Poetic Licence: Goats Suffer in Submarine Tests

Martin Newell Illustration,Michael Heath
Wednesday 31 March 1999 23:02 BST
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Hundreds of goats have been subjected to decompression tests by military scientists to see what might happen to sailors trapped in submarines. Concerned MPs will ask questions in the Commons next week about the experiments, to find out exactly how many goats have died.

Well no. The goats don't always die.

Quite a few of them are reusable.

But not as actual submarine crew

Since they don't have opposable thumbs

And they'd be no use in wartime

Because of smells in confined spaces

Oh and horns getting stuck in hatches

So we use decompression chambers.

Well, they use pigs for testing live ammo

So I suppose we scientists just thought:

"Submarines? Decompression? The bends?

Gotta be goats. For sure. Absolutely. Yup."

Think about it. One minute I'm at uni.

Then the next I've answered this advert:

Reckon You've Got What it Takes?

Come and compress goats for the Navy."

"Had a hard day at the labs, darling?

Any closer to sorting out that pressure problem?

Any fan mail from grateful sailors then?" Nope.

We sure gave those goat spleens what for though.

So do the goats get distressed about it?

How should I know? No. I'm not trying to

Worm out of it. This is what they say:

"They bleat and leap around." Whatever.

No. I don't know what the women scientists think.

One of the guys got taken off it, though.

Oh and your brother, the leftie nutter, told me

To have a word with myself. About myself.

What? Didja think we'd put them in their own

Little submarines? With peaked caps?

In an immersion tank. Like in the film

Das Goat? Sorry. Cheap shot. Don't cry.

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