Retired Submarine Commander Gives Perspective on Lost Submarine

A Canadian aircraft searching for the missing Titan submersible detected “underwater noise” on Tuesday from the vicinity of the location where the crew was touring the wreck site. Former submarine commander Capt. Don Walsh explains how deep submarine dives report every 15-30 minutes to their surface ship. He explains how the sonar buoys can triangulate …

Read more

US Navy Fifth Fleet Task Force Will Test Unmanned Ships and Systems

U.S. 5th Fleet’s Task Force 59 will stand up on Thursday and be the second testing outfit for the Navy’s unmanned ships following Surface Development Squadron One (SURFDEVRON) establishment in 2019. They will expand the operational use of unmanned platforms in the region and experiment with their concept of operations. This will not just be …

Read more

US Navy Buys Four Large Robotic Submarine Drones

The US Navy will pay Boeing $43-million to buy four Orca Extra Large Unmanned Undersea Vehicles (Robotic submarine drones or XLUUVs). Boeing based its winning Orca XLUUV design on its Echo Voyager unmanned diesel-electric submersible. The 51-foot-long sub will launch from a pier and can operate autonomously while sailing up to 6,500 nautical miles without …

Read more

China Has Radio Antenna to Talk to Submarines and It Covers Five Times Area of NY City

China has built a giant radio antenna that uses five times the area of New York City. It will be used to communicate with submarines. The Wireless Electromagnetic Method (WEM) project took 13 years and will emit extremely low-frequency radio waves (ELF waves). Those waves have been linked to cancer by the World Health Organisation. …

Read more

Satellite photos show China is building 5 more nuclear submarines

Planet Lab satellite photos reveal that two of China’s four JIN (or 094)-class subs are undergoing maintenance or repairs at the Bohai shipyard. Three submarines are being built at Longpo and two subs are being built at the Bohai shipyard. Analysts Catherine Dill and colleague Jeffrey Lewis found that China had one more nuclear submarine …

Read more

Next US Navy submarine has a big welding flaw and incompetent contractors

The US Navy is spending $128 billion to build twelve Columbia-class nuclear missile submarines. A costly mistake on ballistic missile tubes almost passed undetected. Contractor BWX discovered welding problems and notified primary builder Electric Boat. This led to a halt to the installation of the missile tubes. Electric Boat admitted this week that the faulty …

Read more

China will build more nuclear weapons for stronger deterrence

China has a policy of striking back with nuclear weapons if they are hit first. Chinese experts have started to worry that this second-strike credibility is eroding. They believe China needs more and better nuclear weapons to show that it could still strike back if attacked. US construction of missile defense and improving conventional precision …

Read more

US Navy returning to expensive Coldwar Seawolf-like sub hunters

The US Navy’s next SSN(X) fast attack submarine will focus on hunting Chinese and Russian submarines. The next-generation attack submarine will be faster, stealthier and have more torpedoes than the Virginia class. They will be similar to the Seawolf class submarine. During the cold war with the USSR, the US Navy focused on submarine hunting. …

Read more

Possible game changer in detection of submarines

China will try to use lasers, microwave radar and a lot of computation to detect submarines down to 500-meter depth. Experiments carried out by the United States and former Soviet Union achieved maximum detection depths of less than 100 meters, according to openly available information. The detection depth has been extended in recent years by …

Read more