SSN "San Fran" Damage Pics
 

Link
http://pic7.picturetrail.com/VOL188/...3/82924857.jpg
Incredible.

This is the first I have heard of this, what caused it to run aground?

Anyone want to venture a guess on the estimate?

:eek:

Uncharted rock formation + 30 knots underwater = more than Maaco could handle.

My bet is the were performing some sort of "silent dash" excercise which relied upon charts rather than active monitoring of the seabed.

She hit a previously uncharted obstruction:

on January 7, 2005, the USS San Francisco, while on its way to making a routine port visit to Brisbane, Australia, ran aground and hit the ocean floor, approximately 350 nautical miles(560 kilometers) south of Guam, in the middle of the East Marianas Basin. The incident reportedly caused one critical injury and a number of minor ones to 23 of the submarine's crew ranging from broken bones, lacerations, bruises to a back injury. The critically wounded sailor later died of his injuries. Initial reports indicated that the submarine's hull was intact and that the submarine's nuclear reactor plant had not been damaged. The submarine resurfaced following the accident and proceeded to return to its homeport of Guam.

The article I read (I'll look for it) said exactly that.

I was wondering when images would come out on it... That's insane.

My question is, how the hell is there any "uncharted" ocean left? It isn't like the Pacific is "Darkest Africa" or anything...You would have figured by now that our maps would be relatively accurate.

Lower right hand corner (high res).

The 'job built' ladder got us a hefty fine from OSHA. Doesn't appear to be vertical supports under each 2X4 rung. I doubt the OSHA morons would get very far with the military (exempt, I assume). But they love to $crackdown$ on contractors with money.

[/Hijack Off]

I can't believe nobody's said it yet...

That'll buff out.

I was going to ask why subs didn't have something like forward-looking radar, then I thought two things:

1) Would that even work underwater?
2) It probably wouldn't be too stealthy. :)

Based on reading The Hunt For Red October 4 times, they have it, but they hardly ever use it because it reveals your position. Also beyond a certain speed your own transient noise drowns out any sonar signal you send out.

As for why nobody ever hit it before, it's a big ocean and earthquakes do change the undersea landscape. Didn't the Indian Ocean EQ drop the sea floor 30 ft?

Yeah right. Not only do we fall under OSHA, the Air Force has their own version of it to further make the CE guys miserable.

So a cylinder full of seamen blindly thrusting forward in an uncharted area at an unknown depth had the tip of it damaged.

I would say in this case it is rightfully named, and lucky.

:D

I can;t believe the thread got this far without the third grade humor ;)

/tg

There's a HUGE amount of the ocean that is uncharted, or I should say the charts aren't very accurate, especially in the Pacific. The last time I spent any time around charts was 5-7 years ago, and there are island charts that haven't been updated in 100-200+ years, and those are coastal waters not open water charts with detail of underwater objects which is FAR worse in terms of accuracy, but then they're more for surface ships, so a sea mount 500ft underwater is of little concern. That includes both DMA (Defense mapping agency, now NIMA iirc) and BA (British Admiralty) charts.

Maybe Pat will see this thread and give us some info (if he can), I'd be curious if they use the same types of charts available to the public.

Andrew

So, when fined, the Air Force cuts a check to OSHA? Or to themselves?

It must be tough enough to be in a sub for a long period of time, but to be in sub, in a depth of water that would crush your skull like a Twinkie, and to actually unexpectedly make contact with something like that - THAT must be truly scary. No thanks. I like this whole "land under my feet" thing. :)

What's under the tarp?

The attack submarine entered dry dock Wednesday at the Guam Shipyard, U.S. Naval Base Guam officials announced in a news release.

Does OSHA have jurisdiction in Guam? :)

Dick

They have active sonar ("One ping only."). But, no its not stealthy. The one-way loss is a proportional to the Range^2 while the return back from a target is Range^4, just like radar. Sonar is even more complicated since the ocean has thermal layers, a surface, and often an irregular bottom which makes for all sorts of multi-path situations. Basically something listening for you will hear you long before you can detect them. Imagine you're in the woods at night with out a light. Some one with a flashlight is trying to find you. How far away can you see them coming? How close do they have to be to you for the flashlight to be effective?

Submarines typically use passive sonar which just listen for the sounds of other vessels which allows them to hide. Stealth is a submarines biggest asset.

This is just speculation, but I doubt we pay any fines. If AFOSH nails you, you get an ass chewing, probably some paperwork (letter of reprimand, etc), and you fix the problem. If OSHA nails you, they shut down the project (if serious enough) or they contact the AFOSH representative. See above for what happens next.

I guess I should clarify that when I said we fall under both, I meant more of the rules and regs, not necessarily penalties. Of course, it's been so long since I had to attend an AFOSH briefing...

I gave up caring about all things OSHA related when I enlisted

A giant squid clinging onto the hull.

The classified pic without the tarp:
http://www.readthehook.com/images/is...00-leagues.jpg

Here's my limited knowledge, before LT Olsen jumps in and spills all the beans.

First, under the tarp is the spherical sonar array (big sphere with lots of microphones on it.

Second, even if they were doing a "mad dash" just using the charts, someone would have already plotted out where they were going and have checked it out. In other words, QM2 Johnson might not know everything about what he was doing, but LT Navigator was looking over his shoulder and did. There are only a few ways of doing this: hitting something uncharted, which is possible but I don't know how likely (though so far this is the official word and I haven't heard any rumors different); not knowing where you are, as in you are convinced you are in one spot in the ocean and you are actually in another (not going to "speculate" how often this happens); or not knowing where you are because of some system malfunction (probably not), or poor communication (unlikely); or just basic misreading of the chart, like you thought that line meant 300' of depth, not 30' (probably did not happen). In my experience, and that is to say not very much (1 month each with 2 different 688-class subs), when there is something that you could hit such as a mountain or another contact, the quartermaster is constantly updating the officer of the deck on their location relative to the danger.

As far as the active sonar, correct, they rarely use it (in my ~45 days underway, I bet I saw it used 2-3x, and probably mostly to show us how it works) because of the stealthiness issues. However, there are various ways of knowing where they are, not just some dude with a grease pencil and a chart.

Sub guys are some of the most anal people out there, and also the most well trained and capable. While ship drivers get relieved with some regularity (I think there were 15-19 last year?), it's not as common with subs. Granted, there is also a smaller sample size. Therefore, it's likely (not definite, mind you) that this is not entirely human error. The CO was relieved, but my understanding is that it was more of a reassignment pending an investigation. Not too much gouge on that though, being halfway around the world.


Oh, and BTW...pretty sure they were going flank speed, or top speed....the unclass top speed is "in excess of 35 knots"....so use your imagination.

Disclaimer: most of this was based on knowledge I gained at least 1.5 years ago, so it may not be entirely accurate...also left a few things out because I'm not sure if they are classified or not. But the gist of it is right.

I'm not buying the explanation they give. I think they ran into the back of a Russian sub doing a "Crazy Ivan"

What's incredible is that we only lost one guy. Thats a big freaking hole there. They were at 500' when this happend!

From strategypage.com:


January 12, 2005: The American nuclear submarine USS San Francisco hit an uncharted seamount on January 7th, killing one sailor and injuring sixty others, 23 of them so seriously they could not perform their duties. Facts about the incident were slow to emerge. It appears that the sub was traveling on a course it was ordered to follow, at a depth of 500 feet and a speed of about 56 kilometers an hour. This was the first time the navy had given the speed of a Los Angeles class sub as anything but “25+ knots” (45 kilometers an hour.) It has long been believed that these subs could make more than 55 kilometers an hour.

The visible damage to the sub indicated that the sonar dome at the front of the sub was partially collapsed, and, according to information released by the navy, some of the forward ballast tanks were damaged. The pressure hull was not compromised. The submarine immediately surfaced after the collision, which was apparently a glancing one, but it immediately slows the sub to about seven kilometers an hour. The crew had some trouble getting to the surface, because of the damaged forward ballast tanks (which hold water, that is rapidly pumped out, and replaced with air, to give the sub buoyancy and bring it to the surface.) The impact, of course, caught everyone unawares, which is why there were so many injuries. The sailor who died, had been thrown forward, hitting his head on a pipe. He died of that injury two days later.

The captain usually losses his command after accidents like this, although in this case, that might not happen. If the captain was following all procedures correctly, and there was no way the seamount could be detected, the incident might not destroy his career. There are many uncharted underwater features, especially 500 feet underwater. The technology does not yet exist to economically chart all of the ocean bottoms to that, and greater, depth. Most waters are charted sufficiently to protect surface ships. But there are only about two hundred subs that normally operate at the depth this accident took place. There may be a call for the navy to change its procedures, and have the sub use more active sonar devices when traveling in certain waters. But this will generate protests, because active sonar disturbs the fish. There are also technical issues regarding how effective such sonar would be in avoiding all types of underwater collisions. Moreover, in wartime, you avoid using sonar as a navigation aid, as it gives away your position. Actually, traveling at high speed gives away your position, because of the noise generated by the propulsion system and water rushing over the sub. In wartime, the sub might have been moving at 10-20 kilometers an hour, which would have caused less damage and fewer injuries.

If the Navy adheres to maritime tradition, that calls for the naming of previously unknown underwater features after the vessel that "discovered' them, even if by running into them, the uncharted seamount will now be known as the "San Francisco seamount".


Accidents like this are rare, but there will probably be a review of the charts, of underwater geography, that are used by American subs. This review process is standard whenever there is a major underwater earthquake or volcano eruption. For example, the December 26, 2004 earthquake off Aceh is known to have seriously rearranged the ocean bottom in that area, and efforts are already underway to update charts. But now an effort will be made to try and determine where there may be other potential "San Francisco seamounts".

"Save the fish! Fuck the sailors!" :mad:
Don't get me going.

Let's see, where to start...

I still haven't seen an official Navy statement that released the actual speed of the SAN FRAN when she ran aground, so I'm stickin' with the "in excess of 25 knots" that has been the standard answer for a while. (Aside: It used to be "in excess of 20kts and in excess of 400ft" until Diane Sawyer went out on a boomer probably 10 years or so ago for whatever news show she was doing at the time. The CO took it upon himself to "expand" the rules a bit and told her "in excess of 25kts and in excess of 800ft", at which point the Navy's official story had to change. :rolleyes: ) SAN FRAN was at max speed, and pretty much instantaneously came to about 4kts upon striking the sea mount. Much of the crew was up because the ship had just completed a cleaning period, and it was lunchtime. Fortunately, since it was lunch a lot of people were sitting down. If they had run aground during the cleaning period things would have been a lot worse, as there would have been lots of equipment broken out, heavy metal deckplates removed for access to bilge areas, etc. As it was, nobody was injured by any flying equipment - all the injuries were due to flying bodies.

The Executive Officer onboard is a friend of mine who was on my last ship, and one of the junior officers was also on my last ship (although I didn't know him as well, he showed up towards the end of my tour). Both were OK, but the XO in particular was pretty banged up.

At the speed they were going it is a requirement to take a sounding (projecting active sonar straight down, just like a surface ship's bottom sounder or a fish finder) every 15min. Our fathometer in secure mode is pretty much undetectable, so that's not a concern. At high speeds we have to shift to non-secure (due to the increase in own-ship's noise previously mentioned) at which point it is detectable. Transiting from Guam to Australia that's not really a concern, since there's nobody out there to hear it. :) Anyway, SAN FRAN had just gone deep and fast a few minutes prior to the grounding. Prior to any significant depth excursion we always take a sounding, and it was 1000+ fathoms. As I recall that was 4 minutes before the grounding.

There are two charts that cover the area in question. I know one is a LIMDIS (Limited Distribution) classified chart, so it's not available to the public. That type of chart is generally what we use for open ocean navigation, and they have very good sounding data. In this particular case, on this chart there was nothing shown in the area. The other chart, which I think may be available to the public, did show "discolored water" in the vicinity of the grounding, as does our electronic chart of the area (which are still not authorized for navigation, just as an "aid"). Honestly, as a Navigator myself, I can't say I would worry much about "discolored water", as there's really no definition of what that means and often it seems to be old data (as in the chart will be marked "Discolored water (rep 1971)"). I'm not sure where exactly SAN FRAN's track was laid out relative to the discolored water area, but I believe they grounded ~3nm away from it, so it's not like they plotted a track right over it.

NIMA, the chart people, has recently changed to NGA (National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency). I've seen one article since the grounding in which NGA said that they have thousands of photos of the ocean, which can be analyzed with modern technology to determine water depth. However, there's a big backlog, and the area in question had not been analyzed yet. I found the article here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2005Jan15.html (one pop-up).

That's LCDR Olsen, mister! ;)

Pat Olsen

Condolences to the family of the deceased sailor, and speedy recovery to the ones injured.

As always, this site has the best tech around. Period. Thanks for the sub-lesson.

Pat,

You always hear that a grounding effectively kills a Captain's career in the USN. Do you think that's likely in this case given the circumstances?

What does "discololred water" mean?

And you call yourself a thug.

However, I have to admit that I share Adams condolences and well wishes.

This NYTs article goes into more detail:

Now, Defense Department officials say they have found a satellite image taken in 1999 that indicates an undersea mountain rising to perhaps within 100 feet below the surface there.
---

The officials said the main chart on the submarine, prepared in 1989 and never revised, did not show any potential obstacles within three miles of the crash. They said the incident happened in such a desolate area - 360 miles southeast of Guam - that updating their depiction of the undersea terrain was never considered a priority.
---
But since the accident, Mr. Andreasen said, his office has examined commercially available images taken by a Landsat satellite in 1999, and at least one image indicates that an undersea mountain could rise to within 100 feet of the surface there. Analysts say variations in water color can sometimes indicate a land mass below. Mr. Andreasen said his agency had not normally used satellite imagery to update sea charts, though it recently began using the images to help pinpoint the boundaries of islands and other land masses. He and other officials said that the charting office's staff had shrunk in recent years, and that the Navy never asked it to focus on the area south of Guam, where it began basing submarines in 2002.
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Current and former Navy officials say the main focus during the cold war was charting areas in the Northern Pacific and in Arctic seas where missile and surveillance submarines guarded against a Soviet attack. Since then, the Navy has been trying to improve charts of shallower coastal waters in the Middle East and other areas where it might have to help battle terrorists.
---
As ships have reported these coordinates, sea-charting offices around the world have found that many islands were "maybe a mile or two out of position" on widely used charts, he said. So over the past year, his agency has been using the Landsat images and other data to update many nations' boundaries.


"a mile or two out of position" Yikes!

First graders + Swimming lessons = discolored water

Sorry 'bout that, sir. Didn't know there was a promotion, cuz I wasn't invited to the wetting down :) BTW, what's your job?

Ever notice how the color of the water changes as the depth changes? Dark for deep light blue for shallow, etc.

Wes

They grow up so fast. :)

Congratulations.

Monroe

Navigator/Operations Officer on a fast attack boat out of Pearl Harbor.

The Navy Times has an article in the Jan 31 issue that shows a LANDSAT image overlayed onto the unclassified chart. There's clearly a shallow spot (estimated to rise within 100ft or less of the surface), and it's about 5km to the north-northwest of the charted "discolored water".

I'm still awestruck by the pictures of the boat in drydock. If they had been 5 yards farther to the left they would have hit square on the bow, and I think we might be talking about the first loss of a US nuke sub in almost 40 years. As it is, what that crew went through is truly amazing. Their corpsman in particular is a hero in my mind. Subs don't have doctors onboard, just an "Independent Duty Corpsman", an enlisted man who receives extensive training - an EMT with the ability to do emergency surgery if necessary. Their corpsman (aka "Doc" on every boat, of course) held it together for about three days while treating nearly half the crew, with 23 people who were pretty much out of commission. Truly amazing.

Pat

So did the airbags deploy? :D

So what, about 3-5 years until you can invite all your CC.com buddies out on your OWN boat? ;)

Andrew

Not to take anything away from their abilities to hold together and get home, but I would assume that if they did an emergency surface, they would be able to call in some sort of airial support to do damage assesment of the boat, bring in more crew members to get her back under way, as well as a few extra doc's or even fly by helicopter the ones who needed imediate med-vac to somewhere that could do the work. Is this the wrong assumption

I say this more because I am curious to here what they could do and also because I would like to hear in more detail about what they had to do to get home.

Wes

I don't know where the accident happened, but what are you going to do if you're thousands of miles out to sea or away from the nearest part of land that is capable of helping you.

I spent a long summer doing some off-shore sailing, and the realization that the only people you can rely on are yourself and the crew aboard is a bit sobbering. There are places in the ocean where you are truly 1-2 thousand miles from the nearest piece of dry land, you are well out of helicopter rescue range, which means in the event of an emergency you are potentially days away from help (obviously any ships in the area can and legally should come and help, but that's providing you are near other ships/boats).

Andrew