U.S. Sub Collides With Cargo Ship in Gulf

[maddezmom]

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - A nuclear-powered U.S. Navy submarine collided with a Turkish cargo ship in the Persian Gulf early Monday, the U.S. Navy reported. Nobody was injured and both ships appeared to suffer only superficial damage, said the spokesman for the U.S. Navy 5th Fleet, Cmdr. Jeffrey Breslau.

It was the U.S. Navy's second collision with a civilian vessel in the Gulf in 14 months.

The USS Philadelphia was traveling on the surface of the Gulf when it hit the Turkish-flagged M/V Yaso Aysen at around 2 a.m. local time, said a statement from the 5th Fleet Headquarters in Bahrain.

The collision happened about 30 miles northeast of Bahrain, said Breslau.

more:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050905/ap_on_re_mi_ea/gulf_submarine_collision

[rzemanfl]

1. More incompetence from the Bush Administration! No cargo

ship should get anywhere near a nuclear submarine. Remember terrorism???

[Spinzonner]

2. The Navy can't screw up all by themselves ?

[Shipwack]

3. You're right, Spinnozer, we don't need any help sometimes.. eom

[rzemanfl]

4. I say again, why are NUCLEAR submarines getting close to

cargo ships? Someone issues orders to these Captains. Probably, in the BushWorld military, they were in the middle of a prayer meeting or at Bible study when this happened. Don't mind me, it is early in the morning and Bushco has driven me to distraction.

Let's just wait for the headline "Terrorists sink nuclear sub in Gulf" before we start looking for some leadership from these assholes.

[Shipwack]

8. Sometimes, Raz, you don't have a choice.

It happened in the Straits. Not much room to maneuver sometimes. It happened at night, which can complicate factors.

At the moment, there's not much info, but here's what could have happened.

It's 2 am, and the sub is heading towards it next port, surfaced, as per procedure, with radar going, lights on (all 5 or 7 of them, I'm not digging out my "Rules of the Road" to check). No one is in a "prayer meeting". The crew is probably tired and getting some rest before they pull into port. An officer and a couple of lookouts are on the bridge (on top of the sail sticking out of the water), and below, in addition to the several people normally in the control room there is probably a piloting party, keeping a second chart up to date with ship's position, landmarks, and other ships (in addition to the other people keeping track of other vessels; we're talking at least one and probably 2 or more layers of redundancy).

They've noticed this merchant vessel, via radar and or from its lights. Folks, merchants in the vicinity of Bahrain aren't always big huge super freighters. Many of the cargo vessels here small "dhows", small wooden or sometimes metal ships. We're talking semi-truck size.

The sub attempts to establish communications. Maybe they can, maybe they can't. Maybe the dhow doesn't have a radio on. Maybe no one on board speaks English. Let's say they don't establish comms.

Officer of the Deck asks those in the Control room for the dhow's course and speed, and confirms that at present course and speed they'll come within a hundred yards of the sub. The sub can either try to speed up, or play it safe and slow down and let the dhow pass by. Changing course is most likely not an option; they might have a channel they have to follow when they are this close to shore. Also, international maritime procedure says that if you do not have comms with the other vessel, in reduced visibility, and you make a course change, it needs to be a very large course change, and this might not be an option in restricted waters.

He informs the Captain, who may or may not be in the Control room at this point, that due to lack of communications, and how close the other vessel will get, he will slow down and let the other ship pass. The sub captain concurs.

Over on the dhow, the mate on watch sees some lights ahead. Maybe he even has a small radar contact (submarines, being mostly underwater even when surfaced, appear much smaller on radar than they actually are). He continues on his course. He gets closer, and sees that it is a submarine. Cool! he maneuvers in behind it to get a better look, or tries to cut in front of it and...

BLAM

hits a submerged portion.

So it might not be incompetance... sometimes things just happen. We'll know when more info gets out. I posted a link to subsim.com for news earlier in the thread.

Bush can't be blamed for -everything-

[geckosfeet]

13. And what if the dhow was packed with explosvies? n/t

[Shipwack]

14. ::shrug:: What if it had a nuke bomb?

Even if it was (conventional explosives), it might not have a an effect. Subs are a bit more sturdy than surface ships in that regard.

But that assumes that the terrorists have, on standby, ships just packed with explosives floating around the Straits, unknown to anyone. And this boat would never get searched, as ships in that area often do, since the international joint task force there is constantly boarding ships looking for pirates, smugglers of weapons, gasoline, people, etc. I doubt that they'd put that many resources when it is much easier to pack their explosives in roadside bombs. The last time Al Quaida did that used an explosive boat, it was a planned operation, not a spur of the moment thing. Submarine schedules are even more secretly guarded than surface ship's.

But if we were worried that any nearby passing vessel was filled with explosives, we'd never could leave port. Heck, we couldn't even stay docked in Norfolk, since vessels sail by the docked Navy ships all the time. Being out at that place and time is a calculated risk, and currently, the "explosive dhow" is not a major worry...

[Ernesto]

19. Thanks Shipwack!

It is refreshingly nice to hear someone actually tell us whats going on out there. Opinionated rants do get old around here.

[daleo]

25. You went from "it might be dhow" to calling it a dhow the rest of the post

That's not good practice.

[Shipwack]

26. I was giving a generic example...

...of how sometimes things can go wrong even when you do things right. It wasn't my intention to explain this instance specifically (though everything I said still applies, except for the ship size). Sorry for not making that clear.

That'll teach me to rush a post before going to work.

[rppper]

33. former submariner, eh?.....

i was on subs for nearly a decade...i find myself having to periodically defend the practices and professionalism of the sub fleet to patrons here...people just don't fathom how two small ships can collide in miles of open ocean unless they have been there...look at it this way...in open ocean, a ship 500 yards from you is the equivalent to bumper to bumper traffic on I95.....when you see it from that perspective and figure the turning radius of a 300+ foot sub is about a quarter mile, it becomes a clearer picture....

[northzax]

34. either way, someone's career just ended

welcome to shore duty, Cap'n.

praise allah no one was injured.

[Captain Hilts]

10. True. This is what diesil - sp? - submarines are better for.

Tight spots.

[Shipwack]

15. Agreed...

But that bastard Admiral Rickover ::spit:: destroyed our diesel fleet.

[Captain Hilts]

29. And named subs after cities. Yetch. Dad was skipper of Sea Robin. nm

[Shipwack]

7. Well, actually...

No ship should ever get near another ship... that's just plain navigation common sense, as well as official USN policy.

That being said, there is still too much not known about this. What are the mitigating factors? The straits are a nasty place for a sub to be in... Lots of traffic, shallow, not much room to maneuver. Did it have to come shallow because of a casualty? Was the freighter dead in the water and thus acoustically invisible (subs rarely run their ship detection sonar constantly, relying more on passively detecting the noises other ships make).

If both were on the surface, did the merchant vessel act improperly, not giving way when it was supposed to, or did it give one set of intentions but act differently? I've seen that happen quite often too. Commercial ship's masters tend to care only for getting from point A to point B as fast as possible using as little fuel as possible. They know that in a game of chicken the US Navy vessel will give way first. Unfortunately, sometimes they miscalculate, and don't see the 100 yards of submarine that lies behind the sail sticking out of the water.

I'll know more in a couple of hours what happened when I read the reports, and if I find out anything unclassified I'll pass it along. I doubt they'll be anything I can say, though I'll give insight to anything published. A good place to keep up on the news is Subsim, which has excellent coverage of all naval news, but especially submarines.

NOTE: I just found this at abcnew.com...

"The USS Philadelphia was traveling on the surface of the Gulf when it hit the Turkish-flagged M/V Yaso Aysen, a cargo ship, at around 2:00 a.m. local time, the U.S. Navy 5th Fleet Headquarters in Bahrain reported in a statement."

So it was on the surface, and at night. Another factor is what lights the merchant vessel was running, and how well the merchant knew of the location of the sub. Subs have small radar profiles (since most of it is below water, even surfaced), so maybe the merchant made a course change and miscalculated. Still not enough info to start casting blame.

[DoYouEverWonder]

5. Good thing the 2nd plane missed the tower

This has been a bad enough disaster. Imagine if it had turned nuclear?

[LunaSea]

6. Either use the sonar, guys...

or put in some windows.
sheesh.

Please tell me it's not the same crew from the "team bush" joyriders.

[Ezlivin]

9. Good thing it's not the USS Jimmy Carter

If that boat hit a ship, we'd never hear the end of it.

[MrBenchley]

11. Were Chimpy's campaign contributors at the helm...

Remember, when the Japanese fishing vessel was rammed by a sub in 2001 and all those people were drowned, a bunch of GOP campaign contributors were actually working the controls...

[Shipwack]

17. As much as I hate to stand up for a Bush contributer...

That really is an unfair characterization.

All the person did was flip a pair of switches. At that point, high pressure air pushed out water from the ballast tanks, making the sub lighter than the water it was in. It started floating rapidly to the surface. Imagine releasing a bar of soap from the bottom of a pool.

At this point, the only thing the sub can do is go up. While there might have been another civilian at the helm, there is nothing he could do. Luke Skywalker could have been steering the boat, and the same thing would have happened.The sub surfaced underneath the fishng boat... ramming makes it soudn as if they both were on the surface and the sub hunted them down.


As for the fishing vessel, there are other issues I'm not going to get into right now, other than it is a tragedy that people died.

[Mika]

20. No it is not an unfair characterization

While your post details the physics of a sub doing an emergency blow quite well, still, they were showing off to a bunch of Bush contributers. I very much doubt that they would be practicing an emergency blow where they did if there had not been Bushco's people on board.


Also, a sub operates in 3 dimensions, so, unlike a surface ship it can "ram" a surface ship from beneath.

[Shipwack]

27. Bush didn't invent the ride for contributors...

We gave dog-and-pony shows when Clinton was President too. Heck, I've seen pictures going back to the George Washington and the Nautilus of civilians taking a ride on submarines.

[MrBenchley]

30. How many let the contributors man the controls?

How many tried to cover it up afterwards?

[Shipwack]

32. Actually, all of 'em...

There are two "driving" stations on the sub, with "steering wheels". One usually controls the dive planes (the "wings" that stick out horizontally from a sub), while the other tends to control the rudder. At the push of a button, the two seats can swap controls, or one can even do both functions at once (turning the wheel left and right moves the rudder, pushing forward or pulling back controls the angle of the dive planes)

Whether it's a child on a "family cruise", Miss America, Senator, or campaign contributor, they all get the chance to sit in the seat and "drive the sub". It's a cool thing to talk about afterwards (in real life, it's one of the most boring jobs on the submarine, manned in general by the most junior crew members), and it makes for a good photo.

So the boat goes out in the middle of the ocean, plenty of water all around, above and below. Someone gets in one of the seats, and moves the controls a few degrees either way, enough to see some dials turn. A submarines is massive things, and it takes a longish time for its course and depth to change appreciatively. The Diving Officer keeps an eye on everything, and if someone does anything too stupid, the other station takes full control.

As for the 'cover-up"... This is the first submarine collision I can recall that had civilians on board, let alone at the controls. As I've said elsewhere, the error came from the submarine being unaware of the fishing vessel being where it was when they did the "emergency blow to the surface", not that anyone "drove" into it. No matter who was at the controls, they would be unable to affect the course, speed, or direction of the sub. I don't remember them trying to cover-up who was where (I could be wrong, though). I don't doubt that they didn't -emphasize- the issue, since they knew how bad it looked to someone acknowledgeable of submarine operation.

As to whether it should be allowed? I say yes. This is the tax payers submarine, and people should get to see and feel what they're paying for. Not only contributers get rides... we've had Boy Scouts, school groups, garden clubs, veterans, sports stars, and family members come on board for a ride. It lets them know what the Navy is like, in a small way, and generates favorable word of mouth.

[tinymontgomery]

12. New Job

New job opening for a CO, OOD and possibly a Navigator, any takers.

[Pepperbelly]

16. It will be a matter of the Rules of the Road.

It will be easy to analyze and reconstruct. One of the vessels was burdened to avoid collision, the other was privileged to stay its course. The DRT and NTDS tracks will tell the tale.

Don't make assumptions.

[petronius]

18. It sounds as though the freighter was anchored

"It weighed anchor afterward and a U.S. Coast Guard vessel inspected the ship and found it to be seaworthy."

[Mika]

21. Promotion time.

Not worthy of a Medal of Freedom, but..

[HEyHEY]

22. All that top notch equipment and they miss an OIL TANKER

I mean, it's not like they rammed into a dory

[Palladin]

23. Nuclear sub

The vessel is undoubtedly a nuclear-powered attack submarine, not a "boomer" (SSBN). Boomers are stationed in the Barents Sea, or maybe these days, the Sea of Othosk, but not in the Gulf. This attack sub is likely part of the escort for one of the aircraft carrier groups moving in or out of the Gulf.
That may be of interest itself, considering all the talk about Cheney ordering up an attack plan on Iran's nuclear facilities on the slightest pretext. The subs themselves carry TLAMs, long-range surface to surface missiles, which would be used in any attack along with carrier-based air assets and USAF bombers based out of Qatar and other airbases along the Gulf. The sub might even be escorting the Marine Expeditionary Force amphibious mother vessel which was recently forced out of the Jordanian port of Aqaba. The Iranians have a small diesel-powered deterrent submarine force, but their goal will be the carriers or the transports, and not to get into a match with an American attack sub.
The skipper will be forced into an early retirement. That's the tradition of the Navy. Even if he was asleep in his bunk below.

[cliss]

24. Well, I'm sure this little bit of news

made it to the Iranian government. I bet they were extremely interested to find out about this in Teheran.

Im sure this little newsflash was followed up by a hasty phone call to Moscow....to Putin.

No doubt Putin had already heard about this by the time Ahmadinjead called him. This is the kind of stuff the U.S. would rather keep clandestine, for obvious reasons.

And don't forget Turkey's reaction to being the victims of this blunder. They are already being pushed to the limit of their tolerance, with Iraq spinning out of control.

Yup, that's us.....The Bull in the China Shop.

[MildyRules]

28. They know we have nuclear attack subs in the Gulf

It's not a surprise to the Iranians, the Russians, or anyone else.

[northzax]

36. it still seems strange

to have a nuke in the gulf, although maybe there's enough ambient noise to equal out the larger signature of the nukes?

are you talking about the Iranian Kilos? the sub of choice for regimes interested in keeping the US out of coastal and inland waterways? (isn't the PRC buying enough to shut off the Taiwan straights?)

[SlowDownFast]

31. It's like the US just has 2 left feet

and reverse midas touch, lately (well the last 5 years, anyhow)...

[northzax]

35. well after years of the Clintons gutting the military

what do you expect?