sosus
cosp is audited by gao. gao recognizes sosus role as a
force - multiplier
and recommends that sosus manning and budget be increased .
surface sonar buoys were also used to fill gaps in the sosus listening network .
sosus work stations (sws) replaced paper gram displays at nopf dam neck .
the sound surveillance system (sosus) provides deep - water long - range detection capability. sosus enjoyed tremendous success during the cold war tracking submarines by their faint acoustic signals. sosus consists of high - gain long fixed arrays in the deep ocean basins
the next year sosus detected and tracked its first soviet diesel submarine. later that year the sosus test system in the bahamas tracked a soviet foxtrot class submarine during the cuban missile crisis. sosus was upgraded a number of times as submarines became quieter .
capt joe kelly, known as the
father of sosus
, retired. >
aaron m. is drinking a sosus by toppling goliath brewing co. at ravinia festival
sosus systems consisted of bottom mounted hydrophone arrays connected by underwater cables to facilities ashore .
april, the uss thresher sinks; sosus plays critical role in pinpointing location of incident .
navfac keflavik iceland established exactly one year after decision made to deploy sosus to the norwegian sea .
navy developed the sound surveillance system (sosus). code named
jezebel
the sosus system provided critical monitoring of soviet submarine and ship movements, especially through the critical ocean gaps between greenland ,
craig c. is drinking a sosus by toppling goliath brewing co. at craig' s bbq and brewery
( the gi - uk gap). sosus systems were so sensitive that trained observers could determine ship type
in 1. 99. 1, the system mission was declassified and the next year it began reporting whale detections and sosus work stations began replacing paper lofargrams. the advanced deployable system became operational as part of iuss in 1. sosus secrecy compromised. john' s, newfoundland for attempting to obtain information on the sosus site at naval station argentia .
in 1961, sosus tracked the uss george washington (ssbn - 598) from the united states to the united kingdom .
in 1. 95. 3, jezebel' s research had developed an additional high - frequency system for direct plotting of ships passing over the stations, intended to be installed in narrows and straits, called project colossus. sosus goes operational. the next year sosus detected and tracked its first soviet diesel submarine. later that year the sosus test system in the bahamas tracked a soviet foxtrot class submarine during the cuban missile crisis. sosus was upgraded a number of times as submarines became quieter .
with the end of the cold war, sosus hydrophone arrays in both the atlantic and pacific faced an uncertain future of shutdowns and closings. consolidation of sosus by array retermination, remoting, or closure was complete by fy97. closures included bermuda, adak, and keflavik. all other arrays will remain operational. sosus in the north pacific is currently being analyzed for low - frequency vocalizations from marine mammals living in the open ocean .
sosus used arrays of hydrophones (underwater microphones) strategically placed along the ocean bottom. the hydrophones were connected by cables to onshore monitoring stations .
sosus (sound surveillance system) .
encyclopedia of espionage, intelligence, and security. . retrieved july 09, 2018 from urltoken urltoken
with the end of the cold war, sosus hydrophone arrays in both the atlantic and pacific face an uncertain future of shutdowns and closings. consolidation of sosus by array retermination, remoting, or closure will be complete by fy97. recent closures include bermuda, adak, and keflavik. all other arrays will remain operational. sosus in the north pacific is currently being analyzed for low - frequency vocalizations from marine mammals living in the open ocean .
the technology is 49 years old. it would be silly to claim that china has not or cannot duplicate sosus in the waters off of china .
on the seafloor both sides positioned sophisticated listening devices. the more advanced u. s. system, called sound surveillance system (sosus), consisted of strings of hydrophones planted at strategic spots on ocean bottoms. sosus was so sensitive that the navy tracked soviet subs thousands of miles from u. s. shores .
sosus (sound surveillance system) .
encyclopedia of espionage, intelligence, and security. . encyclopedia. com. (july 9, 2018). urltoken
john anthony walker, a united states navy. chief warrant officer and communications specialist, divulged sosus operational information to the soviet union during the cold war which compromised its effectiveness. however, the sosus arrays themselves were based upon technology that could only be upgraded irregularly. with the ending of the cold war in the 1. sosus decreased, and the focus of the us navy also turned toward a system that was deployable on a theatre basis. in effect, the end of the cold war eliminated much of the justification for maintaining iuss at its full capability, with the existence and capabilities of sosus and iuss being declassified in 1. pacific fleet (comsubpac) .
the first 2x20 array was installed at navfac argentia. in april, the uss thresher sank, and sosus played a critical role in pinpointing the location of the incident .
i never worked on the sosus system, but the mine sweep i was on in the 70s would snag there ssq - 58a hydrophone buoys off the coast of calif .
sosus works best at tracking vessels on the high seas. its effectiveness is cut the closer a target gets toward the shore, where conflicting sounds and echoes rapidly increase .
eddie n. bernard, director of oceanic agency' s pacific marine environmental laboratory, which uses sosus and is based in seattle, said he hoped common sense would prevail .
'' the best kept secret in the navy is the capability of our sosus system to detect soviet submarines in various modes of operation and in various locations,'' he said .
having spent just a bit under 20 years in sosus, i want to follow up a bit on some of your information - keeping in mind that you were getting it second hand .
one intelligence source said relocating the sosus sensors'' would be an enormously expensive move'' and would be difficult to do secretly because the soviet union has vastly improved its satellite surveillance .
26 october, first positive correlation and sighting of a sosus contact (navfac grand turks) and vp contact on a soviet foxtrot class submarine during the cuban missile crisis; designated charlie - 20 .
also, while there were sosus stations in both hawaii and guam, and there were two stations in great britain, there was never a station in kingsbay, england - actually i have never heard of kingsbay, england. there is a kingsbay, georgia, which is the east coast home of the ohio ssbn' s, but there never was a sosus station in the immediate neighborhood .
in his most notable mosaic work, sosus of pergamon depicts doves sunning atop a golden chalice. the image was said to be so enticing that real birds flew into it while trying to reach their stone companions. this single - hop showcase is inspired by the beauty of divinity of the sosus mosaics. just as the doves discovered their golden nectar, discover the irresistible nature of the mosaic hop .
in 1992, the navy, the national marine fisheries service and the coast guard used sosus to track fishing vessels in the pacific, to explore possible enforcement of international bans on drift - net fishing .
in a may 17 letter, commerce secretary brown asked the defense department to take no action to disable any sosus arrays until the completion of the joint study, which is to include other government agencies .
sosus arrays are being placed in a standby status in which the data is available but not continuously monitored. in the event of a resurgence in the global submarine threat the worldwide network of fixed undersea surveillance systems such as the sound surveillance system (sosus) a critical asset. since the end of the cold war, reservists have been increasing their role in this mission area. in a recent report, entitled
part of project jezebel was the study of short range, high frequency, upward looking sets of bottomed, active sources located in a strait as a complement to sosus; this was known as project colossus .
march, soviet golf ssb (k - 129) sinks nw of hawaii; may, uss scorpion (ssn 589) sinks sw of azores. sosus supports air force aftac system in localizing both vessels .
bell telephone laboratories, western electric corporation, and at & t; were the prime contractors and essentially the creator of the arrays, cables, electronics, and processing systems for sosus systems from day one. this film documents some of the advancements through the 70' s. the film is also provides a look at the curious nature of shore - based naval culture during that period. the mission of sosus, its methods and practices, and the entire technological makeup were a closely held classified program (project caesar) until the very end of the cold war. even mentioning sosus in concert with asw was considered classified .
used mainly to track most of the comings and goings of vessels, military or not, through certain check points. like the straights of gibralter, greenland etc. very sensative and can chart sounds and detect them several thousands of miles away. the us navy is developing unmaned underwater vehicles. little remotely operated submarines that are possibly a new version of sosus, where they can patrol silently like a hunter killer sub, act as a roving sosus system, and can act like a more dangerous captor mine type of concept all in one. thats the future of sosus. movable unmaned subs acting like roving hydrophone arrays with torpedos .
by contrast, little is known publicly about the sosus networks after the cold war. defense systems reports that drapes, like sosus, will be a fixed passive listening system with a new communications capability to transmit its data. mobile systems like surtass have the advantage of being able to get closer to possible contacts and follow them, but can only be in one place at a time, and must eventually return to port. fixed systems like sosus, and now drapes, have the advantage of providing permanent coverage over target areas and then “cueing” a mobile sensor capability, like a ship or aircraft, to zero in on a submarine it detects .
one reason there were 30 iuss sites during the cold war is that the sosus systems had to be connected to collection facilities by underwater cable, requiring sites to be relatively local to the target area. but drapes will apparently use a new underwater communications system to transmit the acoustic data it collects to the three remaining navy operational processing facilities (nopfs). these facilities combine data from the static sosus networks and surtass ships to provide “detection, localization, and tracking of submarines. ” drapes’ ability to provide wide coverage from a fixed location in the ocean, apparently without the need for additional nopf facility footprints, would be a substantial improvement over the old sosus network .
the first positive correlation and sighting was made, at navfac grand turks, of a sosus contact. a vp aircraft contact was made on a soviet foxtrot class submarine, designated charlie 20, during the cuban missile crisis .
part of project jezebel was a design study of a short range, high frequency, upward - looking set of bottomed active sources to be located in a key strait as a complement to sosus; this was known as project colossus .
first naval aviator to command an oceanographic system, capt richard a. hoffman, usn becomes cosp. he assumed title of commodore (not heretofor used in the pacific system) in order to emphasize real - time operational role of sosus .
'' if the navy has got enough indicators that the soviets are doing things a little too smart, then they better start putting their hydrophones in different places,'' said a submarine expert who participated in the placement of the sosus sensors .
additionally, mit' s concurrent creation of the bathythermograph, a device capable of measuring relative temperatures throughout the water column, helped spur on development of sosus by revealing that water temperature—not just pressure and salinity—affects the distance that low frequency sound travels underwater .
several submarine experts with experience in the navy and in the shipbuilding industry said they believed the gravest possibility was that the soviet union learned details about the navy' s ability to detect soviet submarines, including sonar systems on american ships and the sosus devices .
see also. 2, article by edward c. whitman. the acoustic monitoring project. the third battle: innovation in the us navy' s silent cold war (mit: march, 2. sound surveillance system (sosus), global. security. org. a letter from joe worzel to lamont - doherty earth observatory regarding the establishment of palisades geophysical institute, its work, and support of the education and research community. the sound surveillance system, federation of american scientists, intelligence resource program. navy article on sosus .
from 1992 to 1993, biologists used sosus to track the migrations of whales, including a single blue whale as it swam southward from cape cod to bermuda, to florida and back to bermuda. all told, a trek of about 1, 700 miles was closely monitored .
some experts, including former navy officers, said replacing the sound surveillance system, called sosus, was potentially one of the most difficult and costly measures needed to restore confidence in the american submarine fleet' s command of the seas, if the allegations of a 20 - year spy network prove true .
the first sosus stations – navfacs – were sited from barbados to nova scotia on a huge semi - circle that opened onto the deepwater abyss west of the mid - atlantic ridge. later, additional atlantic - area stations were established at argentia, newfoundland, keflavik, iceland, and brawdy, wales .
in 1963 sosus data helped rule out sabotage or foul play in the sinking of the thresher, an advanced american submarine that sank off cape cod. close examination of recordings of underwater sounds revealed only the sickening thud of an implosion caused by crushing ocean pressures, not the sharp report of an explosion .
navfac keflavik was established exactly one year after the decision was made to deploy sosus in northern waters. project caesar was transferred to naval electronics systems command, code epo - 3, located at main navy (now the site of the vietnam memorial). the first 3x16 array system was terminated at keflavik .
1968 - in may, the uss scorpion submarine sank southwest of the azores. in this same year, a soviet golf class ssb sank north of hawaii. sosus played a key role in locating the sites of both disasters. the first detection of victor and charlie class soviet submarines were detected by navfac keflavik .
first usn women assigned to a sosus facility arrive at navfac eleuthera. group of 11 consists of lt susan canfield and 10 ots (e2 - e5): norah brown, iris wirth, barbara yates, mary zenes, yvette shmitz, debra rupp, dorothy hardin, kathy hardy, delta carr, and darla sutherland
specific combinations of temperature, pressure, and salinity may act to create
shadow zones
that are resistant to the propagation of sound waves or that act as reflectors of sound waves. soviet submarine captains attempted to use these zone or layer to conceal their ships from detection by surface sonar arrays. the layers could also to
bend
signals detected by the sosus array in order to attempt to conceal ship movements. in practice, staying within such layers proved impossible to maintain for extended periods, and intermittent sosus plots could be used to track ship movements or provide a probable position to explore with the use of sonar buoys dropped by airplane .
but a civilian bailout may be unlikely. an internal document from the the national oceanic and atmospheric administration, the arm of the commerce department now using sosus, says ,
n. o. a. a. is not prepared to pay for, or contribute to, the support of the systems and archives .
born of a three - way marriage of early cold war strategic necessity, world war ii progress in underwater acoustics, and an extraordinary engineering effort, the navy’s pioneering sound surveillance system – sosus – became a key, long - range early - warning asset for protecting the united states against the threat of soviet ballistic missile submarines and in providing vital cueing information for tactical, deep - ocean, anti - submarine warfare. and although subsequent events – most notably the end of the cold war – robbed sosus of much of its mission, its history remains an object lesson in how inspired, science - based engineering development can lead to extraordinary operational effectiveness .
for decades the sosus system was so secret the government refused to acknowledge its existence. the network was begun in the 1950' s as a way to strip the cloak of secrecy from enemy submarines. it turned out to work better than expected, prompting the navy to vastly expand its size in step with expanding soviet threat .
the sosus budget is down sharply, to $ 165 million this year from about $ 335 million in the fiscal year 1991. for the fiscal year 1995, the clinton administration has requested about $ 60 million. the number of personnel fell to 2, 000 this year from 2, 500 last year and is to drop to 750 by 1996 .
the usa built an anti - submarine hydrophone array – similar to sosus (sound surveillance system) in the north atlantic – in the sea of aland between finland and sweden in the 1980s. in the gulf of finland, finns used hydrophones donated by americans, forwarded information to them, and the americans helped the finns to put together a submarines ”voice library” .
though sosus is under siege, other treasures of technology from the cold war have successfully found civilian roles in addition to military duties. early - warning satellites have spied on meteor blasts in the atmosphere, submarines have dived for civilian scientists and nuclear - weapon labs have aided whole industries, including automobile makers looking for new batteries for electric cars. secrecy is lifted
the u. s. navy, too, began to install its own system of cabled hydrophones off the northwest pacific coast in 1951. the sound surveillance system (sosus) was used, according to the woods hole oceanographic institution
for classified antisubmarine warfare and surveillance during the cold war .
following its declassification after the cold war' s end, dual - use access was granted to the national oceanic and atmospheric administration (noaa) where it was repurposed to monitor undersea oceanic phenomena for scientific study, much as neptune is used today. but unlike neptune, “access to sosus is restricted, ” reads noaa’s website, “both in the sense that the data are classified and can only be used in a secure facility. ”
the navy is obviously in a terrible bind and needs to save ,
said dr. walter munk, an oceanographer at the scripps institution of oceanography in san diego, which is measuring ocean temperatures with sosus .
but i think it would be a mistake to precipitously close the arrays down, if only because of the chance of a political change in russia .
6 july, navfac barbados makes first detection of a soviet nuclear submarine as it crossed over the greenland - iceland - united kingdom (giuk) gap. second class sonar operator bill tilley is believed to be the navfac barbados on - watch operator responsible for the 6 july 1962 initial recognition / reporting of contact # 27103 - the first ever sosus detection of a russian nuclear submarine .
despite wide interest in the once - secret system, the navy says it has little money for old gear for deep - sea monitoring unneeded for new kinds of threats. rear adm. james g. prout 3d, deputy chief of staff of the pacific fleet, told the senate armed services committee in march that both the pacific and atlantic fleets were mothballing their sosus arrays. navy has substitute
on august 29, 1991, the national oceanic and atmospheric administration vents program began monitoring the northeast pacific ocean plate boundaries using continuously recorded data from the u. s. navy' s sound surveillance system (sosus) hydrophone arrays. routine detection and location of small (2. 46 events, and the activity level increased several months afterward, suggesting the... [ show full abstract ]
p wave arrivals recorded by the u. s. navy' s sound surveillance system (sosus) hydrophone arrays were used to estimate earthquake detection thresholds and pn velocities in the northeast pacific ocean. the navy hydrophones have been used successfully to detect and locate oceanic earthquakes using their waterborne acoustic tertiary (t) waves; however, use of these hydrophones for seismic body... [ show full abstract ]
the first prototype of a full - size sosus installation – a 1, 000 - foot - long line array of 40 hydrophone elements in 240 fathoms of water – was deployed on the bottom off eleuthera by a british cable layer in january 1952. after a series of successful detection trials with a u. s. submarine, the navy decided by mid - year to install similar arrays along the entire u. s. east coast – and then opted two years later to extend the system to the west coast and hawaii as well. these early sosus line arrays were positioned on the sea floor at locations that accessed the deep sound channel and oriented at right angles to the expected threat axis. their individual hydrophone outputs were transmitted to shore processing stations called “naval facilities” – or navfacs – on multi - conductor armored cables .
more important, the experts said, the russians may have been able to compute the sensitivity of these undersea microphones. by traveling at a slower speed, producing less noise, they might be able to sneak by the sosus system. soviet submarines thus might be able to move from safe harbors into open sea to mass for war without being detected, giving an added element of surprise to an attack, experts said .
since 1991, noaa / pmel has routinely detected tertiary waves from ne pacific ocean earthquakes using the u. s. navy? s sosus hydrophone arrays. tertiary (t) waves are seismically generated acoustic waves (between 5? 50 hz) that propagate over great distances in the oceanic sound channel with little loss in signal strength. low attenuation, combined with the availability of detailed ocean acoustic... [ show full abstract ]
a planned test, to be run by scripps in california, would measure the temperature of the ocean with sosus. the goal is to send sounds from underwater speakers across the pacific at least once a day every day for two years. since sound travels faster in warm water than cold, the test should detect changes in the sound' s speed that would reveal temperature shifts as subtle as one - hundredth of a degree fahrenheit .
at the cold war' s end, the navy began to share the elaborate system with civilian researchers. in 1991 federal scientists in newport, ore. , began to use sosus to listen to sea quakes, quickly detecting thousands of them. in 1993, the scientists monitored the explosive fury of a deep - sea volcanic eruption and sent a small flotilla of research ships, robots and submersibles to explore the site. enforcing a fishing ban
in great secrecy, sosus in 1968 tracked a submerged soviet submarine as it shattered all previous speed estimates for its class by chasing the aircraft carrier enterprise across the pacific. a 1986 book ,
running critical ,
by patrick e. tyler, now a reporter for the new york times, says the surprising swiftness of the november - class submarine ignited congressional support for a new type of fast american attack sub, the los angeles class .
the sound surveillance system, or sosus, was used during the cold war exclusively to track the ships and submarines of america' s foes. started in the mid - 1950' s, it spans the globe with a network of more than 1, 000 underwater microphones grouped in arrays and tied to navy shore stations by some 30, 000 miles of undersea cables. it can track undersea sounds over hundreds and sometimes thousands of miles of ocean .
captain williams of the naval warfare systems command said that of the 18 navy shore stations gathering sosus data in the 1980' s, all but 4 are to be closed down. in most cases, he said, the data from the arrays will be gathered by computer and transmitted by satellite to a central location but would be left unexamined by the navy. if the automation plan is completed, some of this data might be available to civilian scientists .
after three years of intensive development, the navy installed its first sosus array off the coast of eleuthera, a small island in the bahamas, in 1952. this array, which consisted of a 1, 000 foot long string of 40 hydrophones sunk to 240 fathoms (1440 feet), spotted us subs in the area so well that the navy immediately expanded the program to include the entirety of the eastern seaboard as well as the west coast and hawaii in 1954 .
indeed, rudimentary passive and active sonar techniques had already been used in world war i to search for submarines, but these earliest systems, at relatively high frequencies, achieved detection ranges of only several thousand yards under favorable conditions – and world war ii sonars seldom did much better. the basic physical phenomena subsequently exploited in sosus to achieve longer - range submarine tracking were only discovered in the late 1930s and not adequately understood until mid - way through the 1939 - 1945 war .
in addition to localized sound readings (i. e. , sounds detected within the expected range of the hydrophones), sosus also picked up sounds channeled through specific conditions of state (i. e. , pressure, temperature) or salinity that create channels though which sound waves propagate over long distances with minimal resistance and minimal loss of strength. this sound fixing and ranging channel (sofar channel) was discovered independently by american and soviet scientists in 1943 during world war ii .
direct, indirect, and theoretical methods have been applied to data from various sources to estimate the detection thresholds of fixed hydrophone systems. these thresholds, when combined with frequency - magnitude scaling relationships derived from the global networks, provide predictions of the mean number of events expected for the juan de fuca ridge system. the results indicate that while the global networks are limited to a detection threshold of mb = 4. 2 and 1 event / year; earlier work with pmr / mils hydrophones and analog techniques was limited to mb = 3. 4 and 15 events / year; sosus hydrophones combined with digital signal processing techniques can detect a minimum mb = 2. 5 and 265 events / year, perhaps as low as 2. 4 as indicated by events recorded from northern california; and beam forming of the sosus arrays can reduce the detection threshold to mb = 1. 8 - 2. 1 and 1, 000 - 2, 000 events / year .
development on the sound surveillance system (sosus) began in 1949 as a tactical, long - range means of countering the emerging soviet submarine threat, most of which were still running on easily trackable diesel engines. the idea was to monitor the sofar channel, a horizontal layer of ocean water through which sound travels at its slowest speed. this allows low frequency sounds, like the knocking of a diesel engine to travel hundreds of miles before dissipating. as edward c whitman of undersea warfare explains :
with the development of quieter submarines and counter - tactics to evade sosus, newer technologies have been implemented over the years to
keep up with the threat
. faster processors, higher capacity storage devices, and
cleaner code
has enabled the advancement of the art of locating undersea threats. currently, the integrated undersea surveillance system (iuss) uses all of these advancements in the fixed surveillance system (fss), fixed distributed system (fds), and the advanced deployable system (ads) .
gday, i' m looking for info - mostly operational if possible - on the sound surveillence system. you would be surprised how little there is on the net. sorry to people that came on looking for some new conspiracy. the sosus system is just a lot of passive underwater hydrophones that listen for whales and earthquakes and such - and used to, during the cold war, detect the ruskie subs. i know a fair amount of people on this site have a history with the services, so surely someone was involved in the program ?
the cno letter suggested the following sites: sable island, cape hatteras, bermuda (two arrays), eleuthera, and culebra, puerto rico. one week later cincpacflt wrote a letter to cno saying they wanted to be kept advised of progress and offering a plan for wiring up the pacific. at the end of june three major contracts had been put into effect – one for equipment, one for installation, and a third for the construction or expansion of a cable plant. and, for the first time, the low - frequency passive detection system was called sosus, for sound surveillance system .
in reflecting on the early years of sosus, what is most striking is how much was accomplished in remarkably short time. certainly a major factor was serendipitous confluence of events – the discovery that low - frequency sounds could travel great distances in the ocean, the realization that submarines radiate identifiable low - frequency energy, and the pioneering work at bell laboratories on visual speech analysis. ease of contracting was also an important element. the navy’s resolve to conduct undersea surveillance was crucial. the commitment of weco and bell laboratories and their decision to assign some of their best people to the project were of considerable consequence .
meanwhile, the navy continued to support maurice ewing, by then at columbia university’s hudson laboratory, to study the general phenomenology of low - frequency underwater sound. this effort, augmented by additional work at woods hole and the scripps institution of oceanography in california, was focused on establishing a solid understanding of long - range sound transmission and denoted project michael. when the findings of projects jezebel and michael were brought together for the purpose of designing, engineering, and deploying the broad - area surveillance system envisioned by hartwell’s frederick hunt, the resulting effort – with the highly classified acronym, sosus – was eventually given the unclassified designation, project caesar .
( left) often located at isolated coastal sites in close proximity to their offshore arrays, many navfacs were surrounded by extraordinary natural beauty. this is navfac centerville beach, established in 1957 on the pacific coast approximately 225 miles north of san francisco. (below) a typical sosus watch floor – this one at centerville beach – held hundreds of lofar “gram - writers, ” each turning out a frequency - versus - time representation of an array’s low - frequency sound output along a given beam direction. the machines used an electrical discharge to mark the long “smoky paper” rolls, thus producing a distinctive sound – and the pervasive smell of ozone .
sosus immediately became an invaluable long - range early warning system for the americans. it was eventually supplemented by surface - based listening posts like the surveillance towed array sensor system (surtass) and was later integrated into the larger integrated undersea surveillance system (iuss). the abrupt end of the cold war certainly diminished our need for such a system, however, growing concerns of china' s rising naval power and russia' s renewed agression have the navy' s space and naval warfare systems command (spawar) propositioning to commercial ventures and defense contractors alike for a new generation of deep water listening stations. [ undersea warfare - military aerospace - spawar - wiki 1, 2 - global security ]
in a top secret letter, cno directed buships to procure six sets of low frequency ranging (lofar) components for deployment for deployment in the north atlantic basin. the classified name sosus was established, and the unclassified name caesar was established to cover installation and production. the number of planned stations increased to nine later that year. hms alert installed an initial 40 - element operational array off eleuthera in early january for a 50 day total charter cost of $ 56k. cableships usns neptune and myer were assigned to project caesar. these humble beginnings of the
caesar fleet
were subsequently augmented (over the next several decades) with usns thor, aeolus, mizar, huddell, zeus, and a cameo appearance by usns waters .
the 50' s and 60' s witnessed the birth, early childhood development and growth of undersea surveillance; originally the sound surveillance system (sosus). with the 70' s came technology upgrades both in shore and underwater systems; planning for new cable ships, super navfacs and the follow on to the towed array sensor system (tass), the surveillance towed array sensor system (surtass). the 80' s realized consolidation of shore assets due to technology advances in underwater systems, arrival of the first surtass ships, delivery of the cable ship usns zeus, and the end of the cold war; this last one to have repercussions that most of us did not anticipate. the 90' s where we are today .
history. the panel allocated $ 1. soviet submarine threat consisting primarily of a large fleet of diesel submarines. they decided on a system to monitor low - frequency sound in the sofar channel using multiple listening sites equipped with hydrophones and a processing facility that could detect submarine positions by triangulation. meanwhile, project jezebel at bell labs and project michael at columbia university focused on studying long range acoustics in the ocean. by 1. 95. 2, enough progress resulted in top secret plans to deploy six arrays in the north atlantic basin, and the classified name sosus was used. the number of arrays was increased to nine later in the year, and royal navy and usn ships, including uss neptune and uss peregrine, started laying the cabling under the cover of project caesar .
the 50s and 60s witnessed the birth, early childhood, development, and growth of undersea surveillance, originally called the sound surveillance system (sosus). with the 70s came technology upgrades both in shore and underwater systems. this decade also saw planning for new cableships, super navfacs, and the surveillance towed array sensor (surtass) system. the 80s witnessed consolidation of shore assets, enabled by technological advances in underwater systems, arrival of the first surtass ships, delivery of the cableship usns zeus, and the end of the cold war. thus far, the 90s have seen beginnings such as in the advanced deployable system (ads) and endings in the last of the navfacs, keflavik, ceasing operations. the following reflect upon some of the highlights of the past five decades ...
sosus systems consisted of bottom mounted hydrophone arrays connected by underwater cables to facilities ashore. the individual arrays were installed primarily on continental slopes and seamounts at locations optimized for undistorted long range acoustic propagation. the combination of location within the ocean and the sensitivity of arrays allowed the system to detect acoustic power of less than a watt at ranges of several hundred kilometres (the system is so sensitive that it can even detect the presence of soviet / russian tu - 9. bear 4 - engine bombers flying overhead; the tips of the bombers' long propellers exceed the speed of sound, creating sonic booms as they rotate. these sonic booms reach the surface of the ocean below, which then transmits the sonic shocks to the underwater hydrophones. mawgan, cornwall; antigua; maritime data centre gibraltar, uk; naval facility barbados; naval facility eleuthera, bahamas; naval facility san salvador, bahamas; naval facility bermuda; and naval facility grand turk .
since the 1950s, the navy' s sosus has been supported at sea by a combined effort of at & t; (now lucent technologies) and the military sealift command (msc). the contract awarded to at & t; each year was a sole - source contract, based on its unique capabilities to perform the cable handling at sea. in an attempt to foster competition and reduce the increasing costs of this work, a waiver signed by asn / rda, nora slatkin, authorized spawar to proceed with a full and open competition. award was made to a combination of at & t; (lucent) and msc at significant savings over the overall estimated cost of the proposed work. both at & t; and msc had reviewed their technical needs and business practices and had reduced both the number of people involved in the program, as well as the corporate structure (overhead) necessary to support the work. this award ended a 30 + year sole - source lock on this work and put the navy in a competitive position for the future .
in addition, us navy students earn a 6301p subspecialty code and phase 1 jpme certification .
the nps undersea warfare curriculum offers students the opportunity to study the fundamental principles that apply to the design, performance, and employment of sensors, unmanned vehicles, and tactics in the undersea environment. the program combines electrical and mechanical engineering, mathematics, oceanography, physics, and operations research into a multi - disciplinary program of study. this unique curriculum permits students to select a degree program based on personal interests and undergraduate education, providing more in - depth study in a specific area .
“the naval postgraduate school is unique. there are many institutions that solve problems and create new capabilities. nps solves our navy’s most vexing problems and creates our critical capabilities. in doing so, students also exchange ideas with the future leaders of the armed services of our allies and partners. this makes nps, its faculty, and its students a national strategic jewel in our nation' s crown. ”
preserving american superiority from the depths of the sea ultimately rests in our ability to think and adapt faster than those who would oppose us. ours is a storied history of fielding offsetting capabilities in the face of global threats, but past performance is a poor guarantee of future success. the determined adversaries of near future conflicts are committed to winning the battle for the next great idea. the frontline of this fight remains the grounds of our academic institutions, with none more crucial to sustaining the initiative than the naval postgraduate school .
in my commander' s intent for the submarine force, our force' s vision for 2025 calls for us to
get faster .
nps develops officers with the intellectual foundation to be
fast
in our learning, processes, and innovation .
html public
- / / w3c / / dtd xhtml 1. 0 transitional / / en
urltoken
sharon nieukirk: senior research assistant (pubs) lauren roche: research assistant logan squiers: hydrophone tech .
the noaa / pmel vents program was re - organized into two separate focused programs: earth - ocean interactions and acoustics .
we develop unique acoustics tools and technologies to support the mission of noaa as well as other federal agencies, academic institutions and international partners. our primary goals are [ a ] to acquire long - term data sets of the global ocean acoustics environment, and [ b ] to identify and assess acoustic impacts from human activities and natural processes on the marine environment .
hydroacoustic monitoring allows the detection and precise location of small submarine earthquakes and volcanic activity .
underwater acoustic methods are being used to study the distribution of large whales in the open oceans .
studies on the cause and effect of ambient noise, both from natural and man - made sources, on marine ecosystems .
pmel researchers developed a unique hydrophone mooring that made the first sound recording at challenger deep in the mariana trench .
monitoring baseline ocean noise is critically important to understand both natural and anthropogenic changes in the marine ambient sound environment. a network of 11 ocean noise reference stations has been established in u. s. waters to measure changes and trends in natural and man - made ocean noise. natural sounds ranging from whale calls and volcanoes to anthropogenic sounds from shipping and oil / gas exploration are recorded by the moored, underwater hydrophones developed by pmel engineers and scientists and deployed in collaboration with nmfs - ost, all the fisheries science centers, nos marine sanctuaries, and the national park service. the establishment of a long - term record provides fundamental data needed to understand how increased noise in the ocean may affect marine life and ocean health. for more information, see: urltoken
strong earthquakes off the oregon coast: a sequence of strong earthquakes (magnitudes 4. 3 - 5. 9) occurred on the seafloor ~ 250 miles west of newport, oregon. the earthquakes are along the western blanco fracture zone, a 200 mile long strike - slip fault located in water a mile deep. the blanco forms one of the southern boundaries between the small juan de fuca plate and the much larger pacific plate. clusters of earthquakes of this magnitude occur on the blanco fracture zone roughly every 3 - 5 years. (june 1, 2015): usa today | weather channel | statesman journal | oregonian
urltoken no longer supports internet explorer 9 or earlier. please upgrade your browser .
submarine experts said today that as a result of the walker family spy case, the navy might have to rebuild portions of the undersea network of sound detectors that are a crucial early warning system against a soviet nuclear attack .
the navy has not completed its appraisal of what steps might be needed to compensate for security breaches that may have resulted. experts interviewed today stressed that it was too early to be sure what countermeasures would be required .
navy spokesmen, citing the confidential nature of investigations by the justice department and a navy intelligence team, declined to comment .
in interviews today, experts in navy affairs said they believed reports so far of possible military damage from the purported spy ring might have been exaggerated .
several experts said the worst danger would be if moscow had gained information that would help it track american submarines carrying ballistic missiles. the submarines are considered the least vulnerable portion of america' s nuclear arsenal .
the experts said they believed none of the suspects arrested so far in the case had access to recent information involving the submarines. the submarines operate under a command independent of non - nuclear navy forces and with separate communications .
so far, the experts said, the only suspect with experience aboard submarines carrying nuclear missiles is john a. walker jr. his experience in the 1960' s as a radioman aboard two submarines carrying polaris - class missiles, experts said, would probably have given him access to only limited information of value to moscow .
the polaris class of vessel was succeeded by poseidon submarines, which are now being replaced by trident submarines. a number of polaris submarines are still in service, but they have been extensively modernized .
stansfield turner, a retired admiral and former director of central intelligence, said today:'' my alarm focuses on john walker and his experience in the ballistic missile submarine force.''
but admiral turner said mr. walker would probably have had access to little information that would threaten more modern submarines.'' it isn' t going to make our subs totally vulnerable tomorrow,'' he said .
a former submarine commander with wide experience in the pentagon and the shipbuilding industry, who spoke on condition that he not be named, said:'' i can' t picture any serious loss of strategic submarine security. that' s a totally isolated command, and i think rightfully so.''
dr. harlan k. ullman, a former navy officer and pentagon consultant, said'' it' s my understanding'' that the ballistic - missile submarine force'' remains silent on patrol.''
'' john walker may have had access to operational details with a very short half - life,'' dr. ullman said,'' but i think the damage has been greatly exaggerated.''
nonetheless, several experts said they assumed that, because of the walker case, the navy had changed the travel patterns of the submarines and had altered codes and radio frequencies .
from the new york times. you may opt - out at any time .
you agree to receive occasional updates and special offers for the new york times' s products and services .
in the 1950' s and 1960' s, the united states draped chains of sound - sensitive devices called hydrophones along the sea bottom and on the continental shelf at key points separating soviet ports from the open seas .
according to several submarine experts, if the soviet union had access to many years of navy communications reports on russian submarine movements, it may have been able to deduce the weak points in this network .
one intelligence source said some navy officers had long suspected from watching changes in soviet submarine movements that the russians had access to inside information. but navy officials have debated for years whether the russians' information came from a close reading of published technical data or from spies .
rear adm. gene r. larocque, a retired expert in antisubmarine warfare who now directs the center for defense information, a private research group that is often critical of the administration, said he doubted such a drastic step as replacing the system would be necessary .
but he said the navy might need to add sensors to'' blind areas.''
'' the soviets know where some of the sensors are already,'' admiral larocque said.'' they know it exists.''
but he said that if it became clear that the spy ring had given away the precise detection abilities of the network, the navy might need more sensitive devices .
the espionage case has heightened congressional interest in a $ 10 million study by the central intelligence agency of the security of united states missile - carrying submarines .
representative les aspin, democrat of wisconsin, chairman of the house armed services committee, said in a telephone interview,'' we asked for an assessment of how invulnerable the strategic submarine force is, and how invulnerable it might be in the future.''
he stressed that the 18 - month study, which was requested last year, was not prompted by any specfic incident or threat to the submarine fleet .
mr. aspin said he assumed that if any sensitve information regarding the nuclear submarine force had been passed to the soviet union as a result of the alleged spying, this would be addressed in the study.
sosus , an acronym for sound surveillance system , is a chain of underwater listening posts located around the world in places such as the atlantic ocean near greenland , iceland and the united kingdom — the giuk gap — and at various locations in the pacific ocean . the united states navy 's initial intent for the system was for tracking soviet submarines , which had to pass through the gap to attack targets further west . it was later supplemented by mobile assets such as the surveillance towed array sensor system ( surtass ) , and became part of the integrated undersea surveillance system ( iuss ) . 
sosus, an acronym for sound surveillance system, is a chain of underwater listening posts located around the world in places such as the atlantic ocean near greenland, iceland and the united kingdom — the giuk gap — and at various locations in the pacific ocean. the united states navy's initial intent for the system was for tracking soviet submarines, which had to pass through the gap to attack targets further west. it was later supplemented by mobile assets such as the surveillance towed array sensor system (surtass), and became part of the integrated undersea surveillance system (iuss).
sosus, an acronym for sound surveillance system, is a chain of underwater listening posts located around the world in places such as the atlantic ocean near greenland, iceland and the united kingdom — the giuk gap — and at various locations in the pacific ocean. the united states navy's initial intent for the system was for tracking soviet submarines, which had to pass through the gap to attack targets further west. it was later supplemented by mobile assets such as the surveillance towed array sensor system (surtass), and became part of the integrated undersea surveillance system (iuss).