Posted on 08/06/2005 9:36:49 PM PDT by nuconvert
Russian Sub Surfaces; All Seven Crew Alive
By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV, Associated Press Writer
Seven submarine crew members trapped for nearly three days under the Pacific Ocean were rescued Sunday after a British remote-controlled vehicle cut away the undersea cables that had snarled the vessel.
The seven crew members, whose oxygen supplies had been dwindling amid underwater temperatures in the mid-40s, appeared to be in satisfactory condition, naval spokesman Capt. Igor Dygalo said. The seven were being examined by ship medics, he said.
The sub surfaced late Sunday afternoon, some three days after becoming stranded in 600 feet of water off the Pacific Coast on Thursday.
"The rescue operation has ended," Rear Adm. Vladimir Pepelyayev, deputy head of the navy's general staff, said in televised comments.
Russian authorities had hoped that the British unmanned submersible could help free the sub and avoid losing a sub crew as they did with the Kursk nuclear submarine, which sank almost exactly five years ago, killing all 118 aboard.
In sharp contrast to the August 2000 Kursk disaster, when authorities held off asking for help until hope was nearly exhausted, Russian military officials quickly sought help from U.S. and British authorities.
Earlier Sunday, a British remote-controlled Super Scorpio cut away the cables that had snarled the vessel in Beryozovaya Bay, about 10 miles off the east coast of the Kamchatka peninsula.
The United States also dispatched a crew and three underwater vehicles to Kamchatka, but they never left the port.
Officials said the Russian submarine was participating in a combat training exercise and got snarled on an underwater antenna assembly that is part of a coastal monitoring system. The system is anchored with a weight of about 66 tons, according to news reports.
Russia's cash-strapped navy apparently lacks rescue vehicles capable of operating at the depth where the sub was stranded, and officials say it was too deep for divers to reach or the crew to swim out on their own. An earlier attempt to drag the vessel to shallower waters failed when cables detached after pulling it some 65 yards.
By early Sunday, President Vladimir Putin had made no public comment on the latest sinking, but Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov had traveled to the site of the rescue operation.
The new crisis has been highly embarrassing for Russia, which will hold an unprecedented joint military exercise with China later this month, including the use of submarines to settle an imaginary conflict in a foreign land. In the exercise, Russia is to field a naval squadron and 17 long-haul aircraft.
Praise God!!
It is good news. I am glad the crew were rescued alive.
One of the other positive aspects of the story is an indication of more openness in dealings between Russia and the United States along with Britain. Long term, that will lead to better cooperation, and also a freer society in Russia.
As to why the Russian submarine was close enough to the cable to get tangled, it is most likely they were eavesdropping on the cable communications. We eavesdrop, they also eavesdrop, to verify official information coming from the other country. This verification does help to avert disastrous misunderstandings between the two countries.
The obvious answer is that they were testing their own sub detection system for gaps (perhaps close in gaps)...as in, could a foreign vessel "crawl" past our sensors without being detected.
Based upon the results, I'd guess "yes."
Then you'd have to wonder if that particular area had something special that needed protecting from foreign vessels getting too close in.
"Communication cable" is probably technically accurate but a bit misleading. The United States, Russia, and other major powers have networks of underwater passive sonar monitors running along their coasts to listen for enemy submarine activities. These sensors are networked by communication cables back to land reporting stations. This is apparently what the minisub became entangled in. These cables are strictly military unlike the Transatlantic cable(s) you refer to.
You lose. It was their own antenna, cable and etc, near their own secret military base.
"The AS-28, itself a rescue vessel, got its propeller tangled in metal cords from the antenna of an electronic underwater monitoring station -- part of Russia's coastal defenses."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/russia_submarine_dc
Thank God they got the sub out and that the crew are all still alive.
It was the US that secretely tapped into their military communications cables for years in the same area. We specially modified a submarine to perform the 'tapping' operation. One of the US spies that we finally caught told them about our tap. So, a little paranoia is understandable.
I thought I had read posst from Freepers about the following:
1) Possibly another Russian sub in the area that the snagged sub was trying to reach.
2) possibly the snagged sub was trying to monitor cable traffic as you suggest-- or practicing for it.
3) My own pet, tinfoil, see-if-it-sticks theory: that it was staged to see how quickly and with what equipment the West would send aid. I note that the Russians didn't ask for Chinese help and they are supposed to be engaged in joint excercises on land. (The snagged sub may not have been in any great danger.)
GOT a question for the group that knows about military stuff.... Since we have tomahawk cruisemissiles that are programable in flight. DO you think that we can replace the weapons payload with a deployable satalite remote submersible that could be fired from a ship and then deployed to a stranded sub, or downed plane or stranded ship? Could they carry enough payload to deploy emergency supplies since a ship may take hours to get on scene and helos dont have long legs. Feasibility?
They night save 7 Navy SEALS some day and I won't give a Rat's what the SEALS were up to.
It's not likely that these Russians were up to no good anyway, for one thing, that platform at 600 ft has no manipulators, and no way to interface with a cable.
If they were up to something shady, they wouldn't have called for the help. Russians are stoic like that.
I'm just glad to see a good outcome, as far as I know, it was one of their OWN COMMO antennae that they snagged.
I expect info to dry up from here on in, but if the Russians were doing something snakey, I'm sure it will be apparent to the British U.S. people on scene and handled appropriately in back channels.
"Bravo Zulu" to our British Naval cousins.
A truly extraordinary piece of Seamanship.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/05/AR2005080500159_2.html?g=1
"They're looking to be able to release the propeller from whatever it's caught on, whether fishing line or cable. That will be the first priority," said a U.S. Navy official, who spoke on background because of the uncertainty of the problem. "Then they can use their ballast to surface." About 30 Navy personnel, including the vehicle operators, deep-sea divers, technicians and a doctor, flew with the equipment toward Petropavlovsk. The divers are equipped with suits that allow them to reach depths of 2,000 feet for up to six hours. Two more diving suits and a deep-sea drone are being dispatched by the U.S. Navy from the East Coast.
"We're trying to offer multiple tools for the tool box," Brackenbury said.
Cooperation between the Russian and U.S. navies on the rescue effort has been good, Brackenbury said, noting that the two forces conducted a four-week submarine rescue exercise in June off the coast of Italy. It was the first time that Russian units took part in a submarine rescue exercise with NATO.
Also helping to coordinate the rescue is the International Submarine Escape and Rescue Liaison Office, a NATO initiative set up in Norfolk in the fall of 2004.
The rush to dispatch U.S. personnel and equipment was in keeping with a "brotherhood of the sea" rule that overrides national differences, one official said. "That's why we're taking this so seriously. It's very important to us to get to these folks."
If you do a search on "Operation Ivy Bells" you should find some interesting articles about the whole operation, and how it eventually came to an end.
God bless the crew, God bless Mother Russia and God bless our British brothers.
Maybe they were just ill trained and don't know what they are doing!!!
I find it odd that no freeper has brought up the question why this Russian submersible was so close to a communication cable to get snagged on itThenn put your thinking cap on; that was this sub's duty, to 'service' SOSUS type listening devices, and they had a work accident ..
(PREVIOUS threads have covered this subject. HINT: Do a search on my name.)
No mention that American rescue teams were on their way to the site. Kudos to the Brits for a great job.
I'm just glad to see a good outcome, as far as I know, it was one of their OWN COMMO antennae that they snagged.Rubbish.
You've bought into the pap the snooze mediots are jawing about ...
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.