Posted on

Super-fast sub “Golden Fish” lives on in North Russian Navy town


It was one of the most innovative projects of the Soviet Navy. The K-222, also known as the Golden Fish, was capable of sailing as quick 44,7 knots (82.8 km/h) in submerged position

It was a unique effort by Russian engineers and vessel designers, who had been commissioned to develop a brand new kind of submarine radically different from all former projects. The result was Project 661, an extremely fast attack submarine built with a titanium hull.

The vessel was laid down in late 1963 and commissioned six years later.

In December 1970 it set its official world speed record. An attempt to push for even higher speed was made in 1971. The new record was originally to be announced at the start of the 24th Soviet Party Congress, but that time schedule failed because of bad weather in the Barents Sea. Still, later that same day, the ship captain set out to the Motovsky Bay north of the Kola Peninsula and pushed the vessel’s two reactors to the utmost. Three stretches were planned, but only two executed, reportedly because the turbines were about to get out of control. The speed during the tests reached 44,85 knots (83,06 km/h), but it is still the result from 1970 that has remained the official record, notes at Wikipedia read.

The world had never seen a vessel like the K-222.

But it came with a hefty price. The submarine is believed to have costed up to two billion rubles, or approximately 1 percent of the Soviet Union’s 1968 GDP. It became the only vessel built of the project. In addition to its high cost, the K-222 created too much noice and had several more downsides.

The Golden Fish served in the Northern Fleet from 1970 to 1984. It had its home base in Zapadnaya Litsa and later Ura-Guba on the Kola Peninsula.

ADVERTISEMENT

It was officially taken out of service in 1989 and decommissioning started in 2008. In 2015, the spent nuclear fuel was remove and the reactor compartment is to be brought to the storage site in Saida Bay near Murmansk.

But the life of the historical submarine did not completely come to an end. The conning tower of the vessel is now being rebuilt to become a memorial in the city of Severodvinsk, the site of its original construction.

In early July, the tower was brought from the submarine repair yard of Zvezdochka to the nearby yard of Sevmash.

 

The tower of the K-222 is up for a facelift. Photo: Sevmash

 

According to Sevmash, the reconstruction will start as soon as an agreement is concluded with the city of Severodvinsk. When completed, the K-222 memorial will be placed in the local Primorsky Park.

The memorial is dedicated to builders of the sub, as well as its designers and experts that undertook repair works and upheld its battle preparedness, Sevmash reports.

 

 



Source link

Posted on

“Siri, Find Me A Russian Submarine,” U.S. Navy Asks


Virtual assistants such as Apple’s Siri or Amazon’s
AMZN
 Alexa have become popular technological helpers. Ask a virtual assistant to find a restaurant or tell you today’s weather, a soothing AI voice obligingly responds.

So why not a virtual assistant to help the U.S. Navy find Russian and Chinese submarines?

The Navy wants a virtual assistant — like the ones found on consumer smartphones — to help overloaded sonar operators manage multiple anti-submarine warfare (ASW) systems. In particular, active sonar on Navy cruisers and destroyers come with a variety of settings. “This includes employment decisions such as changing the operational mode between pulsed active sonar (PAS) and continuous active sonar (CAS) as well as changing waveform and various other system settings,” according to the Navy research solicitation. “Operators must conduct sonar analysis of resulting sonar returns and interpret them based on the sonar settings and the environment.”

This is where a Siri-like assistant would come in handy. The AI would use sensor data and monitoring of environmental conditions to recommend optimum sonar employment, and to assess potential moves of the enemy sub. The system would provide sonar operators with “situational awareness regarding key parameters such as primary propagation path(s), bearing-dependent complications (such as sea mounts that might obscure threats), significant topology features into which a threat might retreat to minimize detection, best tactical waveforms, and situational best practices to enable operators to maximize the potential of the tactical sonar suite for the specific conditions present at that time and location.”

The Navy is hoping to see at least a 25 percent gain in active sonar efficiency by employing a virtual assistant.

Phase I of the project calls for developing an AI architecture and algorithms. Phase II calls for testing the virtual assistant on the hull-mounted sonar fitted to Navy cruisers and destroyers, as well as the Variable Depth Sonar on Littoral Combat Ships.

Submarines have been long been the nemesis of the U.S. Navy, whose carrier battlegroups can dominate the surface – but are vulnerable to subs armed with sophisticated missiles and torpedoes. In addition to Russian and Chinese nuclear-powered attack submarines, even smaller powers like Iran and North Korea may eventually field a new generation of ultra-quiet diesel-powered attack subs. This will place an even greater strain on the ASW capabilities of a U.S. Navy surface fleet already undermanned and overworked.

The deeper question is whether military technology is becoming so complex that a virtual assistant has become a necessity. Pentagon research agency DARPA, for example, is working on AI battle command assistants to help human commanders.

As always, the benefits of advanced technology must be weighed against the challenges that humans face in mastering it. A Siri-like AI assistant can help.

Too Hot To Handle? Why The U.S. Navy Wants An Air-Cooled Laser Weapon

Robot Tanks Are Awesome. But Are They Too Expensive To Risk In Combat?



Source link