After arriving in the waters of western Canada, the "Grasshopper" team wandered around for two days without seeing a serious boat. Those small fishing boats were not targets at all. Although it was a provocative action, the federal navy could not be shameless enough to use submarines to deal with it.
Small fishing boat level.
If there is no Canadian ship on the vast sea, they can only search near the port. The "Kaspidus" team searched for a long time on the map and could only choose the Port of Vancouver because there are no big ports on the west coast of Canada.
It is too difficult to find the Canadian Navy in places like those small fishing villages. The only port in Vancouver is a large port. There must be two naval ships in a port of this size.
But after approaching the Port of Vancouver, the "Grasshoppers" were dumbfounded. The sea channel here is too complicated. The entire Port of Vancouver is deeply hidden to the east of Vancouver Island, and there are countless small islands in the bay lying across the channel.
, although the Federal Navy has detailed waterway drawings, it is also a very challenging task to enter the port area from here.
What makes it even more difficult for the Grasshopper team is that the south side of this waterway belongs to the United States. A few dozen kilometers away is Seattle, a large city in the western United States. There is not a single Canadian warship in the harbor. The U.S.
Patrol boats appeared one after another.
Originally, this mission was a high-risk job, and the Grasshoppers did not care about calculating the success rate. They left two submarines outside the bay as a response, and the remaining three submarines quietly followed a Canadian cargo ship in the evening.
and dived into the port area.
Since the South China Sea Federation has always been the main imaginary enemy of the United States in the Pacific, and it has openly invaded and occupied Australia, the threat to the United States has suddenly increased. Therefore, the U.S. Navy is relatively focused on defense along the west coast. Not only is the Pacific Fleet more
The Pacific Fleet was much larger in history, and patrol boats equipped with submarine detectors were arranged to patrol many important ports on the West Coast to guard against federal submarines that might enter the port area.
On duty outside the Port of Seattle today are two "Clemson-class" destroyers, the USS Alden and the USS Oakley, with hull numbers dd-211 and dd-258. This older destroyer was developed by the United States in the 20th century.
Made in the 1990s, a total of 15
There are more than 0 ships. One of its distinguishing features is that there are 4 chimneys in the middle of the hull. Most of these destroyers were aided by the US government and given to the British Navy as escort ships for the fleet. The remaining few remain in the Pacific Fleet.
As patrol ships in some ports.
When the two destroyers sailed near the exit of the U.S. side of the Georgia Strait, an echo suddenly appeared in the submarine detector aboard the Alden. After checking the machine and the sea surface, the detector operator determined that this was
It was not a false alarm due to machine failure or other obstacles at sea. The situation was immediately reported to the captain of the destroyer.
After receiving this information, the American destroyer captain did not take immediate action. Instead, he asked the Seattle Port about the ship traffic situation tonight. While waiting for a reply from the port, the echo disappeared from the detector again.
The captain stopped searching the nearby sea and continued to patrol according to the scheduled route.
This cannot be blamed on the captain for not being serious about his work, because the submarine detector on the Alden was only installed at the beginning of this year. Not only is the machine new, but the operators are also newly trained. Due to the U.S. Navy’s inefficiency in recent years,
This kind of machine is commonly installed on ships, so the number of operators cannot keep up with the installation speed of the machine. Many of the operators are ship's communications officers who temporarily go to the anti-submarine school for half a year training, and then serve as detector operators.
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Although half a year of training is basically sufficient for normal operation of submarine detectors, this type of detector still uses an oscilloscope to display the waveform of the echo, and determines the orientation and data of the reflector through changes in the waveform, which is very challenging for operation.
The experience and practical ability of the personnel are far from being completed in a few months of training.
Since this kind of submarine detector often reports false alarms, the officers and soldiers on the destroyer do not trust this thing too much. Instead, they value another anti-submarine device, the hydrophone. When the submarine detector found the signal just now, the hydrophone
There was no obvious engine noise in the transmitter, so everyone regarded this time as a false alarm.
The three-hour maritime patrol mission was about to end, and the USS Alden and the USS Oakley were about to turn right from the Strait of Georgia back to the Port of Seattle. At this moment, a muffled thunder-like sound came from more than 10 nautical miles away.
A signal came from the Vancouver port area, and then the lookout on the destroyer mast also sent a signal. On the sea more than 10 nautical miles away, a ship was on fire, accompanied by an explosion-like phenomenon.
Faced with this situation, the two U.S. destroyer commanders took immediate action, that is, crossing the U.S.-Canada border and sailing to the scene of the accident. In their view, this place is no different from the United States, if only because of a non-existent maritime border.
If they don't rescue the shipwrecked ship at the border, this matter will be more serious than casually crossing the US-Canada border, and the press of both countries will have to drown the two captains in spit.
More than 10 minutes later, two destroyers arrived at the sea near the incident site, where two more small fishing boats had arrived first. They were rescuing people who fell into the water. There was no trace of the accident ship now.
Two destroyers also lowered their lifeboats and joined the rescue effort.
But when several people who fell into the water were rescued, the commanders of the two American destroyers became angry, because the accident ship was a patrol boat of the Royal Canadian Navy. The surviving boatswain told their American counterparts that their ship was attacked by
a torpedo strike
The ship sank in Zhongcai. Before the torpedo hit the hull, the sailors and captain on the port side clearly saw the track in the water. Most of the sailors on the port side and the captain were lost in the explosion. He was at the stern of the ship at the time, directly
It was thrown into the sea by the shock wave.
Submarine!!! Torpedo attack!!! These two words deeply stimulated the 2 US Navy captain. Under his nose, a submarine actually slipped into the bay to attack the Canadian Navy ships. This was simply irritating.
The U.S. Navy is a big talker. Who doesn’t know that the Canadian Navy exists in name only. Their warships can’t even sail 200 nautical miles and can only entertain themselves near the port. There are people who come to bully such an honest child.
This is really unbearable.
The two U.S. destroyer captains discussed it for a while, then returned to their ships. While reporting to the U.S. Pacific Fleet, they sounded the alarm and searched for enemy submarines in the strait. Because the strait was too narrow,
After entering the strait, the three submarines of the "Grasshopper" team could only maintain the periscope depth.
Moving in little by little, we finally found a slow-moving offshore patrol boat flying the Canadian Navy flag outside the Port of Vancouver. The three federal submarines discussed it, and only one submarine was left to deal with it.
The target was attacked, and the remaining two submarines withdrew from the strait first, leaving a retreat channel for the attacking submarine.
Attacking an unprepared patrol boat with a speed of only more than 10 knots was not as difficult as a drill for these federal navy submariners. With only one torpedo, this small iron ship of more than 400 tons became
A fireball. After completing the attack, the submarine only watched for one minute before putting away its periscope and waiting for the other party's rescue ship to arrive to see if it could find another Canadian Navy warship as prey.
Unexpectedly, two American destroyers actually crossed the border and came to Canada. The commander on the submarine was now in a difficult position. Attacking was not allowed by discipline. This mission only included attacking Canadian Navy warships, not the U.S. Navy.
Run, submarine commanders know that most warships in the U.S. Navy are equipped with submarine detectors.
Although the detector is not very sensitive, in such a narrow strait, the submarine cannot dive deeply or maneuver, and the possibility of being discovered is very high. It is impossible to wait patiently in the water for the destroyer to leave. The two destroyers seem to
We are conducting an anti-submarine search. Sooner or later we will locate ourselves, and when the time comes we won't be able to run away.
The sonar soldier in the submarine reminded his captain over and over again that the destroyer's anti-submarine circle was getting closer and closer to him, and if he didn't move away, he would really be unable to leave. The captain, who was nearly 40 years old, gritted his teeth and ordered the submarine to move towards him at a slow speed.
The exit movement of the strait took the risk of lowering the submersible depth by 10 meters. According to the chart, this was the deepest depth that the submarine could sail. In order to escape, the captain had to take a risk. (To be continued.
