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.
It was their own antenna.What antenna?
An antenna in a conductive medium like sea water?
Absolutely nuts ... now, an armored coaxial cable to a buoy w/an antenna, more likly ...
Thanks.
Shades of Watergate? Just wait, they'll blame Nixon.
Operation Ivy Bells
In the early 1970's, the U.S. government learned of the existence of an undersea cable running parallel to the Kuril Islands chain, connecting the major Soviet naval bases at Vladivostok and Petropavlovsk. At this time during the Cold War, the Sea of Okhotsk was aggressively claimed by the Russians as territorial waters, off limits to foreign vessels - especially U.S. warships. To this end, the Soviet Navy constructed a net of sound detection devices along the sea floor to warn of any unwanted visitors. Additionally, the entire area was the location of frequent surface and subsurface naval exercises. Nonetheless, despite these formidable obstacles, the potential for an unprecedented windfall of intelligence was simply too great to pass up.
Thus, a joint Navy-National Security Agency (NSA) mission was initiated, code-named Operation Ivy Bells, involving the use of U.S. Navy fast attack submarines working in conjunction with specially-trained Navy combat divers. Working in tandem, they would make monthly incursions into these dangerous waters to "tap" the line. One of the first such missions involved the USS Halibut (SSN-587) and the installation of a miniaturized, waterproof pod on the cable. This "wrap around" device, developed by the NSA, could eavesdrop on - and record - all communications passing through the line without the need for actually penetrating the wires inside. This capability was deemed necessary to prevent any possible damage to the cable that might then attract unwanted attention. In the event that the Russians chose to perform routine maintenance, the pod was designed to break off and fall to the sea bed in the event the line was raised for any reason.
Once the device was in place, subsequent missions were required in which a submarine would return to the location to pick up the six to eight weeks' worth of recordings inside the pod. For this operation, the frogmen would depart the sub's escape trunk, swim to the cable (reportedly with the aid of a minisub on occasion), remove the recorded tape, and then make their way back to the waiting submarine. This tape was then delivered to the NSA for processing and dissemination to the appropriate military and civilian agencies. Not long after the recovery of the first tapes, it was discovered that the Soviets felt so sure of the security of their undersea communication line, that the majority of the concersations recorded were completely uncoded! Needless to say, the eavesdropping on traffic between senior Soviet officers provided an invaluable look inside military operations in the region.
In 1981, however, this windfall came to an abrupt end when Western satellites photographed a small fleet of Russian warships gathered over the exact location of the listening device. One vessel was a unique deep salvage ship that had been monitored hurredly making its way across the globe to the site. This development caused a wave of concern through those assigned to the project, raising concerns that the operation had somehow been discovered. In what would later come to be viewed as one of the most dangerous missions of Ivy Bells, the USS Parch (SSN-683) was sent in to retrieve the next tape. Upon arrival, divers discovered that the pod had been removed. They quickly made their way back to the boat and the team exited the area, reportedly without incident.
It was clear that their fears has been well-founded. A major, but covert, investigation ended in with a startling revelation: This operation (along with at least seven other code-word operations) had been betrayed to the KGB in January 1980 by Robert Pelton, an employee of the National Security Agency for the sum of $35,000. Mr. Pelton was later convicted and sentenced to life in prison where he currently resides.
Operation Ivy Bells remains one of the most successful intelligence gathering operations in modern U.S. history, and could not have been accomplished without the daring and skill of U.S. Navy submarine officers and crew - and a handful of Navy frogmen.
I doubt they were eavesdropping on their own cables.Some of you people are never going to get to the truth w/o assitance.
Imagine a line of sonobuoys, fixed in position w/anchors, and long cables running to the surface for VSAT (Very Small Aperature Terminals) as well as sonic transducers for capturing 'sound' at variuos levels due to thermocline induuced effects (sound tends to 'duct' with the same thermal layers); viola, we have the present scenario wherein a 'serice' sub had a work accident.
No?
Yes.
Wires in that area are theirs, they are in close proximity to a sub base. Do you have any specific cites or information to indicate otherwise?
Ironic rescue, given that the Russkis and ChiComs are in the midst of war games.
good. that has to be a bad way to die.
Husband says, "It's obvious. It's Argentinian. And if not them, it's the Bolivian navy."
O.k. cite for me all of the incriminating information youWell, there is -REDACTION OF CLASSIFIED MATERIAL- and also -REDACTION OF CLASSIFIED MATERIAL-.
Does that help?
Well, yeah, I admit .......I didn't know I needed "assitance".
Some of "you people" need to back off with your hateful comments. I don't see that they are doing a bit of good on this forum. Whatever.
No help at all, does post #20 do anything fer ya?
:)
This wasn't a communications cable, it was some sort of sensor/antenna array.Antenna array - under water?
To quote Al Borland: "I don't thing so Tim".
Other sensors: I think I've alluded to that on any number of posts; we are in agreement there.
..I didn't know I needed "assitance".Based on the posting I read: Yes ...
Soviet era VLF has an underwater cable component, get off it already sheeez. Lives were saved today, just go with that thought.
No help at allHmmm .. I see some of the previous post I made was redacted. Guess I can't post that stuff ...
Soviet era VLF has an underwater cable componentBS already.
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