I got the unbelievable honor to attend the commissioning of the USS Texas Virginia class attack submarine of 9/9/06.  The tickets could not be bought and were very hard to come by, but my chapter of the Sons of the Republic of Texas sponsored the "Deck hand of the year" on board the boat, so we got tickets.  Mike Wilson and I got to go with Sam Houston IV and many other members of the Sons.

The security was nothing short of amazing with Laura Bush, Senators Cornyn and Hutchinson, as well as about every single Admiral in the United States Navy, including the two top ranked ones.  The boat is unbelievable with no propeller and no periscope!  Technology has produced a 360 digital camera on a mast that captures the surface and transfers it to LCD monitors in the boat!

They are are thumbnails, so if you click on them, the resolution is much better.

Here are some Video clips I ran....  (Boy, am I so not a camera man!)