USS Connecticut (SSN 22) struck an object while submerged on Oct. 2, while operating in international waters in the Indo-Pacific region.
A Sea Wolf attack submarine struct something in the South China Sea. I get the feeling it hit another sub or some anti-sub defense. This is definitely a non-good event.
> As for what the submarine hit, details remain limit. U.S. officials have reportedly said that there are no indications at present that the "object" was another submarine.
"No indications at present" does not mean the same thing as "did not." Neither gives a proper quote of whatever statement they're paraphrasing, but I can easily see the former being transmuted into the latter by a careless journalist.
A lot of cargo containers are lost overboard. They don't all immediately sink to the bottom (sealed air, bouyant cargo, etc)
What's the sonar signature of a 40 foot shipping container that's just floating below the surface? Are you even going to hear it without going active?
What kind of damage does that do, if your submarine plows into it, even at a slow speed? My understanding is that the bow isn't entirely metal, that there's fiberglass (or something similar) where the sonar equipment is located.
Former Navy submarine officer here. This sucks, but it happens. (It happened to a boat I was on.)
It could be hitting the bottom of the ocean (which nearly killed 130+ people on the USS San Francisco years ago - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_San_Francisco_(SSN-711)#Co...), it could be hitting another ship above it (coming to and/or operating at periscope depth is dangerous), or potentially another sub.
Invariably people get fired, and whatever happens becomes a lesson learned that the Navy trains on in the future.
That is a possibility. The navy has had at least two serious collisions with other ships in recent years. Oddly enough, touchscreen-based UIs were determined to be one of the contributing factors!
Not related. But no real (even if configurable) button sucks a lot. It is not because old hand but imagine a pure iphone like camera for very quick photographic decision. Or video.
> Oddly enough, touchscreen-based UIs were determined to be one of the contributing factors!
There's no substitute for looking around (which of course is impossible in a submarine below periscope depth). As a JOOD* underway aboard an aircraft carrier, I had a tendency to spend a lot of time looking at the radar scope. But as soon as I qualified and started standing OOD* watches, I realized that I had switched to constantly scanning the horizon and the flight deck and only occasionally glancing at the radar.
* OOD = Officer of the Deck, the person on watch who's responsible for the safe navigation of the ship for that "watch" (generally, a four-hour period), reporting to the commanding officer. JOOD = Junior Officer of the Deck, in training to be an OOD.
who knows at this point, at least with regard to this latest incident, but it is always a possibility, given that the navy traditionally overworks enlisted crews on subs and gives them substandard living conditions... when i was on a fast attack sub 40 yrs ago, I had to work 6 hrs on and 6 hrs off, around the clock, while underway...and during one of my 2 6 hrs shifts off, I had the opportunity to sleep in a cot where two other men also slept during their shifts...it's called hot bunking...
this all goes back centuries, back to when navy crews were often kidnapped and made virtual slaves...the navy has always been operated for the benefit of the officer class...
and nowadays we have the issue of lowered standards as well.
I'm pretty sure that GP just did. Their post was a multi-pronged dig at their time serving - the first being that their training was (mostly?) ppt based, and secondly that sailors are overworked.
Have you received training as an enlisted person? Because PPTs are but one - of numerous - ways, to include drills, exercises, and other physical doing.
Yes, 12.5 years enlisted. I've sat through more dumb PPT's that are a reaction to an incident than I care to remember. With Covid, the model seems to have moved to doing an online course which is a bunch of slides and some multiple choice questions.
Experience varies. I've enjoyed all my postings, some more than others and I don't regret enlisting for a second. But I've certainly seen a lot of reactions to make incidents in the form of watch a video or a PowerPoint presentation. Not so much for proper training.
The cutting edge in mediocre corporate training at the moment is drawing pictures about experiences based on open ended questions to which no one dares say an answer is wrong but instead passively aggressively use voting via small tags of coloured paper and resulting in nothing aside from a few quotes from self improvement books, and a cake and photo at the end of the day to *celebrate the journey", and that shading stick figure figurines with grey makes them look better.
My understanding is they're relying on inertial navigation and water pressure sensor (to know the current depth) - you could turn on active sonar to map the sea floor, but that kind of ruins the stealth thing, and you can't look out a window.
If there's a submerged obstacle that isn't mapped, especially another sub, you won't know it's there until it's too late. Which is pretty much what happened in the HMS Vanguard and Le Triomphant collision.
Silly question, could it have been an animal? Would hitting a full-grown blue whale or anything less at 30 knots cause such a disturbance? Also is there any way to detect marine life at close proximity?
I saw the story about USS San Francisco earlier today and that led me to reading about the USS Thresher... Really sad story but it led to changes that years later resulted in the USS SF surviving intact. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Thresher_(SSN-593)
A grown blue whale weights about 1/50th of the submarine (~200 tons vs ~10k tons) and is quite a bit squishier. But maybe that would still be enough to knock some submariners around and cause some injuries? I'm not sure.
A grown blue whale is about 1/5 the length of the USS Connecticut.
If a submarine crashed in to a whale, it would not only have the forces of trying to accelerate the mass of the whale, it has to accelerate an object with a large surface area under water.
Aerodynamics vs hydrodynamics might skew your perception of the forces involved.
Well no, because it will be less of "submarine crashes into a whale and pushes it forwards" and more "submarine swims partially in whale". Compared to the forces involved, living tissue just isn't that strong.
But there was one piece of equipment on board that normally runs for ~20-30minutes at a time. It had to run continuously until the ship came into port or the submarine would have sank and 130+ people would have died. They got VERY lucky everything worked out.
How would they check what's above them? Visual is out. Passive sonar will only detect noise sources. And pinging with active sonar loudly announces to everyone around exactly where you are.
e: to be clear, that upward looking camera isn't going to be enough to detect much beyond your own footprint. If someone is about to cross that area you'd need some other way of detecting them.
There’s special equipment/procedures for surfacing in the Arctic. That’s another really dangerous place to operate. (Default action in a submarine emergency is to get to the surface. That’s… NOT easy when there’s ice above you that’s potentially too thick to punch through)
Surface ships are very noisy so submarines listen for other ships in the area before surfacing. They have dead zones in their sonar coverage, but can usually deal with that by turning to listen in those dead zones before surfacing. Nevertheless, there are occasional accidents.
Surface ships are not always noisy. This is especially a problem with supertankers if you they are head-on to you, they can be hard to hear from underwater, especially with the high level of noise from the surface around the supertanker.
This was a contributing factor to a collision in the Mediterranean about a decade or so ago.
I personally had what we called an “ass-puckering” moment for exactly this reason once. At periscope depth in fog, huge cargo ship coming at us… it was the only time in 3 years on board I (or anyone else) had to call “emergency deep”.
> And pinging with active sonar loudly announces to everyone around exactly where you are.
From what I overheard in cafeterias frequented navy navy men while living in Vladivostok is that active sonar is used all the time unless deep blue waters.
Navigational active sonars are nowhere near as detectable as long range military ones.
Any sonar useful enough to navigate at speed is going to give away your position.
It's the "flashlight in the dark room" problem. Your sonar ping has to travel to an object and reflect back to the submarine. But an adversary just needs to hear the original ping to know what direction it came from, so you can be detected at a longer distance, and potentially a much longer distance, than you could reliably detect the other submarine at.
That's not to say active sonar is never used, but at least with the U.S. it's not going to be continuously used, and it's going to be rare to use it if you're in a mission area.
A sonar transducer that can emit a ping with directionality is sometimes useful (e.g. a fathometer to measure depth to the ocean bottom, since the crushing pressure of the depths ensures the area below you is generally clear of enemy subs), and those are used. But even there, that wouldn't be useful for navigating when otherwise blind; you use fathometers to confirm that you're approximately in the area you think you're in based on the chart readings.
Submarines do you passive sonar extensively before going to periscope depth. There are lots of ways to figure out where contacts are, your range to those contacts, and then avoid them all. But there's no sensor that can tell you with 100% accuracy what's above you.
How much visibility(Visual or sensory) there’s in a submarine? Are there cameras or sensors where you can observe in every direction or is it more like driving really large and old vehicle where you don’t know what’s happening around the vehicle most of the times?
Under the water you've got sonar, which only tells you sound (and sound pressure levels) from a particular bearing.
If you're up at periscope depth you can stick a periscope up to see and other antennas. If you're on the surface you typically send people up into the sail and the boat is commanded from there. (Only a couple people fit up there, so the people actually operating the rudder and navigating are belowdecks).
Overall you generally get a good indication of what's happening, but... it's definitely possible to be surprised.
> Invariably people get fired, and whatever happens becomes a lesson learned that the Navy trains on in the future.
In the debates surrounding some of the most recent incidents (see, e.g., https://www.propublica.org/series/navy-accidents-pacific-7th...) I remember reading claims to the effect that submarine captains are the last ones in the Navy who actually know how to pilot a boat. I know that claim is hyperbolic rhetoric but those Pro Publica pieces really make me think it's not far from the truth, and that while submariner training may still be exceptionally rigorous and responsive to newly identified risks, that's not necessarily true in the case of surface ships.
Possibly? There are far fewer officers on a submarine, so there's more opportunity for training.
But submarines don't spend a heck of a lot of time on the surface where piloting skill matters. They stay submerged through the Straits of Gibraltar, the Straits of Hormuz, a lot of the Red Sea, etc. Submarines are slow on the surface and appear much smaller than they really are, so it's generally best for everyone if they go underneath or around chokepoints.
To answer your first question, a significant amount of RCS for a capable commercial radar, not least of all because it is rounded for hydrodynamics, which is a terrible shape for minimizing RCS.
Second, I should have been clearer: the submarine stands to gain by operating their own radar rather than working from sonar alone.
Finally, submerged transits are mostly advantageous for security concerns.
My first CO believed that submarines should be stealthy all the time. He didn't put out the radar ball (a retro-reflector to account for the low observability of the sail relative to a submarine's size) or turn on any of the running lights.
We operated that way even when steaming on the surface in the shipping lanes shared with the Port of New York.
So it isn't always a matter of "actually knowing how to pilot a boat". Sometimes its just plain recklessness.
My Battalion Commander in Afghanistan made us run livefire training ranges for the ANA in an area that had multiple recent IED strikes and had clear overwatch from the ridgeline from miles away, as a way to basically brag to the TF commander that he was "getting the ANA out into the shit" - despite the fact that these people were just utterly and completely incompetent. Just a total psychopath, so in some ways it makes me feel better (worse?) that those personalities are not unique to the US Army.
Kind of off topic but those ProPublic articles on the state of the USN are incredible, and worth the time to read closely. Just re-read the one about the USS John McCain and it's such a fascinating article that hits all my interests (tech challenges with defense procurement, UI/UX problems, my love of Naval warships despite being an Army vet).
Each sub / surface vessel gives off a unique acoustic signature.
My understanding is that US subs don’t travel in packs, so anything they detect is generally the enemy, and especially so if it’s submerged, unless they are escorting a carrier.
Yep, just sound. And you don't even know range, you only know how strong sound is on a particular bearing.
The Navy trains to do a series of maneuvers that helps you understand the range to the ships you do hear, and positions the sub most safely to come to periscope depth. And then while you're coming to periscope depth you're looking out to see if there are any indications you've screwed up. But yeah, there's nothing visual available when you're under the water.
I worked on Target Motion Analysis (TMA) software that was live on S&T class UK submarines in the 90s. There were only a few types of data that were highly classified and which we never saw, Electronic Surveillance Measures (ESM) databases were an example. Emitter characteristics could pretty much allow a good SONOP (Jonesy!) to be able to identify specific instances of a class of boat. Fun stuff.
Sonar identification is incredibly accurate (with computer assitance). We've been dragging "mics" through the ocean for a long time. They can identify the exact ship by noises coming from the engine(s), the propellers, etc. They can count the rpm of the props of that ship and determine it's speed. They can tell if it is approaching, going away, etc.
During sea trials of a new boat, they have it do passes specifically for sonar to listen to it. Partly so they can learn its sound signature, but also to see if they can hear annomalies during construction. They've found toolboxes left inside a double hull by the builders.
They do have visuals with the waterfall displays and what not. Last I looked into sonar operations was in the early 90s, so not sure what the kids are using now.
They can do all of this without making a sound to allow someone else to know they are there.
This is going to be a stupid question, and I am going to already guess an answer but I have to ask.
Given that there is a collision about to happen, isn't there a sensor that would give some type of warning? And I'm guessing that the answer to my stupid question is that a sensor would give away the position of the submarine because anything emitting a signal would defeat the point of the sub?
Ya, not a dumb question, and you are correct. Submarines can’t use active navigational systems (anything that emits energy) like radar because it would defeat its own core mission of being a stealth weapons platform. They do use passive sensors to detect the environment around the ship and probably some other spooky secret stuff that I don’t know about.
A few years back two submarines from France and the UK collided - turns out that although the ocean is pretty big the places that missile subs are likely to hang are smaller than you might think:
The probability of mid-air collisions actually went up in step with the finer granularity of GPS systems.
> The navigation paradox states that increased navigational precision may result in increased collision risk. In the case of ships and aircraft, the advent of Global Positioning System (GPS) navigation has enabled craft to follow navigational paths with such greater precision (often of the order of plus or minus 2 meters), that, without better distribution of routes, coordination between neighboring craft and collision avoidance procedures, the likelihood of two craft occupying the same space on the shortest distance line between two navigational points has increased. [1]
It got to the point on many routes where regulators had to mandate an offset in opposite directions along common flight paths to effect "lanes" of traffic. [2]
Is this how the Navy deals with accidents? I can understand being fired for failing to do your duty but operating a sub is both hard and dangerous. Things are going to go wrong. If everyone did their job isn’t this just a learning opportunity?
For people who aren't the captain, it might indeed merely be a learning opportunity.
But if you're the captain of a ship that's at fault in a crash? The inadequacies revealed in the crew's training are kinda your fault.
For example, in 2017 when the USS Fitzgerald collided with a container ship [1] and the captain was relieved of his command, despite the fact he'd been in bed during the collision.
It's normal, in 95% of jobs, that if you cause $$$$$$$$ of damage by making a mistake, you get fired.
Submarines don't use active sonar as a matter of course. That is, it's not something you turn off when you want to be sneaky, it's something you only ever use in very limited and specific situations.
This increase in recent collisions (including training jets) is probably due to the Navy's "five and dimes" sleep schedule that basically guarantees every squid mustang and sardine is a combat worthless zombie due to sleep depravation.
Looks like 11 sailors were hurt. Very interesting indeed. Some sort of reconnaissance buoy? Or perhaps they were traveling close to the bottom of the South China Sea and hit the bottom? China considers the South China Sea an internal lake, so they would think they’re within their rights to mine it or otherwise defend it with submarine nets or booms. I imagine within the context of a larger conflict the PLAN would enact all sorts of submarine countermeasures in the South China Sea. This is why the lack of clarity/conflict regarding ownership of that body of water is so dangerous for the rest of the world.
If the Chinese were really so hot-headed to start a nuclear war because they were annoyed by an American submarine doing typical submarine things (an SSN no less, with no nuclear weapons of its own..), then there is no telling what other petty incident might also set them off. But I don't think they're so sensitive as that.
I'm not worried about them doing it deliberately, it's the accidents that are the problem. This incident, for example. What if it were a Chinese mine that they hit? And the Pentagon mistook it as prep for an invasion of Taiwan?
It seems equally unlikely to me that the Pentagon would let loose the nukes after losing a single SSN and having no other indication of an invasion. For one thing, it would probably take days to confirm the sub was sunk, and by that time the lack of an invasion should be clear. All the other American ships in the area being unscathed would also be a pretty big clue.
To be frank I'm not even sure I believe America would start a nuclear war at all even if Taiwan really were being invaded.
Laying a minefield in international waters (from the point of view of everyone but China, anyway) is an act of war. It's not necessary for there to be any interpretation or misunderstandings at that point, it's pretty much the same as if the Chinese fired ballistic missiles with real warheads at Taiwan, or engaged foreign navies in the South China Sea with swarms of anti ship missiles. At that point, the war has already started, so no one would do that unless that's what they wanted.
Which is why China hasn't placed any mines there, and your question doesn't make sense.
Happy injuries were just 11 people. If a submarine is submerged, it's kind of like a weird building without windows, even though it may be traveling at a pretty significant speed. If you imagine being in your own office and then suddenly getting thrown sideways, forward, or up/down, it's easy to imagine getting hurt.
"As for what the submarine hit, details remain limit. U.S. officials have reportedly said that there are no indications at present that the "object" was another submarine. "An official who requested anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak on the record said that the area’s topography at the time did not indicate there was a land mass in front of the boat," Military Times reported."
I understand the motives behind keeping it vague, but at a certain point doesn't the vagueness remove all value? What is the point in releasing a statement effectively saying "Our sub hit an unknown object for an unknown reason in an unknown location and the damages are unknown but do not threaten the ship"? Why say anything at all at this point?
I'd guess it was for the families of sailors. They may hear through the grapevine that there was an accident, but think it would be good to get out in front of it to state there was an accident but there were no life threatening injuries so that no undue grief is caused. It seems like it would be a little nerve racking thinking about a loved one even just working on a submarine.
And also presumably for the Chinese. Who, if the preliminary reports are not to be believed, possibly received a notification that one of their UUVs or subs was damaged. While tensions are high with Taiwan. And there are five(?) international carriers / amphibs conducting manuevers off Japan.
The Navy’s of the worlds job is a whole lot of high tech ‘watching’ of the other Navy’s. So having an official statement seems to make sense. (But I don’t think the GP really meant they shouldn’t say it at all, they just want more details.)
they're essentially saying nothing. at some point word would get out that the sub hit something - people talk. and then the story would be "this sub hit something, and the navy is keeping it secret"
a statement like this is just an acknowledgement of facts that would become public anyways, and a pre-emptive refusal to provide any further details. it exists so that when a somebody asks a question, they can say "please refer to our already published statement"
The value is in providing accountability to the civilian world, even if we can’t have access to specifics for security reasons we can watch for any patterns of safety or diplomatic incidents or bother our representatives to go find out more info.
It's important to note this is a Nuclear sub. https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/weapons/a37898620/... If the Navy can't successfully run these complicated machines, perhaps we need to re-think the USA's need for submarine assets in the first place. Or at least, the role of the Nuclear Submarine in 21st Century warfare; perhaps fewer, higher-tech units --- with crack seal-type units only operating them --- might make more sense. High automation. Robotics. Things like that. For sure, never give a meatbag a job better performed by automation.
US could lose all SLBM nuclear missile subs and still assure destruction, because of the triad.
Land based ICBMs are more accurate than SLBMs and would launch in retaliation.
The US has stealth cruise missiles it can launch from bombers.
The US has the B1 and B2 bombers that can deliver nukes.
Many Navy ships can launch nuclear cruise missiles.
The USA is the only superpower that has such robust nuclear weapons delivery via a triad (land, air, sea). With Russian SLBM subs it is said they are so noisy that US attack subs are always silently tailing them after they leave port and can take them out before they can launch. Russia and China really only have robust land-based ICBMs. If all of those could be preemptively attacked (by stealth strikes and commando raids) then the US could potentially win a nuclear war. Not that we'd want to try.
They are ridiculously complicated to operate. Teslas can't avoid hitting stuff on the road completely, I wouldn't feel great about having one completely automated and deciding for itself when to initiate nuclear war if it isn't in communications range. I highly doubt they were all sitting around drinking beers and not watching the road in front of them, but it would be good to wait until we have more information before throwing the sailors under the bus.
> with crack seal-type units only operating them
There already are highly skilled individuals that operate them. Seal team members are in limited supply and think it makes more sense to have those that are more intellectually strong run them.
They are a deterrent and non-nuclear submarines have large drawbacks when in combat. China has become more and more aggressive and they have scaled up their nuclear missile silos a bunch in recent years, have been sprinting towards a large more effective navy and I don't think they will have qualms about using morally questionable tech.
> it makes more sense to have those that are more intellectually strong run them.
Ridiculous implication that Naval Special Warfare is somehow “intellectually weak” when there are multiple Trident wearers who have qualified as astronauts or went on to Ivy League schools.
How do you get that implication? Did I say they were weak? "More strong“ just means they are stronger. I'm sure there are lots of geniuses in the seals as well but I would have to guess that nuclear physicists are on average smarter.
Submarines were hitting things every 1-2 years for a fair period of time between 2003 - 2013. If anything it's gotten better... but complaceny kills, a lesson we continuously have to re-learn.
7th fleet being 7th fleet. Being accident prone is better than the alternative - UAV tech out there Seawolf can't detect, or worse UAV tech that can detect Seawolf and decided to touch.
I wonder if this is all part of the game China and the US are playing. US gives AUKUS nuclear sub tech, China bops one of our most advanced nuclear sub classes...
> "The safety of the crew remains the Navy’s top priority."
Can any military really say this with a straight face? It's obviously not their top priority. If it was, they wouldn't be packing actual live humans into a pressurized nuclear-powered tube packed with explosives and send them into the black. Not to mention that whole "going to war" thing they occasionally do. That's pretty risky stuff, or so I hear.
Sorry for the snark. One can only take so much BS per hour, and I just got out of a meeting so my tolerance was low.
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[ 0.23 ms ] story [ 194 ms ] threadA Sea Wolf attack submarine struct something in the South China Sea. I get the feeling it hit another sub or some anti-sub defense. This is definitely a non-good event.
https://twitter.com/LucasFoxNews/status/1446190294693781509
> As for what the submarine hit, details remain limit. U.S. officials have reportedly said that there are no indications at present that the "object" was another submarine.
"No indications at present" does not mean the same thing as "did not." Neither gives a proper quote of whatever statement they're paraphrasing, but I can easily see the former being transmuted into the latter by a careless journalist.
A lot of cargo containers are lost overboard. They don't all immediately sink to the bottom (sealed air, bouyant cargo, etc)
What's the sonar signature of a 40 foot shipping container that's just floating below the surface? Are you even going to hear it without going active?
What kind of damage does that do, if your submarine plows into it, even at a slow speed? My understanding is that the bow isn't entirely metal, that there's fiberglass (or something similar) where the sonar equipment is located.
You know what these subs are doing, right?
It could be hitting the bottom of the ocean (which nearly killed 130+ people on the USS San Francisco years ago - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_San_Francisco_(SSN-711)#Co...), it could be hitting another ship above it (coming to and/or operating at periscope depth is dangerous), or potentially another sub.
Invariably people get fired, and whatever happens becomes a lesson learned that the Navy trains on in the future.
I imagine it'd be like being on a glacier, hitting another glacier.
Ding ding! "Knuckledragger, arriving!"
(For those mystified: This is an inside joke.)
Former enlisted here. Unfortunately death by power point doesn't solve the problem of overworked sailors.
I don't think those details have been released on this incident though.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Fitzgerald_and_MV_ACX_Crys...
Move to a moving platform.
A lot of our muscle memory and sense help us.
God bless.
There's no substitute for looking around (which of course is impossible in a submarine below periscope depth). As a JOOD* underway aboard an aircraft carrier, I had a tendency to spend a lot of time looking at the radar scope. But as soon as I qualified and started standing OOD* watches, I realized that I had switched to constantly scanning the horizon and the flight deck and only occasionally glancing at the radar.
* OOD = Officer of the Deck, the person on watch who's responsible for the safe navigation of the ship for that "watch" (generally, a four-hour period), reporting to the commanding officer. JOOD = Junior Officer of the Deck, in training to be an OOD.
this all goes back centuries, back to when navy crews were often kidnapped and made virtual slaves...the navy has always been operated for the benefit of the officer class...
and nowadays we have the issue of lowered standards as well.
This was called "Shanghaiing"[0] or "Impressment"[1] (ala a "press gang") and has an interesting history:
https://www.amusingplanet.com/2018/04/shanghaiing-how-tricke... (also see [3])
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghaiing
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impressment
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kelly_(crimper)
Give me back days of dross PPTs please.
Took y'all long enough to get with the times. The civilian contractors have been doing these for years.
Re: Sub Sailor
(This happened to us on Ustafish)
But in the case of subs, aren't there automated warnings and such? Certainly the computers are monitoring the signals as much as the humans.
Certainly the humans shouldn't be overworked, but how does a ultra high end military vehicle (?) strike something?
It really depends on who dies. Luckily, there are far better ways to solve the problem than by killing someone.
I saw the story about USS San Francisco earlier today and that led me to reading about the USS Thresher... Really sad story but it led to changes that years later resulted in the USS SF surviving intact. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Thresher_(SSN-593)
Also, this happened underwater, so the harder-to-displace water would give more resistance ("inertia"?) to the whale maybe?
If a submarine crashed in to a whale, it would not only have the forces of trying to accelerate the mass of the whale, it has to accelerate an object with a large surface area under water.
Aerodynamics vs hydrodynamics might skew your perception of the forces involved.
But there was one piece of equipment on board that normally runs for ~20-30minutes at a time. It had to run continuously until the ship came into port or the submarine would have sank and 130+ people would have died. They got VERY lucky everything worked out.
Is there any reason why they can't check what's above them before ascending?
Also pressure proofing cameras are not cheap I presume.
You can see it in the last Smarter Every Day video[1] where they're talking about surfacing a submarine in the arctic ocean.
At several points you can see a video monitor showing an upward view of the ice.
[1] https://youtu.be/XFJnWp1tAdU?t=1427
e: to be clear, that upward looking camera isn't going to be enough to detect much beyond your own footprint. If someone is about to cross that area you'd need some other way of detecting them.
This was a contributing factor to a collision in the Mediterranean about a decade or so ago.
And Iron Mike probably had the conn aboard the cargo ship .... (Source: A similar experience in the South China Sea.)
From what I overheard in cafeterias frequented navy navy men while living in Vladivostok is that active sonar is used all the time unless deep blue waters.
Navigational active sonars are nowhere near as detectable as long range military ones.
It's the "flashlight in the dark room" problem. Your sonar ping has to travel to an object and reflect back to the submarine. But an adversary just needs to hear the original ping to know what direction it came from, so you can be detected at a longer distance, and potentially a much longer distance, than you could reliably detect the other submarine at.
That's not to say active sonar is never used, but at least with the U.S. it's not going to be continuously used, and it's going to be rare to use it if you're in a mission area.
A sonar transducer that can emit a ping with directionality is sometimes useful (e.g. a fathometer to measure depth to the ocean bottom, since the crushing pressure of the depths ensures the area below you is generally clear of enemy subs), and those are used. But even there, that wouldn't be useful for navigating when otherwise blind; you use fathometers to confirm that you're approximately in the area you think you're in based on the chart readings.
I mean the difference is possibly hundreds of metres to hundreds of kilometres in between navigational sonars, vs sub detection sonars.
This is because they need to stay undetected, and rely completely on passive sensors; which can be dicey.
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjHf9jaFs8XWoGULb2HQRvhzB...
- how submarine systems work: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLF9K78gj2FP2fDVRu_Bkc...
- sonar acoustic signal analyses: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLF9K78gj2FP2D-EIZkYN1...
- overview of sub classes: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLF9K78gj2FP0hID8jeOp_...
If you're up at periscope depth you can stick a periscope up to see and other antennas. If you're on the surface you typically send people up into the sail and the boat is commanded from there. (Only a couple people fit up there, so the people actually operating the rudder and navigating are belowdecks).
Overall you generally get a good indication of what's happening, but... it's definitely possible to be surprised.
The inputs they'd be able to use would include:
1. GNSS location (only if surfaced)
2. Passive sonar data (detecting location of electromagnetic signals through water e.g. acoustic noise of another ships propeller)
3. Active sonar data (only if stealth is unnecessary)
4. Radar data (only if surfaced)
5. Bathymetry models/charts[2] (accuracy depends on location in the world)
6. Tide prediction models[3] (availability is location dependent)
7. Inertial navigation sensors (dead reckoning so accuracy drifts over time)
8. Surface Electronic Support Measures sensors (allows geolocation of signals from other ships, aircraft and ground transmitters)
[1] https://osimaritime.com/solutions/software/ecpins-submarine/
[2] https://www.admiralty.co.uk/digital-services/digital-charts/...
[3] https://www.admiralty.co.uk/publications/admiralty-digital-p...
In the debates surrounding some of the most recent incidents (see, e.g., https://www.propublica.org/series/navy-accidents-pacific-7th...) I remember reading claims to the effect that submarine captains are the last ones in the Navy who actually know how to pilot a boat. I know that claim is hyperbolic rhetoric but those Pro Publica pieces really make me think it's not far from the truth, and that while submariner training may still be exceptionally rigorous and responsive to newly identified risks, that's not necessarily true in the case of surface ships.
But submarines don't spend a heck of a lot of time on the surface where piloting skill matters. They stay submerged through the Straits of Gibraltar, the Straits of Hormuz, a lot of the Red Sea, etc. Submarines are slow on the surface and appear much smaller than they really are, so it's generally best for everyone if they go underneath or around chokepoints.
Theoretically yeah, but radar is pretty great for resolving ambiguity.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/98/USS_Los_...
To answer your first question, a significant amount of RCS for a capable commercial radar, not least of all because it is rounded for hydrodynamics, which is a terrible shape for minimizing RCS.
Second, I should have been clearer: the submarine stands to gain by operating their own radar rather than working from sonar alone.
Finally, submerged transits are mostly advantageous for security concerns.
We operated that way even when steaming on the surface in the shipping lanes shared with the Port of New York.
So it isn't always a matter of "actually knowing how to pilot a boat". Sometimes its just plain recklessness.
Edit: this one
https://features.propublica.org/navy-uss-mccain-crash/navy-i...
Silly question: how do you identify a target? Sound only? It seems like you would want something visual.
My understanding is that US subs don’t travel in packs, so anything they detect is generally the enemy, and especially so if it’s submerged, unless they are escorting a carrier.
The Navy trains to do a series of maneuvers that helps you understand the range to the ships you do hear, and positions the sub most safely to come to periscope depth. And then while you're coming to periscope depth you're looking out to see if there are any indications you've screwed up. But yeah, there's nothing visual available when you're under the water.
During sea trials of a new boat, they have it do passes specifically for sonar to listen to it. Partly so they can learn its sound signature, but also to see if they can hear annomalies during construction. They've found toolboxes left inside a double hull by the builders.
They do have visuals with the waterfall displays and what not. Last I looked into sonar operations was in the early 90s, so not sure what the kids are using now.
They can do all of this without making a sound to allow someone else to know they are there.
Given that there is a collision about to happen, isn't there a sensor that would give some type of warning? And I'm guessing that the answer to my stupid question is that a sensor would give away the position of the submarine because anything emitting a signal would defeat the point of the sub?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Vanguard_and_Le_Triomphant...
> The navigation paradox states that increased navigational precision may result in increased collision risk. In the case of ships and aircraft, the advent of Global Positioning System (GPS) navigation has enabled craft to follow navigational paths with such greater precision (often of the order of plus or minus 2 meters), that, without better distribution of routes, coordination between neighboring craft and collision avoidance procedures, the likelihood of two craft occupying the same space on the shortest distance line between two navigational points has increased. [1]
It got to the point on many routes where regulators had to mandate an offset in opposite directions along common flight paths to effect "lanes" of traffic. [2]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navigation_paradox
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lateral_offset_proce...
Is this how the Navy deals with accidents? I can understand being fired for failing to do your duty but operating a sub is both hard and dangerous. Things are going to go wrong. If everyone did their job isn’t this just a learning opportunity?
But if you're the captain of a ship that's at fault in a crash? The inadequacies revealed in the crew's training are kinda your fault.
For example, in 2017 when the USS Fitzgerald collided with a container ship [1] and the captain was relieved of his command, despite the fact he'd been in bed during the collision.
It's normal, in 95% of jobs, that if you cause $$$$$$$$ of damage by making a mistake, you get fired.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Fitzgerald
This increase in recent collisions (including training jets) is probably due to the Navy's "five and dimes" sleep schedule that basically guarantees every squid mustang and sardine is a combat worthless zombie due to sleep depravation.
https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2017/july/let-our...
Looks like 11 sailors were hurt. Very interesting indeed. Some sort of reconnaissance buoy? Or perhaps they were traveling close to the bottom of the South China Sea and hit the bottom? China considers the South China Sea an internal lake, so they would think they’re within their rights to mine it or otherwise defend it with submarine nets or booms. I imagine within the context of a larger conflict the PLAN would enact all sorts of submarine countermeasures in the South China Sea. This is why the lack of clarity/conflict regarding ownership of that body of water is so dangerous for the rest of the world.
or you ment ownership of hormuz strait by us ... ?? https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-57066277
or maybe you though ownership of russian waters ? https://apnews.com/article/europe-russia-coronavirus-pandemi...
and do NOT forget that those ships in South China Sea are transfering GOODS TO AND FROM CHINA TO US XD
hillarious
To be frank I'm not even sure I believe America would start a nuclear war at all even if Taiwan really were being invaded.
Laying a minefield in international waters (from the point of view of everyone but China, anyway) is an act of war. It's not necessary for there to be any interpretation or misunderstandings at that point, it's pretty much the same as if the Chinese fired ballistic missiles with real warheads at Taiwan, or engaged foreign navies in the South China Sea with swarms of anti ship missiles. At that point, the war has already started, so no one would do that unless that's what they wanted.
Which is why China hasn't placed any mines there, and your question doesn't make sense.
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/42669/one-of-the-navys...
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/03/us/pipeline-broken-oil-pa...
25 miles per hour ! XD
a statement like this is just an acknowledgement of facts that would become public anyways, and a pre-emptive refusal to provide any further details. it exists so that when a somebody asks a question, they can say "please refer to our already published statement"
US means it can be US + UK because reasons.
Land based ICBMs are more accurate than SLBMs and would launch in retaliation.
The US has stealth cruise missiles it can launch from bombers.
The US has the B1 and B2 bombers that can deliver nukes.
Many Navy ships can launch nuclear cruise missiles.
The USA is the only superpower that has such robust nuclear weapons delivery via a triad (land, air, sea). With Russian SLBM subs it is said they are so noisy that US attack subs are always silently tailing them after they leave port and can take them out before they can launch. Russia and China really only have robust land-based ICBMs. If all of those could be preemptively attacked (by stealth strikes and commando raids) then the US could potentially win a nuclear war. Not that we'd want to try.
> with crack seal-type units only operating them
There already are highly skilled individuals that operate them. Seal team members are in limited supply and think it makes more sense to have those that are more intellectually strong run them.
They are a deterrent and non-nuclear submarines have large drawbacks when in combat. China has become more and more aggressive and they have scaled up their nuclear missile silos a bunch in recent years, have been sprinting towards a large more effective navy and I don't think they will have qualms about using morally questionable tech.
they do not know what reality is, they can compute/evaluate only that which they obtain by some flawed means.
Ridiculous implication that Naval Special Warfare is somehow “intellectually weak” when there are multiple Trident wearers who have qualified as astronauts or went on to Ivy League schools.
https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2017/08/27/navy-swo...
Can any military really say this with a straight face? It's obviously not their top priority. If it was, they wouldn't be packing actual live humans into a pressurized nuclear-powered tube packed with explosives and send them into the black. Not to mention that whole "going to war" thing they occasionally do. That's pretty risky stuff, or so I hear.
Sorry for the snark. One can only take so much BS per hour, and I just got out of a meeting so my tolerance was low.
Source: was submariner.