Courtesy Photo | A current look at the Kesselring site, has safely operated for more than 600,000 hours...... read more read more
Kesselring Site: Then and Now - Part I
Story by Troy Miller • NNSY Public Affairs Specialist
Editor’s Note: This is the first in a two part series on NNSY’s Kesselring Site Operations work in New York.
When Norfolk Naval Shipyard (NNSY) sent a surge team to one of NNSY’s remote locations in 2018, I was asked what I knew about the Kessel Run. I was very confident in my answer when I said, “Han Solo made the run in less than 12 parsecs flying the Millennium Falcon in Star Wars: A New Hope.” Needless to say, I was a bit confused on what the science fiction Kessel Run had to do with a surge team from NNSY. Looking at their confused faces, I realized they said Kesselring, not Kessel Run. At that particular time, I knew more about the Kessel Run than I did about the Kesselring Site.
To appreciate what NNSY is doing at the Kesselring Site now, we need to first go back to see how the site came to be.
In the 1940s, the government began to acquire what would eventually become the 3,900 acres of land nestled along the Kayaderosseras Creek, Glowegee Creek and Crooks Brook in the towns of Galway and Milton, New York. Approximately 65 acres were used for the Remote Atomic Power Laboratory, while the remaining acreage was maintained for natural habitat.
“The Remote Atomic Power Laboratory was originally developed for testing early reactor designs in the late 1940s,” said Karen Staulters, former Town of Milton Historian and member of the Town of Milton Historic Structures and Places Committee. “However, the site shifted its direction to testing of propulsion plants in the Naval Nuclear Propulsion Program and subsequently for training Navy operators for these propulsion plants.”
The first prototype began operation in 1955. It was a liquid-sodium cooled naval prototype for the second nuclear powered submarine, USS Seawolf (SSN 575).
“In 1952, Lt. j.g. Jimmy Carter, who would become the 39th President of the United States, became a part of the Navy's fledgling nuclear submarine program, led then by Capt. Hyman G. Rickover, who is now known as the ‘Father of the Nuclear Navy,’” said Staulters. “In March 1953, Carter began nuclear power school at Kesselring and assisted in the setup of on-the-job training for the enlisted men being instructed in nuclear propulsion for the USS Seawolf.”
Carter stated in his book “Why not the Best?: "I was ordered to Schenectady, New York, as the senior officer of the crew of the Seawolf, and began to teach the men mathematics, physics, and reactor technology. At the same time, we helped General Electric workers to construct the prototype power plant within a huge steel sphere near the Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory."
Carter went on to say in his book “A Full Life” that “designing and building one of the first high-capacity nuclear power plants and understanding the submarine in which it would be installed was a constant learning process, on the cutting edge of science. I was ordered to supplement my practical training with studies of theoretical nuclear physics at nearby Union College. There were few people at the time who were as knowledgeable as we were about this new technology, and all of us had unique security clearances, known as ‘Restricted Data.’”
The second plant, the S3G prototype, was put into operation in 1958, for the former submarine USS Triton (SSRN/SSN 586). Unlike its predecessor, the S3G prototype contained a pressurized water type reactor which was carried over to the D1G (1962), MARF (1976) and S8G (1979) prototype plants.
In 1991, the S3G prototype operations were shut down to allow more modern platforms to complete testing and training requirements. In 1996, operations at the D1G prototype similarly were ceased. Dismantlement and removal of the S3G prototype from Kesselring was completed in 2006, and the D1G prototype is in the process of being dismantled.
The name of the site was changed from the West Milton Site to the Kenneth A. Kesselring Site in 1972 to honor the former General Electric Company’s General Manager of the Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory.
For almost 70 years, more than 57,000 Sailors have trained at Kesselring. Operations Department (Code 300) Kesselring S8G Prototype Reactor Project Superintendent Matthew May went through the same rigorous program in Charleston, South Carolina, so he knows firsthand what is asked of the Sailors who go through the training.
May recalled his own experiences going to A-school for academic training prior to his time in nuclear power school. “The process to become a nuclear certified operator is very demanding. I went through the program when I was in the Navy back in 1990,” said May. “Like myself, Sailors go to school for six months. That's the academics portion to learn their trade. Afterwards, they go to nuclear power school where they learn all the physics of how the reactors works. If they pass all the tests, they get to go and actually run the reactor on the site for six months.”
Once certified the Sailors go to the fleet where they begin to put their training, knowledge, hard work and effort to practical use on a U.S. Navy warship.
In an upcoming issue of Service to the Fleet, we will slip it into hyperdrive to see what great things Norfolk Naval Shipyard is currently accomplishing at the Kesselring Site—an urgent mission for our Navy even if it’s not measured in parsecs.
| Date Taken: | 09.01.2023 |
| Date Posted: | 09.25.2023 10:56 |
| Story ID: | 454207 |
| Location: | US |
| Web Views: | 1,816 |
| Downloads: | 1 |
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