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Posted on 08/05/2005 4:12:44 AM PDT by visagoth
Russian Mini-Submarine Stuck on Sea Floor
Aug 5, 6:57 AM (ET)
By YEVGENY KULKOV
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VLADIVOSTOK, Russia (AP) - A Russian mini-submarine with seven sailors aboard snagged on a fishing net and was stuck on the sea floor off Russia's Pacific Coast, and a Navy spokesman said the seamen had enough air to survive one more day.
Navy authorities scrambled to figure out how to raise the vessel from a depth of some 625 feet. The Interfax news service said Russia's Pacific Fleet commander was in talks with U.S. Navy officials over how the United States might help.
"There is air remaining on the underwater apparatus for a day - one day," Capt. Igor Dygalo said on state-run Rossiya television.
"The operation continues. We have a day, and intensive, active measures will be taken to rescue the AS-28 vessel and the people aboard," he said.
Pacific Fleet spokesman Capt. Alexander Kosolapov said contact had been made with the sailors, who were not hurt, and that authorities were preparing to send down a similar vessel to assess the situation.
The sub's propeller became entangled in a fishing net Thursday, trapping the craft, Dygalo said.
The mini-sub, called an AS-28, was too deep to allow the sailors to swim to the surface on their own or for divers to reach it, officials said.
Dygalo's statement about the amount of air remaining, which he said came after "all the information was checked," followed conflicting statements from officials who said there was enough air for anything from one to five days. The range of estimates may have come because there were seven people aboard the vessel; the crafts usually carry three.
The accident occurred early Thursday after the mini-submarine was launched from a rescue ship during a combat training exercise, Kosolapov said.
Kosolapov said nine warships were in the area to aid the rescue operation.
Officials said the accident occurred in Beryozovaya Bay, approximately 100 miles south of Kamchatka's capital, Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky.
The accident occurred almost exactly five years after the nuclear submarine Kursk sank to the bottom of the Barents Sea after explosions on board, killing all 118 seamen aboard in a painful blow to the Russian navy. Some of the Kursk's sailors survived for hours after the accident as oxygen ran out, and Russian authorities came under sharp criticism for their handling of the crisis.
The same type of vessel that is now stuck, called a Priz, was used in the rescue efforts that followed the Kursk disaster, Interfax reported.
The AS-28, which looks like a small submarine, was built in 1989. They are about 44 feet long and 19 feet high and can dive to depths of 1,640 feet.
Russian news agencies reported that Japan decided to send four ships in a response to a request for help. A Japanese Marine Self Defense Force spokesman, Mitsyasu Yokoe, said the press service had no information on such a dispatch and could not comment.
of COURSE i knew that! ; )
AMERICA TO THE RESCUE
That job did actually take place: The CIA funded Howard Hughes to build the Glomar Explorer (cover story = pick up mangense nodules from the mid-ocean floor) to recover a sunk Russian Golf nuke missile sub from off the floor northwest of HI.
It worked, partially, but took years. (The Russian sailors who they recovered were re-buried at sea with full honors.)
Ironically, the station keeping, deep "oil-drilling" type designs, "moon pool" ship designs, and deep ocean recovery mining WERE effective, and are still being used today.
The ship itself is in mothballs north of San Francisco, but was rebuilt to actually mine the ocean floor later!
That's not what bill1952 was talking about. His original quote was: "Not to mention that sub is not just "sitting" on the bottom. It is being pressed down into it by untold pressure."
He's confusing pressure with weight. The pressure on the sub is equal all the way around, regardless of whether it's surrounded by water, on a rocky bottom, or stuck in the mud.
It works just like a suction cup on the wall. It stays there because of air pressure on the outside. To you move it you have to equalize that pressure by getting air under it.
This is an entirely different thing, and is more akin to the pressure differences between that inside the sub and outside. In your cup on the wall, you've sucked the air out creating a (partial) vacuum. That force pulls the cup into the wall, but the wall pushes back with equal force. The friction between the cup and wall (created by the vacuum) are what hold the cup in place. You could then cut the wall out around the suction cup and create a little "atmospheric submarine." Set it on the floor and pick it up. It won't be any harder at sea level than it would be in Denver, even though it would be missing a full mile of the thickest atmosphere above it in Denver.
Slim Picken's character from Dr. Strangelove arrives on the scene with a roll of steel cable, hook on the end, and winch.
"Now out of the way boys, we've got some stuck Rooskies to rescue"
Your math lesson for the day!
(Of course, at depth, sea water compresses a little so it's more dense; but the lead or steel also compresses a little bit too, so the metal is also very, very slightly smaller = less volume. "Hollow" metal strucutres like submarine hulls actually compress several inches in diameter at deep depths, and you have to change trim accordingly if you're down there for a long time. Most of the time, you just ignore it.)
On the other hand, the ambient temperature is colder down deep, so the water is also more dense, but the metal cools down also so it contracts a smaller amount as well. Theorectically.
Practically speaking, the net may weight as much as several hundred tons, or as little as only few tens of thousands of pounds: you can't tell. Also, the net, since it was originally lost because it snagged "something" on the bottom, may be completely immobile (anchored and stuck to the ground through tons and tons of new sediment and marine growth.)
Well, my "a pint's a pound" worked out pretty good - only off by 0.1 lb... Thanks.
self ping for later reading
Go out in the yard and put your foot in a thin layer of mud.
Does lifting your foot require a force anything like 14.7psi times the area of your foot in inches?
Would the viscosity of the mud make any difference? Would it make any difference if you put your foot in water or molasses?
Raise the net.
She used to post here. Her FR page had a photo of her in see-through dress. Definitely not classy, a troublemaker, and dyed hair to boot. Anyway, she ran around FR with a guy who drove a similar car as shown in your photo.
Per FoxNews: Disabled Mini-Submarine Being Towed to Shallower Waters. There's no story yet, just this banner at the top. http://www.foxnews.com/
That's a d@mn shame.....
I always figgered CGEB was Anne Coulter in disguise.
Russians attempt deep-sea rescue
A rescue vessel has managed to attach a tow cable to the stricken diving vessel trapped on the sea bed in the Russian Far East, officials say.
They are hoping to be able to tow the Priz submersible into shallower waters, the commander of Russia's Pacific Fleet was quoted as saying.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4125674.stm
that is what I thought too, hell just keep dropping the hook until you snag the net. Then bring everything up real slow.
Ah, Richard Jordan! There was an actor who was a lot more actor than most of his roles required. I think I'll put Les Miserables in the vcr tonight.
Great! How am I supposed to get that image out of my head now? Huh?
That looks kinda like the robot from Lost In Space. Must be his cousin.
Well, I could post a picture of Daisy Duke if that'll help...
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