Slashdot Mirror
US Navy Cruiser and Submarine Collide
An anonymous reader writes "Despite billions of dollars in advanced electronics, radar, and sonar it seems the Navy needs to install backup cameras on their boats. 'The Pentagon said late Saturday that it is investigating why a Navy submarine collided with an Aegis cruiser during routine operations at an undisclosed location.' According to ABC, 'the two ships were participating in a “group sail” along with another vessel. The three ships were participating in an anti-submarine exercise in preparation for an upcoming deployment as part of the strike group for the aircraft carrier USS Harry S Truman."
It could have been worse.
"Despite billions of dollars in advanced electronics, radar, and sonar it seems the Navy needs to install backup cameras on their boats. '
The point of a submarine is to be undetectable. Apparenly it worked.
My speculation, knowing submariners, is that the sub's captain was playing grab-ass with the surface ships, as they are wont to do during these kinds of exercises, due to the utter disdain for the surface fleet.
There are two kinds of seagoing vessels. Submarines and targets.
--
BMO
Navy Times has better information. The collision occurred off Jacksonville, FL. The sub was surfacing to periscope depth when it was hit by the cruiser. The cruiser's bow sonar dome was damaged. No injuries.
"A collision at sea can ruin your whole day". It's usually a career-ending event for a Naval officer. The captain of the USS Essex, which had a collision with a fleet oiler during a replenishment operation in May 2012, was removed from command. Even though the collision was apparently due to a steering malfunction, the captain is responsible.
They need a man with "Welcome Aboard" tattooed on his dick.
A friend who was a coastie told a story about a sub messing with them:
The guy watching the radar grabbed the first officer because he was confused. He was seeing an occasional weak reading from behind them, a real small return like a little boat or something, fairly close, but when he'd look there was nothing out there. It was daytime, plenty of visibility, all that. It was inconsistent, not always there. Nothing seemed to be wrong with the radar. The XO saw this too, so they grabbed my friend and had him continually monitor aft to see what was going on.
The answer? A sub goofing around. It would raise up part of its sail, wait until it got hit with the radar (they have ESM antennas) and then dive. When it came back up again, my friend flashed Morse at it with a light and the sub then surfaced and came over to say hi.
It wasn't an exercise or anything, just a sub screwing around. Was it against Navy regs? I dunno, probably, but the sub was doing it anyways and it wasn't like anyone got in trouble. Everyone had a laugh and the sub went on its way.
Homer: On the water, under the water. On the water, under the water. Hey, this pentagon operations coordinator gig isn't so difficult at all. On the water, under the water. On the water, on the water. D'Oh!
Generally, an incident like this will be traced to the submarine commander skipping the surfacing protocols spelled out in the exercise tasking. The submarine CO has everyone tracked, knows where everyone is and can torpedo at will. The reality is there are surfacing protocols, signals and course/speed specified to avoid collisions built into any ASW exercise. USS Leftwich collided with submarine in 1982 during exercises. The Leftwich CO and bridge watch were cleared and commended for rapid damage control reaction and rendering assistance. The submarine CO was selected to pursue other career options.
Because you know exactly how to do his job, right?
He also has a keen grasp of basic physics, apparently. Hint: a warship does not steer like an Indy race car. (I was qualified master helmsman in the USN a couple decades ago. I do in fact know how this works.)
"We're an apex predator with the fecundity of a base level herbivore... We're a virus with shoes..." RazorJAK
"All back" is how you say "hit the brakes!" on a ship.
The ship in question displaces 9900 tons (full). It does not turn on a dime. Ordering all back shifted the pitch on the controllable-reversible screws so that they were pulling the ship in reverse (without having to reverse the rotation of the shafts, so it happens pretty quickly).
Maneuvering to either side while doing this would have simply placed a larger portion of the ship in jeopardy by exposing it in profile to the head-on threat.
Clearly you have never sailed a warship. (I have - actually, one that I sailed was a Belknap class CG, a predecessor of the Ticonderoga class, which is what the San Jacinto is).
"We're an apex predator with the fecundity of a base level herbivore... We're a virus with shoes..." RazorJAK
just lost their jobs. For the CO ( commanding officer ) his career just ended. The JO ( Junior Officer ) that more then likely had the Deck and the Con ( In other words he was in charge of operating the sub at the moment and a single person is normally the Officer of the Deck and the Conning Officer generally referred to as the "OD" ) more then likely will get a punitive letter of reprimand ( A kiss of death) and here is why:
Periscope Depth (PD) is ~ 65' feet of water over the Deck ( The top of the submarine you see ). When preparing to go to PD the sequence is: The Conning Officer gets a round ( a spoken list ) of contacts from the Sonar Supervisor on watch, eg: "Sonar, Con give me a round." and the list of all known contacts is told to the OD orally. In addition to there is a display repeater to show the OD what the sonar guys see on their displays.. Generally if the CO is awake the OD informs the CO that he believes all is clear to come up to PD from ~ 150'. At this point the sub is going slow enough to raise the #2 Periscope ( they have two ). So the OD raises the Scope and the takes a look around. He looks for shadows or hulls form in the vicinity. When he is satisfied he then gives the order to the Diving Officer ( Normally a Chief Petty Officer that is in charge of the Chief of the Watch, the Helmsman ad the Planesman), "Dive make your depth 65 feet." the Diving officer responds, "Make my depth 65 feet, aye sir." and he will then tell the Helmsman and Planesman to position the control surfaces to accomplish that.
At this point the OD is just basically on the Scope spinning around looking for anything that will ruin his day and focusing most his attention to a 30 degree area in front of the sub and should be calling out to everyone in the control room, "No underwater hull shapes or forms, no shadows." When the Scope lens breaks the surface, he calls out, "Scope Clear, no close aboard contacts." This lets everyone in the Control Room chill out a little. Meantime he is still looking everywhere to make damn sure that they are not going to get run down."
So a chunk of the officer corp is now fucked but my SWAG on this is that it will go a little deeper then that. My guess is that the Sonar Supervisor ( an enlisted guy ) will at minimum get his Watch Supervisor certification yanked ( possibly for good ) and quite possibly demoted since an Aegis Class Cruiser is VERY damned obvious to submarine sonar and the Fire Control guys should have had a continuous plot on the damn thing and the SONAR system should have had them locked on with Automatic Target Following.
The Submarine Squadron Commander more then likely met the boat at the pier and relieved the CO on the spot as that is pretty much SOP for the Navy. The CO of a naval ship at sea is responsible for everything except when the Bow of the sub crosses over the sill of a dry dock ( at which point it shifts to the docking officer ) and when transiting the Panama Canal ( The Co takes orders from the Certified Canal Pilot as far as navigation and speed ) and even then he will still get singed of the shit goes wrong.
And yes I was a Submarine Sonar Tech ( SSN-650 and SSN-692 ).
Hey KID! Yeah you, get the fuck off my lawn!
The article reminds me of that old US/Canadian joke that circulates every so often ...
------------------
This is the transcript of an actual radio conversation between a US naval ship and Canadian authorities off the coast of Newfoundland in October 1995. The Radio conversation was released by the Chief of Naval Operations on Oct. 10, 1995.
US Ship: Please divert your course 0.5 degrees to the south to avoid a collision.
CND reply: Recommend you divert your course 15 degrees to the South to avoid a collision.
US Ship: This is the Captain of a US Navy Ship. I say again, divert your course.
CND reply: No. I say again, you divert YOUR course!
US Ship: THIS IS THE AIRCRAFT CARRIER USS CORAL SEA, WE ARE A LARGE WARSHIP OF THE US NAVY. DIVERT YOUR COURSE NOW!!
CND reply: This is a lighthouse. Your call.
There is no fair. The CO is given complete charge of a multi-billion dollar war machine and has absolute authority over its operation and crew, therefor he has absolute responsibility for everything that happens, his fault, your fault, my fault, nobodies fault he still burns.
Hey KID! Yeah you, get the fuck off my lawn!
The Iranian Navy are pissing themselves laughing.
If opportunity came disguised as temptation, one knock would be enough.
3^2 * 67^1 * 977^1
Head on collision slowed down as much as possible damages the bow sonar dome and possibly the first 2 hull plating, though the triangular shape would help strengthen this section of hull so damage to the cruiser is limited also the triangular shape is sloped to push objects down under the boat (usually it's water being pushed out of the way). So a few days to weeks in dry dock.
If one starts to turn instead and still hits the submarine it now scrapes down the side of boat putting dents in the hull plating as it bounces along it. Now it's weeks to years in dry dock as they replace half the hull.
The sub probably wouldn't get off so lucky.
I expect commendations for the actions of the cruiser crew as the submarine was at periscope depth and therefore only a shadow (possibly) and the periscope above the water to detect it by and they took fast and appropriate action.
Anyway 1) Why on earth didn't the sub crash dive when the sonar operator heard the noisy screws go full back? and 2) What the hell was the sub doing surfacing to periscope depth right ahead of another ship and that close to it?
Jamming is basically having a bigger signal than the other guy in relation to the location of the receiver. It's deliberate interference, or what hams call QRM.
Having a bigger signal than the other guy is how a sat relay got hijacked in the 80s to transmit a foul mouthed Max Headroom.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pj1mUk04_ho
They still haven't found him, in spite of the fact that only a few places had uplinks powerful enough to hijack a bird. It had to be commercial broadcast or military. My bet is military.
Taking over someone's AM radio is trivial.
Just transmit at any AM radio at 455KHz.
It's the IF frequency. Any and all tuning gets converted to that frequency and then the signal is stripped of its carrier and amplified.
For FM, the IF is 10.7Mhz. The antenna is smaller and easier to build. The same thing still applies. Overwhelm the IF and you can say anything to the listener no matter where he tunes.
Back in the cold war, Voice of America would get jammed by Soviet bloc nations. VOA still gets jammed in N. Korea and other places. It's doubtful you'd be allowed a tunable shortwave reciever in N. Korea these days, though.
--
BMO
There was no "All back" in those days. Props did not reverse. The Titanic had old technology triple expansion steam engines and could not manoeuvre quickly. The telegraph, I believe, had to go to stop and then full reverse when the command was acknowledged from the engine room.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
It's usually a career-ending event for a Naval officer.
Couldn't the commander of the cruiser say, "I was really getting into the exercise and seeing the sub was too close for firing on it, I decided to ram?"
No?
Actually the turn was hard to port, and the command as given in modern times would have been "hard aport". The damage was on the starboard side.
Confusion exists because in those days "starboard your helm" meant "turn the ship to port". Think of it as how you work a tiller. To turn to port, you push the tiller handle to starboard, which turns the tiller to port, which shoves the stern of the ship to starboard, which turns the ship to port ... in due course. The British were really big on historical convention.
The actual command on Titanic by the accounts I have read was "hard astarboard", which is more than a bit mystifying until you realize it was a less time consuming way to order "starboard your helm HARD". This was all common usage in the British mechant marine at the time. It wasn't until 1932 that the Merchant Shipping Act of 1932, which brought British convention into line with the rest of the world. Since that time, no matter what service you are in, "hard aport" means "turn the wheel (and the ship) hard to port".
The Greenville was pure stupidity. That was what was called a "Family Cruise". There is a maintenance requirement to do an emergency blow every now and again to make sure all the bits and parts work. It is also a hell of a fun ride. I did one of those and we had wives, kids and girlfriends on board. The procedure should have been surface transit out to one of the designated operating area's. Submerge, do some angles and dangles have lunch and let everyone mill about, hang out with the crew and then get ready to do the blow, do it and then surface transit back to port.
The procedure should have been: Come up to PD, and have a good long look around and the course you intend to perform and make sure there was nothing withing quite a few miles. Then back down. Make an announcement then perform the operation. My guess is that they got distracted and failed to notice the fishing boat and the fuck up ensued.
As to your other question. It happens quickly. From the moment the OD gives the order to come to PD it takes less then a minute. You don't want to fuck around. A submarine in the transition zone is VERY vulnerable since you are in the depth zone where deep draft tankers and container ships can just flat out cut you in half. You want to get the scope above the surface quickly so you can actually see what is out there.
As to quick action to abort that operation.. Remember your basic motion equations and inertia. You get that much steel moving in a direction and it takes quite a bit of time to make it suddenly go in the opposite direction.
Hey KID! Yeah you, get the fuck off my lawn!
My understanding is that passive receivers do leak noise. Isn't that how the TV detectors in the UK work? Not sure if the noise frequency is related to the signal frequency, but it doesn't seem too far fetched.
Still, I guess you need a really sensitive and directional antenna and/or get pretty close.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."