The Hunt for Red October (Jack Ryan, #3)

by Tom Clancy

Ryan pulled the blowups from the back of the folder. “These doors, bow and stern.” “Uh-huh.” Tyler set them down side by side. “Pretty big. They’re two meters or so, paired fore and aft. They look symmetrical through the long axis. Not cruise missile tubes, eh?” “On a boomer? You put something like that on a strategic missile sub?” “The Russkies are a funny bunch, Jack, and they design things their own way. This is the same bunch that built the Kirov class with a nuclear reactor and an oil-fired steam plant. Hmm . . . twin screws. The aft doors can’t be for a sonar array. They’d foul the screws.” “How ’bout if they trail one screw?” “They do that with surface ships to conserve fuel, and sometimes with their attack boats. Operating a twin-screw missile boat on one wheel would probably be tricky on this baby. The Typhoon’s supposed to have handling problems, and boats that handle funny tend to be sensitive to power settings. You end up jinking around so much that you have trouble holding course. You notice how the doors converge at the stern?” “No, I didn’t.” Tyler looked up. “Damn! I should have realized it right off the bat. It’s a propulsion system. You shouldn’t have caught me marking papers, Jack. It turns your brain to Jell-O.” “Propulsion system?” “We looked at this—oh, must have been twenty some years ago—when I was going to school here. We didn’t do anything with it, though. It’s too inefficient.” “Okay, tell me about it.” “They called it a tunnel drive. You know ho...