A collection of experiences that have washed ashore during a 40-year career in the United States Navy.
In early February 1977, my first month in command of USS Seahorse, we were operating south of Sicily when we received a radio message from Commander Submarine Group Eight (CSG-8), the Admiral in Naples commanding submarines in the Mediterranean. We were directed to proceed to the western Mediterranean in the vicinity of Gibraltar. There we were to intercept and covertly trail a Soviet submarine enroute from the northern fleet.
The Soviet submarine being tracked in the Atlantic was a Victor class which was a second generation Soviet nuclear attack submarine, an improvement over their early submarines, but still quite noisy. It had been first detected just West of North Cape, which is the northern most point of Norway, by our underwater sound surveillance system (SOSUS) which is a vast array of hydrophones located throughout the Norwegian Sea and the Atlantic for the express purpose of tracking Soviet submarines. After detection by SOSUS, P-3 ASW aircraft flying out of Iceland were vectored out to establish contact on the submarine and track and identify the class of submarine with airdropped sonobuoys. Tracking of the Victor continued with SOSUS and P-3 aircraft flying out of the Azores and Spain.
Gaining passive sonar contact on a submarine passing through the straits of Gibraltar is a difficult task as there is a high concentration of shipping contacts in this vicinity. In fact, tracking submarines in the Mediterranean is challenging because of the number of interfering sonar contacts throughout. One advantage we had was that we knew the class of the submarine we were hunting (Victor Class) and had specific information on various sonar frequencies associated with this class. This allowed us to separate the wheat from the chaff.
Within about six hours of the projected time of arrival, sonar reported hearing compressed cavitation, generally associated with a Soviet submarine and we started picking up some of the typical Victor class frequencies. Within about half an hour we had established an accurate bearing to the Victor and began maneuvering to close the contact and establish the range. After a few course changes across the contact's line of bearing we had enough information to establish the range as 8,000 yards or four miles and sonar also had a turn count on his propellers which gave him a speed of twelve knots. The only unknown regarding the contact was his operating depth and to reduce the risk of collision it was important for us to establish our depth different from his. Over the years of surveillance of Soviet submarines, we were pretty confident that his depth during this transit was 100 or 150 meters and I directed the Officer of the Deck to establish our depth at 575 feet, below his maximum expected depth. This depth separation issue would continue to be an unknown factor for the rest of the trail of the Victor.
Once we had established a solid trail deep in the Victor's port quarter at about 6,000 yards, we came to periscope depth to report by radio to CSG-8 that we were in contact and the course and speed of the Victor. Shortly after returning to 575 feet, the Victor slowed and maneuvered to check for contacts and then went shallow. Our intelligence data indicated that this was a normal communications period for Soviet submarines in the Mediterranean. Our next communications from CSG-8 indicated that the other submarines operating close to our projected track had been alerted and had cleared the area so that we would not have to worry about submerged interference.
We stayed with the Victor for about ten days as he transited to the Eastern Mediterranean and then maintained loose contact with the carrier battle group for a few days. He then broke off and headed toward the Soviet surface support group for replenishment and we went on to Naples for a scheduled port visit.
©2008 Hank McKinney
