky's 22,000 cruising radius figure seems to be wrong, as it is contradicted by the museum's current website, too. Which agrees with Friedman, if "cruising radius" means the same as "range". Hmm, by surface endurance I would clearly understand that to mean how far the ship can go. By cruising radius, I would think that should mean 1/2 the distance it can go. By range, I would think it could mean either how far, or 1/2 as far. Go figure, if they all mean the same thing. doncram (talk) 02:16, 27 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Per discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ships#New DANFS section template available, I have removed the implementation of template {{DANFSsection}} from this article. — Bellhalla (talk) 13:53, 25 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think that was really necessary. As discussed there, the section-specific template happens to fit this article. You and I both noted there that the template's included footnote does not work properly, but that could just be deleted from the template. The section-specific template served this article to advise the reader which material is paraphrased from the DANFS source. Simply removing the section template and slapping on the generic DANFS template here loses that identification. By the discussion there, I understand that Bellhalla and others do not feel that there is a general problem with DANFS referencing quality, and generally do not like any suggestions to the contrary. However, stomping out the use of this DANFS section here seems WP:POINTY to me, to use a term that I have been reading up on recently, and seems not relate to a genuine concern about the referencing quality and appearance of this article.

If the general DANFS template is left in, then each paragraph that is DANFS material (i.e., each paragraph in the one section) needs a footnote to the DANFS text. That would implement what I am now understanding to be current "best practice" in citing DANFS. Bellhalla, do you want to carry that out? I would prefer to restore the section template, however. I would like to hear others' comments about the use of the section template in this article. Anyone is free to comment of course, but I would prefer to hear from contributors to this article and not so much to hear from others sailing in just to make a point that is not so much related to this article. doncram (talk) 00:07, 27 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If the general DANFS template is left in, then each paragraph that is DANFS material (i.e., each paragraph in the one section) needs a footnote to the DANFS text

NO, it does NOT. Per WP:V:

All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged should be attributed to a reliable, published source using an inline citation.

There is no need for every single statement sourced from DANFS to be provided with inline citations. General references are acceptable on Wikipedia. TomTheHand (talk) 00:35, 27 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

USS Hornet (CV-12), which is berthed in Alameda and is also a museum ship like the Pampanito that doesn't go anywhere, also does this. --BrokenSphere^{Msg me} 20:55, 27 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So does the USS Texas (BB-35) and USS Lexington (CV-16), but I don't have cites off the top of my head. This thing is fairly standard for museum ships. -MBK₀₀₄ 21:02, 27 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Massachusetts (BB-59) [1], Alabama (BB-60) [2], New Jersey (BB-62) [3], and Yorktown (CV-10) [4] do it too. I think North Carolina (BB-55) used to do it, and they may still, but Google's not pulling up any info. I think it's unusual that a boat as small as Pampanito does it; WWII fleet submarines are tiny. TomTheHand (talk) 21:57, 27 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"USS Pampanito (SS-383/AGSS-383), a Balao-class submarine, was a United States Navy ship, the only one named for the pompano fish. "

This article shows that this is not the case:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Pompano — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.228.19.55 (talk) 01:43, 9 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

There is an image of the pompano's propulsion system in the article, probably be good for the article cheers! (cant code or i would do it)

The facts presented concerning the terminology of "ship" and "boat", and of the apt pronunciation of "submariner", even if they may be correct, are entirely irrelevant to the section, page and possibly even website they are in (not to mention completely uncited; consider wiktionary). Aotoda (talk) 07:03, 15 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The Pampanito article states Pampanito sank Rakuyo Maru, while the Sealion (SS-315) article states she was sunk by Sealion. 2600:8802:4516:B100:1C40:92A:8A2E:9F6A (talk) 02:50, 20 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]