The Argentine submarine, ARA San Juan, and the trail of false hope
The ARA San Juan, a TR-1700 submarine, was manufactured in Germany and went into service with the Argentine Navy in 1985. In 2014, a costly mid-life refitted was carried out in Argentina, during which the rear section of the submarine was cut in half, so as to replace its engines and batteries. The submarine's captain had reported problems with its electrical power system, likely to be a battery failure, before it stopped communicating and vanished.
It disappeared some 240nm off the San Jorge Gulf area, (432 km in landlubber speak), at the edge of the Patagonian continental shelf in the South Atlantic. The search area had a size of over 480,000 square km, (roughly the size of Spain).
From 18 November onwards, the Argentine Navy started a lost submarine, (DISSUB), search off Patagonia. Over a week, this grew into a comprehensive international SAR. Operations. Brazil, Chile, Canada, Colombia, France, Germany, Peru, Spain, South Africa, Uruguay, UK and US all were contributing resources helping with the search in some way or other for the missing submarine.
Situation by 21 Nov:
-Despite 11 countries, by air and on sea - searching for SIX days, a sub that needed to be found;
-Despite false positives such as noises or satellite signals, proven not to be from the submarine ;
-Despite 2 dedicated ASW P-8 US Navy aircraft, several Argentine ASW aircraft with sonobuoys and NASA aircraft;
-Despite several specialist ships with side sonar, MAD (magnetic anomaly detection), active sonar and passive sonar (ASW) ships;
- No trace of distressed ARA San Juan.
The video shows the initial deployments of ships, (AIS tracks), participating in rescue efforts:
http://www.lanacion.com.ar/2084655-video-el-recorrido-de-los-barcos-que-hoy-buscan-al-submarino-ara-san-juan/amp/2084655
While a frantic sea search by ships & airplanes was going on, two Patagonian based Offshore Vessels were at Comodoro Rivadavia Port, to be become temporary host ships for ROVs, diving bell and DSRV, supplied by the US Navy from San Diego.
https://mobile.twitter.com/SalernoCarlos/status/933361593458491392
One ultimately left the port with US Navy crew and part of submarine rescue equipment - the ‘Skandi Patagonia’.
https://mobile.twitter.com/NAVSOUS4THFLT/status/933141611218792448
PART 2 - A dramatic change
https://mobile.twitter.com/Armada_Arg/status/932744259643551746
https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=ewFAmP9nxCE
While the ‘Skandi Patagonia’ set sail for the search zone, the other remained in port. So one ship had remote-operated vehicle (ROV), the other was supposed to have the DSRV chamber. One was still in port on 24rd November, the one with the vital DSRV to rescue submariners, as major work on the stern of the ‘Sophie Siem’ was still being carried out for a A-frame & to accommodate the sub-rescue equipment onboard:
https://mobile.twitter.com/marcelovidalcr/status/933813661994553344
Had it been a time critical operation, the fact that the US Navy’s Undersea Rescue Command (URC), vital piece of equipment remained dockside for long, rescue would have been too late for the San Juan crew members. This is surreal! Even more so, when you consider the request by the US Navy for 44 lifejackets for the submarine crew made on the 24th Nov.
Situation on 23rd November
The Marine AIS situation as of the 23rd, where several ships are seen to be converging to more southerly position. The line of red dots coming from the West is the route of the ‘Skandi Patagonia’, which quite noticeably changed her course at some point.
https://mobile.twitter.com/steffanwatkins/status/933508852955467781
On this day, President Putin and President Macri had a telephone conversation. Following this, Russian Defence Minister,Shoigu had a phone conversation with his Argentinian counterpart, señor Aguad, thus starting a chain of events, as announced in Russian media. Subsequently, Project 22010, oceanographic survey ship ‘Yantar’ was dispatched to the search area for ARA San Juan. https://mobile.twitter.com/SputnikInt/status/933678522891194373
The ‘Yantar'- is ideally suited since it has a reputation for being an deep-sea underwater Research intelligence ship. It was previously in Cape Town last week. (Defence Web 22 Nov 2017). http://itweb.co.za/mobilesite/defenceweb/home/item_id-49949/
Russia has also sent a specialist team by air, specialists from the 328th expedition search and rescue unit of the Navy, along with a ROV, a Pantera Plus with depth rating of 1000m (Sputnik 23 nov 2017)
(according to TASS 24 Nov 2017) http://tass.com/defense/977244/amp
The Antonov 124 arrived in the night at Comodoro Rivadavia airport. (RT 24 Nov)
https://www.rt.com/document/5a16b295fc7e9335378b4567/amp/410732-russia-helps-search-argentine-submarine
Already on scene is the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) research ship, RV Atlantis which is carrying a seabed search:
https://mobile.twitter.com/LepontDahu/status/933809917961613313
RV Atlantis is usually host-ship for the mini-sub - ‘Alvin’ (test depth of 6500m and famous in its part in the discovery of the Titanic ), but it isn’t inboard, so that’ll leave the ‘Yantar’ with the task of sending hers down, if the need arises.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RV_Atlantis_(AGOR-25)
The question of the “hydro acoustic anomaly”
On 23 Nov, the Argentine Navy released the tragic news of the loss of the submarine, where it confirmed a "singular, abnormal, short, violent & non-nuclear event" consistent with an explosion, took place on 15th November, in area close to where the submarine was last reported. The noise was made three hours after contact was lost with the San Juan.
https://mobile.twitter.com/Ruptly/status/933804864202711040
Finally, it is reported that the Argentine Navy got on the 23rd, crucial data on a probable location & fate of the San Juan. Tragically too late to be effective.
Questions:
Was the data withheld from being released to Argentine Navy?
What was the excruciating delay in time in giving data to the Argentine authorities?
The clue is in the 2 responding organisations, one ISMERLO, (briefly outlined in Part 3 Sub rescue), seemingly spearheaded by NATO. The other organisation is the CTBTO. https://mobile.twitter.com/SinaZerbo/status/933745155399708674
While it is unofficially known that the US has a sophisticated global network of highly sensitive monitoring stations, previously part of the Integrated Undersea Surveillance System (IUSS) and prior to that ‘SOSUS’.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SOSUS#SOSUS_after_the_Cold_War
Both of which were officially declassified in 1991, so no guesses to understand the likely top secret high-tech upgrades that the US military has nowadays. There are also a host of worldwide dual use acoustic systems operating today, under partnerships with various scientific and university entities, (such as WHOI).
http://www.whoi.edu/page.do?pid=83377&tid=3622&cid=78986
[This is the same WHOI that has the RV Atlantis deployed in the South Atlantic].
Hence, no traceability of data, leading to to the question: Was ISMERLO the go-between - to mask the original agency, due to secrecy of the information sensitivity,(+ protocol of type of handling code dissemination of originator?).
Remember that there’s a lot a lot of data from all kinds of sensors, (land, sea, underwater and space), being collected daily, with real-time monitoring, some systems send data back to a shore facility in real time for evaluation. A lot of it is part and parcel of what is essentially the US Navy’s global maritime situational awareness, (The Diplomat Nov 2016). Given the highly important military nature of the systems, handling of strikingly abnormal signals ought to have been done in a matter of hours, not days.
https://thediplomat.com/2016/11/us-navy-upgrading-undersea-sub-detecting-sensor-network/
I’m not sure how much experience CTBTO with underwater maritime accidents, but sure, but intriguingly later in the day on 23rd, a series of tweets appeared, explaining about more about the origins of the data. The timing of the really optimistic tweet is indeed bizarre, at a time when the relatives of the submariners were apparently being told of their deaths).
https://mobile.twitter.com/SinaZerbo/status/933760443155472384
Question: Is just me or has CTBTO just popped out of nowhere with the noise findings? Have they been known to have assisted in other non-nuclear reports of disastrous explosions?. Otherwise this is a first. Amazingly they managed to shift, filter and fine tune their hydro acoustic data to provide an estimated location for the ‘noise’. Interestingly, the CTBTO backtracked the next day to say it was a minor noise.
More significantly either they or ISMERLO also were able to refine the analysis for the noise to be determined as non-nuclear, short duration and consistent with an explosion, (as stated by Argentine Navy press spokesman earlier in the day). Their systems are hydro acoustic arrays (in 3s), located worldwide. Consequently a bearing to the noise source was obtained, from 2 stations. Their video on the system is telling, as the data is relayed to Vienna practically in real-time.
https://www.ctbto.org/verification-regime/monitoring-technologies-how-they-work/hydroacoustic-monitoring/
I don’t think that we will ever get a definite answer to how the hydro acoustic data was obtained in the first place, or even whether the delay was due to politics or military secrets, (or a combination of the two). But the tragic event of the 15th November did give us a timely glimpse into the underwater monitoring world and another perspective on the ASW search and rescue resources to hand.
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