Subs Collide?

[bobbbiez]

Someone want to explain to me how two nuclear submarines can collide.

Just thinking about what I hear in the news all the time, planes crashing, bridges collapsing, and now two subs colliding. What the hell is going on and what source of training is given out to avoid some of these things from happening? Way too much happening lately.

[frankcor]

Nuclear subs are very very quiet. And they practice sneaking around being quiet. It had to happen sooner or later.

[bobbbiez]

Ok, I'll buy being very, very quiet and sneaking around to find whatever you're sneaking around to find, but ramming each other is pretty damn stupid in my book.

[dan]

Finally, a topic I have some real knowledge of.........

The two boomers in question are both quite old. The HMS Vanguard is the oldest UK fleet missile sub they have of that class. The Le Triomphant is newer, but the French are basically a shallow water navy, not used to deep water exercises. That may be part of the problem, they are trying to practice in open water with 1990 era sonar. The British, USA and Russians have had 60+ years of deep water operations and are much better at knowing what depth each nation feels comfortable at. The fact that the Le Triomphant has sustained damage to her sonar cone tells me she impacted the Vanguard. This means she was following too close in an open ocean version of "drafting" or she got mixed up with what operating depth she should have been at. I haven't seen where the Vanguards damage is located yet, but I'm betting on just aft of the conning tower, probably port side. The scenario I envision is the Vanguard starting to come about (which would lower her forward speed and momentum) and the Le Triomphant smacking her in the side. The probabilities that these two had no idea the other was there is very unlikely. The possibility that two boomers end up in the same three-dimensional spatial plane is unrealistically high odds. They were, in essence, playing "chicken" with approximately 18 to 20 billion dollars worth of technology

[bobbbiez]

WOW Dan! You impressed me with your knowledge about subs. Were you in the Navy?

Thanks for sharing the info. Was very interesting.

Playing chicken ya say.
Guess I called that right by calling it stupidity.

ps: Years ago had a boyfriend in the Navy who was stationed at Great Lakes, Ill.
He was on the first nuclear sub christened the USS Nautilus. Wouldn't see him for months at a time because they were always on their journeys where ever. We never knew where he was. Their journeys were kept secret.

When he was home he'd be non-stop talking about the sub (which he loved) and I learned a lot from him. Pretty awesome stuff if one is made to understand. ;D

[bobbbiez]

I heard both subs were carrying nuclear missiles.
Thank God they were traveling at a very low speed when they collided.

[frankcor]

I wasn't in the Navy but I have read a lot of Tom Clancey. What Dan says seems to make a lot of sense. Maybe the Brits pulled a "Crazy Ivan?"

[Swimmy]

I'm not a submariner, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn last night...

According to Fox News, both ships were traveling with passive sonar to keep extra quiet, but that at close range the images are difficult to determine. It appears fishy, pun intended. Dan's explanation sounds like something out of the Hunt for the Red October.

My question is why a french sub was so close to the UK sub. Where they trying new listening equipment?

[dgriffin]

They have to spar with someone. Maybe it raises the wargames stakes a bit higher if the other sub is owned by another country.

[Clipper]

Joint maneuvers are not at all unusual among allies, although France has not been a very supportive ally to either UK or the US lately.

[bobbbiez]

lol!!!!!! Does joint maneuvers include ramming each other or playing "chicken?"

[Clipper]

If you go to wiki and search under "crazy Ivan" you will find that Frank most likely has the answer to what happened, or at least a logical possibility. I am confused by your question as to what "source of training is given out to avoid some of these things from happening". What possible common thread would there be among airline pilots, submarine captains, and structural engineers, and their safety training?

The true answer to your question is "human error". Yes they can run into each other on joint maneuvers. How? Through lack of communication, which would possibly leave the French not knowing that the Brits were going to execute the "crazy Ivan", and the Brits not knowing exactly how close behind them the French boat was cruising in their "blind spot" where their sonar could not detect them.

With modern sonar technology, any other scenario would have to include both boats having a problem with their sonar at the same time in order for them to be that close together and unaware of each other's presence. That is doubtful.

Joint maneuvers are a necessary part of working with our allies in keeping the free world safe. Until there is a way to prevent humans from making errors, the human element will always be the unpredictable part of any equation.

[dan]

I'm not convinced it was joint maneuvers in this case. these were two missile boats, they don't hunt, they hide. Actually, there is no reason in the world for two allied missile boats to be in the same sector. It makes them too easy to find. The best way to play the game is to spread your assets as broadly as you can, keeping the odds in your favor that any strike against your strategic defense network will miss some or most of your response capabilities. To have two allied boats on station in the same place at the same time is close to suicidal. The British normally only have one boat on sea station at a time, the French don't participate in grid assignments as a rule, instead they choose to play their own game of going for a Sunday drive. They don't assign a set route, but instead they kind of "wander aimlessly". Thats trivializing their strategy, but its the closest description I can come up with accurately. The US has about 1/3rd of our missile boats on station at any given time, or about 5 to 6, with another 3 in route to rotate the assigned boats back to port. That makes about 8 allied missile boats in the water at any given time. During the cold war if the Soviets knew the position of any two boats they could have eliminated 1/4 of the at-sea allied fleet with one shot.
American missile boats normally have at least one if not two hunter-killer sub assigned to their sector for protection from harrassment by the Soviets. This makes the seas very congested if you're not watching where you're going. The Soviets had pulled most of their boomers back to the Barents and the Sea of Okhotsk in the 80's to protect them because we were harrassing them so much. A Soviet sub couldn't leave port without two shadows during the 70's.
......but I digress.........
To sum this diatribe up, if this was two hunters, I'd think that joint excersizes was probable, but being these were two boomers, I think they were either harrassing each other and got tangled up, or the French boat just plain was somewhere she shouldn't have been.

[frankcor]

There seems to be some confusion here about sonars possibly not working. If you check up above, you'll see that both subs were using passive sonar. That means listening only -- they weren't pinging trying to find something. Pinging will certainly find something but it also broadcasts your own location.

Rather, by using passive sonar techniques, they were being quiet, listening for other ships' sounds. But because boomers are very quiet especially when moving slowly, they couldn't hear one another. Then, as Dan suggests, they got crossed up and collided.

[dan]

Just to clarify my expertise, I'm not ex-navy, but I've been involved with a civilian research group that has written on tactics and assets associated with the cold war era.