There is a very good scientific use for these EARS units and it, of course, has significant military uses as well. Submarine hunting is still very much alive and the Russians regularly test NATO’s detection systems and protocols. It is a game of ‘cat & mouse’ that is normally carried out in the spirit of a game. Just like airborne sorties that take place to test and annoy
The EARS buoy is an acoustic data collection unit that records the acoustic signature of the area in which it is deployed. That data provides a baseline for detecting sounds that are unusual, such as propeller or other propulsion induced noises coming from man ,ade systems operating at depth. Counter incursion, detection and identification technology basically. The unit is designed to operate over a long period of time to log the acoustic signature of the area and is recovered by its owners at the end of its assignment. It is then downloaded and the data analysed. It does not send its information to the surface in real time and is not part of a defence network, hence it is unclassified and well documented. Those scientists with an interest in Whale sounds and song have been able to extract such scientific data from the recordings of these EARS units. With the data they learn more about the Whales communications etc.
This is a piece of science equipment with a good purpose. It operates at great depths far away from most human activity but occasionally a fisherman catches one. No great drama and truthfully not much of a story.
If you want scary..... consider this..... trawlers have actually ‘caught’ submarines in their nets.... there is often no time for a Mayday call and the vessel is quickly pulled under the surface. Trawlers are known to just disappear without reason and this is one cause.
http://www.ladcgemm.org/research-2/Some more trivia ..... if you were in a military submarine and in a state of war, consider this......
As you pass into enemy territory there is submarine detection technology that is both passive and active in operation. There are ‘listening posts’ all over the World listening for specific acoustic signatures in the sea. There are fixed sonobuoys operational in the seas that also listen for acoustic signals of interest. They pass detection data back to their controllers in real time. If a ‘target’ is detected the ‘hunter killer’ teams launch a search. They deploy multiple sonobuoys, both active and passive types in a specific pattern that searches for the target and passes real time data back to the surface ships, hunter killer submarines and airborne submarine killers. A detection and location network is formed with significant processing and killing power. If the submarine is detected by these sophisticated systems its only chance is to defend itself using weaponry or it may attempt to ‘go silent’ at great depth. Most modern submarines are equipped with sub-surface missile and torpedo systems to attack sea borne and air borne vessels. Make no mistake, hunting a modern submarine is challenging and very dangerous as the submarine is not going to sit and wait to be attacked first. Imagine being in that submarine though.... you know that an acoustic ‘net’ has been deployed as the submarines passive sonar has heard the distinctive ‘plop, plop, plop, of parachute dropped hunter sonobuoys being deployed around your location. You do not know whether the hunter can ‘see’ you with them. These modern hunter sonobuoys are very sophisticated and can identify known target signatures and sounds that are suspicious. They can operate in a matrix comparing their detected anomalies to triangulate target position and likely type. There could be the horrific ‘splash’ sound of a very sophisticated helicopter launched anti-submarine seeker torpedo on the submarines passive sonar, followed by the whine of its turbine as it powers itself towards you using both the location data uploaded to its nav system by the host helicopter and its own on-board seeker systems that can also take real time data from the sonobuoys..... will it hit, or miss ? Submariners work in tin coffins...... there is no way I would wish to serve on one of them.
So when people say that the EARS units are not necessary in the 21st Century, think again. If a detection system knows the natural sounds of an area of sea and the submarine hunters extract that information from a search area when hunting a target, the target can lose its ‘cloak of invisibility’ provided by its rubber coated hull and low noise, low cavitation propulsion
Fraser
Edit: this is all unclassified information freely available on the internet and shown to the Public at the Portsmouth Royal Navy Museum and Docks. It is basic acoustics and physics in action and avoiding detection from basic physics based systems can be challenging. If this is what the Military freely release to the public you can be sure that the more sophisticated armed forces of the World have secret submarine detection systems of which we know little, or nothing
Home
Help
Search
Login
Register
