“One Bainbridge resident has been following the collision of the nuclear submarine Greeneville and a Japanese fishing vessel with special interest.Capt. Michael King, who moved here five years ago to take command of the Trident submarine USS Alabama, is now Chief of Staff of Submarine Group 9, consisting of all the Trident boats at Bangor. His immediate superior, Adm. Chip Griffiths, was named investigating officer of the tragedy for the court inquiry; the Navy launched a formal inquiry this week.The investigation has raised questions about the possible involvement of civilians in the control room at the time of the accident, in which nine Japanese were lost.But King said that having civilians aboard Navy ships is nothing new.My father (a Navy captain who served from World War II to the Vietnam War) took me to sea for a day on his destroyer in 1964 or 1965, and there were other civilians on board, he said.King himself has on several occasions played host to groups of civilians on board the two subs he’s commanded – the Alabama and the USS Albuquerque, like the Greeneville a Los Angeles-class attack submarine.The practice became more regular with the end of the Cold War. The result is that at Bangor, groups of up to 45 civilians meet boats as they return from patrols at sea for four-hour VIP cruises.We consider all civilians to be VIPs, King said. One of our purposes is to engage the public and educate them about what the submarine force does and how professional a force it is.Tour groups represent a pretty diverse spectrum of society, he said, running the gamut from Paul Allen and Bill Gates to U.S. senators to local businesspersons.We get requests from many different individuals and groups. We look at the people who ask to go and evaluate the benefits to them and to the Navy, King said. For example, if we had a staff delegate for a senator who made decisions about the Navy, the person would be better informed to provide support for that senator.If people call, they get put on our list. Eventually everyone gets under way. It’s just a question of how long it takes, because sometimes people have to wait up to a year.On board the ship, King said, visitors are broken up into small groups, so they can hear their escort and so the crew can maintain control to avoid the risk of injury.When he retires in June, King will have spent 27 years in the Navy, all of it in submarines.He’s familiar with the emergency main ballast blow, the maneuver that brought the Greeneville up directly under the Japanese vessel. In that procedure, high pressure air is forced into the submarine’s ballast tanks to bring it to the surface rapidly. The maneuver was designed as a safety measure following the loss of the USS Thresher in 1968.Every submarine is required to perform it once every three months as a test to make sure the system works, King said. Some commanding officers have timed the test to coincide with the VIP cruises.Lest boaters on Hood Canal worry about a 600-foot Trident submarine bobbing to the surface beside them, King said no emergency blows are conducted there, even in 600-foot-deep Dabob Bay. In addition, escorting surface vessels remain in contact with submerged subs during their transit of Hood Canal.Despite limitations recently imposed by the Secretary of Defense in the wake of the Greeneville tragedy – no civilians at any controls, no emergency blows with civilians aboard – King said he doesn’t foresee the VIP cruise program being scrapped.It’s too important to us, he said. I can’t imagine civilians leading the U.S. military without understanding the military.There’s another benefit for the Navy, King added.We demand a lot from our sailors – long hours, being away from their families, he said. It’s good for them to have people observe what they do and to thank them. Most of our visitors know nothing of the submarine force and they leave in awe of the submarines and of the professionalism of these young sailors. Many of them were in high school a few years earlier.The visitors seem to like it, too.A few years ago I had a businessman from Oklahoma visit the Alabama for an in-port half-hour tour, King said. The gentleman came into my stateroom and shook my hand. ‘I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart,’ he said. ‘It brings tears of joy to my eyes to see what you’re doing for the nation.’ “