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Discussion » Statements » Rosie's Corner » Argentina is missing a navy submarine (the San Juan). The 44-crew sub has been out of radio contact for 3 days. How do you misplace a sub?

Argentina is missing a navy submarine (the San Juan). The 44-crew sub has been out of radio contact for 3 days. How do you misplace a sub?

Can't planes fly over the area it was and use radar or ships glide over the area and use sonar?  I mean it isn't a raft or a twig. It is sizeable. Does it happen often? How?

Posted - November 18, 2017

Responses


  • 44175
    It could have had a catastrophic watertight failure and sank to the bottom. It would be very difficult to locate amongst the bottom clutter; especially at great depths. We have lost two: the USS Thresher and the USS Scorpion back in the 60s.
      November 18, 2017 6:43 AM MST
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  • 113301
    Thank you for your informative reply Ele. So if it is deep enough it's difficult to locate amidst whatever else is there?  Ours were never located/recovered? Sad end. A watery grave. :(
      November 19, 2017 3:04 AM MST
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  • 44175
    The Thresher was located within weeks off of Cape Cod at 8,400 feet. The Scorpion was found after 3 months of searching at 9,000 feet.
      November 19, 2017 6:58 AM MST
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  • 1326
    The news is  reporting that the sub was designed to escape detection. Seems to have developed into a very tragic story. Latest news is that the sub has sunk, with no hope of recovery. The bible holds out hope for all those that suffered death at sea. "And the sea gave up the dead in it, and death and the grave gave up the dead in them." (revelation 20:13)"And I have hope toward God, which hope these men also look forward to, that there is going to be a resurrection of both righteous and the unrighteous" (acts 24:15)
      November 23, 2017 10:01 PM MST
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  • 3680
    Modern submarines have smooth exteriors and absorbent cladding to make them very hard to detect by sonar.

    Also the ocean covers a vast area in which an object only a couple of hundred feet or so long and perhaps 30 or 30 feet diameter at most is really very small.


    There were reports of ships detecting what sounded like an explosion in approximately the area concerned.

    IF two or more ships picked it up and each measured the time and magnitude of the sound as they heard it, and its bearing relative to their recorded position at the time, then in theory at least they could compare notes to determine the source area by triangulation; and approximate the intensity and nature of the sound at its source to help identify it.


    There are two ways to find sunken vessels in deep water, where neither radar nor optical methods cannot work - though the camera and flood-lights are good for close-up inspection once you've located the wreck.

    Magnetometry measures the tiny magnetism given by the Earth's magnetic field to the mass of steel; and searching, using a magnetometer towed behind and well below the search ship, can be rapid. It may not show what is magnetic but shows something is there.

    Side-scan sonar "sweeps" wide swathes of sea-bed with sound pulses to produce false-colour images of the floor and anything on it, from the echoes. The picture looks a bit like an old-style TV image, but will show objects sufficiently well to take closer looks at higher resolution. The submarine's absorbent cladding will hinder the technique to some extent, but I would guess the image would show at least as a "dark" patch against the sea floor - part of the patch being the boat's acoustic shadow. 

    Both tools are very effective but they can search only relatively narrow bands of the sea-floor, maybe a few hundred metres wide, so the search is matter of patiently cruising back and forth, back and forth,... along the likely track of the missing vessel over hundreds of square miles of open ocean;  and with sonar, at fairly low speed.


    Submarines have emergency beacons that can be released to float to the surface and transmit its whereabouts, but if the submarine sinks before anyone can release it, especially in ocean depths below the boat's crush limit, then sadly Autumnleaves' suggestion - prayers - is all that anyone can do for the poor crew. If the boat has sunk to depths beyond hope of rescue or salvage, but is found, all that could and should be done is an external assessment by submersible to try to find evidence of what went wrong, then leave her undisturbed, as a grave.
      November 28, 2017 5:06 PM MST
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  • 3680
    Thank you for the "Like".

    I've heard nothing about this incident for months. This thread is from last November. Has anyone any more recent news, such as whether the submarine has been found?
      June 19, 2018 12:48 PM MDT
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