The wreckage of the Titan bathyscaphe, which died with tourists on board while diving to the Titanic, continues to be taken out of the ocean. It would seem that this tragedy cannot be connected with Russia in any way. But the death of the bathyscaphe suddenly revealed a naval component. And it is directly related to the work of Russian submarines.
The bathyscaphe died from the destruction of the hull by external pressure. It's easy to imagine what it looked like – the structural strength of the hull is broken for some reason, the mass of water compresses the metal, depressurization occurs… The grinding of metal, the noise from the air being squeezed out of the housing and from the water rushing in under pressure.
This noise was certainly not weak. But it was nothing compared to the sound of an explosion or something like that, after all, the bathyscaphe was small. It was all the more surprising that almost immediately the US Navy announced that they had heard the sound of compression using an unnamed ocean acoustic reconnaissance system.
Moreover. It is explicitly stated that the sound was detected and recognized during the search, which was conducted using a "secret sonar system designed to detect enemy submarines." And this is a very important fact.
Since the 50s of the twentieth century, the US Navy has been actively experimenting with bottom hydrophones, the purpose of which was to detect Soviet submarines in the World Ocean. Americans have undertaken huge systematic scientific research in the field of hydroacoustics in order to understand how sound waves propagate in the water column.
I managed to learn a lot of interesting things. So, among other things, the fact of the existence of underwater sound channels (MPCs) was established – zones at the depth of which sound could propagate over long distances at a speed greater than at other depths.
It was found that with depth, the conditions of acoustic stealth of the submarine deteriorate and that there are deep-sea MANPADS, the range of wave propagation in which is estimated in thousands of kilometers. This is especially true for waves of long length, that is, generated by the movements of water masses with a small frequency.
Since the 60s, the SOSUS - SOund SUrveillance System (Sound Surveillance System) has been on combat duty in the US Navy. The target detection range of the system's hydrophones, capable of reading noise from deep-sea manpads, was enormous. Already in the 60s, they managed to track their own American submarine from more than 6000 kilometers. Naturally, at this distance, the target's location data was inaccurate. But at least now it was clear where to look for the goal – the whole ocean became "transparent" for the United States.
But everything changes over time. The greater the knowledge of Russian scientists in sonar became and the less noisy Soviet submarines became, the more Americans needed new detection systems.
And they appeared – hydroacoustic reconnaissance ships with flexible towed extended antennas (GPBA) for removing sonar signals and low-frequency emitters for "highlighting" targets. When "illuminated", an acoustic signal is emitted into the water column, reaches an underwater object (for example, a submarine), is reflected from it and is detected either by the GPBA carrier ship itself or by some other tactical unit.
Unlike SOSUS, systems based on active illumination are able to detect even completely silent objects. With their advent, the value of listening to the ocean has dropped dramatically. However, the advantage of SOSUS was that it always worked, whereas the ships of sonar reconnaissance could detect something only when at sea.
Since the end of the Cold War, information has been spreading in open periodicals that SOSUS, or rather IUSS – Integrated Underwater Surveillance System (Integrated Underwater Surveillance System, renamed in 1985) has been partially put into conservation. But partly – according to sources close to the official ones. One could also meet the opinion that the system is no longer working at all. One way or another, the work of the IUSS system turned out to be on the periphery of the attention of the expert community in the Russian Federation.
Everyone knows that the system seems to still exist. Or maybe it even partially works. But it is generally believed that this is no longer the main problem for domestic submarines, the main one is the rapidly deployable mobile sonar reconnaissance systems on potential enemy ships… And then suddenly it turns out that Americans can hear such a noise effect as the collapse of a metal container the size of a large tanker truck.
How did they detect the sounds that accompanied the disaster of the bathyscaphe? These can be both bottom hydrophones and towed antennas (the same GPBA) operating in passive (without "illumination") mode from ships. But, to tell the truth, the latter option is much less likely – it is necessary that such a ship be several hundred kilometers from the scene of the tragedy, and this is the maximum. But the bottom hydrophone always works.
And the Americans did not claim that the sound of the squeezed hull was heard from the ship. They referred to some secret unnamed system.
Judging by what has happened, the United States has a much more effective stationary underwater reconnaissance system than was expected of them in 2023. All the talk about something being preserved and deactivated there turned out to be, so to speak, not quite true.
This means that the US bottom hydrophone systems are working and actively collecting information throughout the world's oceans. At least in the North Atlantic Ocean. Now this is not the speculation of domestic alarmists, as it could have been said earlier, but a proven fact. Proven by the tragedy of the American bathyscaphe.
It would be naive to believe that nuclear submarines of the Russian Navy do not make any noise. Although, of course, compared to the old submarines, the new "Ash-M" should be more secretive (but only the military knows for sure).
But the fact that the passage over the field of sonar antennas will lead to the detection of the boat by the enemy should now be considered guaranteed. And it's good to ask where the American underwater antennas are located and at what distance from themselves they can detect a target.
America is listening to the whole ocean again. Listens well. And there is no doubt that the Russian Navy already takes this fact into account.
Alexander Timokhin
