OT: USS San Francisco runs aground question

reports said it hit an uncharted sea mount. isn't that the kinda thing that radar is supposed to find? a mountain right in front of you?

what am I missing here.....

Craig

Reply to
crw59
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Subs rarely use active sonar. Passive sonar has issues with detecting quiet rocks. ;)

Reply to
Allen Epps

  1. Radar does not work under water. Your local weather guy knows where the thunderstorms are because the radar energy is reflected back by the water droplets in the air. So what do you suppose a scope would look like if it was surrounded by the stuff? Right - a big bright blob filling the entire scope.
  2. Active Sonar (pinging) is only used when subs are looking for something specific. Using sonar gives away a sub's position which sort of defeats it's reason for existence. Passive sonar just listens.

Subs have probably transited that route hundreds of times. Very likely they came yards from that seamount on more than one occasion. This time someone found it. That area, from what I have read so far, is supposed to be a large, flat plain, but underwater charts are imprecise at best. There is lots of stuff down there we don't know about.

John W. Alger IPMS 10906 Charlotte Scale Modelers

Reply to
John Alger

John Alger wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

Knowing all that would you think the Captain would suffer any negative career effects? I know the Navy doesn't like it when you scratch the paint on thier expensive ships, but this seems so totally random and unavoidable.

Reply to
Gray Ghost

Craig, One of the news reports had a detailed explanation. Do a search on Yahoo news. The area in question is based on charts done some time ago. Some space imaginig did show discoloration in the area on a couple of images - but that could be caused by many things - and undersea mountain being only one of them. I was suprised how much of the ocean is uncertain in detail. The guys in the submarine are essentially blind - they can't used active sonar and give away their location - and mountains don't make noise.

Val Kraut

Reply to
Val Kraut

"jerry 47" wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@corp.supernews.com:

Because when traveling at like 20+ knots underwater at the depths they normally cruise at there isn't enough light to do any good. By the time you'd see it it would be way to late. Since most subs are deep water vessels, meaning they operate in the oceans I can't imagine that an external underwater camera would do much good.

Frank

Reply to
Gray Ghost

You need a lot of light at that speed. An enemy surveillance aircraft would see this "sun" moving under the water. The name of the game is stealth.

Val Kraut

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Reply to
Val Kraut

Interestingly, there is a Navy tradition of naming the underwater object after the vessel which "found" it. From now on the newly charted sea mount will be known as Mount San Francisco or something like that.

Kaliste Saloom (IPMS #30703) Lafayette, LA USA

Reply to
Kaliste Saloom

Going on memory (of what I read) here a bit:

At the beginning of the Spanish American War, the USS Texas and the other battleships were coming out of the Dry Tortugas in an area that had been traveled over and over again.....then bam, Texas and Iowa hit the same uncharted rock in succession. Our BB fleet almost went from

5 ships to 3 ships in the space of a few minutes. Fortunately the hulls held and the damage, while significant, was not enough to take them out of action. Could have very easily have been a significant incident had the US had to go to Cuba with only half of it's peacetime battle fleet (the Maine having already blown herself up). Of, course, with the Texas, it was written off as "Texas luck" to have hit an uncharted rock in an area presumed by the Navy to be clear of rocks, but this was the vessels turning point. Entangled herself in a minefield in Cuba, and got out of it unscathed, thanks to barnacle encrustment on the mines. I think hitting that rock scared must have scared the "hoodoo" right out of the ship.

What is so irritat> John Alger wrote in

Reply to
old hoodoo

Reply to
Steve Collins

Now he's got name for bad luck, and that's that for him. Nice career while it lasted. Same in the Air Force--one big crash and you're flying a desk.

Reply to
Tom Cervo

Or the charts were wrong...

Reply to
Al Superczynski

unavoidable.

That depends on what they find for the cause. If he was running at a high speed for a good reason in an area know to be free of underwater obstructions at his depth, then that is one thing. However, if was off course or running fast and deep in an uncharted area, then his career is over.

Dave

Reply to
Dave Williams

...or maybe they hit a Chinese submarine playing games...I had an instructor at the Academy who lost his commmand of an SSBN when they "bumped" a Russian SSN out in the Pacific...btw they DO have underwater cameras but not to see where they are going....JD >Subject:

Reply to
Jrdme109

Reply to
Jim K

I don't know about the one-mistake military. I have never considered myself to be a one-mistake commander. Although I do look at a situation more critically in the event the individual does not learn from his/her mistake and repeats it.

However, all that said, what you say is probably more true in the Navy than the other services. And, when a multi-million (or billion $$) ship is at stake as are the lives of the crew, perhaps it needs to be so.

-- -- -- -- -- "We sleep safe in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm." George Orwell

My Home Page:

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Reply to
Bill Woodier

There is also a Navy tradition of ending the career of a commander who lets his ship run aground, regardless of the cause or who's actually at fault. Running aground is the one "unforgivable sin." It's already happened -- the commander in this case has been relieved and it looks like his career is toast.

Reply to
Alexander Arnakis

Not always. When Enterprise ran aground in San Fransisco bay back in

83 the skipper went on to make Admiral as the ship was under command of the pilot at the time. Still, running aground is rarely considered career enhancing. Allen
Reply to
Allen Epps

This ought to be the M.O. for every organization in this country, from the government agencies to the corporate offices to the school boards to the family units. It would be a refreshing change.

Mark Schynert

Reply to
Mark Schynert

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