The USS Scorpion Buried at Sea…

Unfortunately, the tape has disappeared.

For background, the purported detection of the dogfight by SOSUS hydrophone arrays in the western Atlantic would have involved detection ranges at least as great as 976 nautical miles, the distance from the SCORPION wreck-site (32-55N, 33-09W) to the closest SOSUS array – designated 3141 – which terminated at Argentia, Newfoundland.

Earlier comments left on this HistoryNet.com thread state that the acoustic detection of SCORPION (on the tape) included a "bathtub effect." The term bathtub is SOSUS operator slang for the appearance of a Lloyds Mirror multi-acoustic-signal-path effect (interference pattern) on a SOSUS lofargram which is a time (y-axis) versus frequency (x-axis) plot of the low-frequency acoustic spectrum.
 
The Lloyds Mirror effect appears on a lofargram as a series of energy swaths separated by nulls, both of which gradually decrease in frequency as an acoustic target is detected approaching a sensor on a constant course. The nulls, which have a common (basic) spacing (separation) in frequency, are not multiples of a common frequency, i.e., they are not harmonically-related. They decrease in frequency until a target, maintaining a steady course, reaches the closest point of approach (CPA) to the sensor. The swaths and nulls then increase frequency/spacing as the target, still operating on a steady course, opens range to the sensor. Viewed over time, this pattern resembles a bathtub in that it has a frequency dip (the bottom of the "tub") at CPA. The swaths represent detection of broadband energy from the target. (Such energy is rarely detected from US nuclear submarines at ranges in excess of 5-10 nautical miles.)
 
If the depth of the acoustic sensor is known and the range to the target can be derived from a Doppler shift in the targets narrowband energy during CPA, then the spacing (in Hz) of the nulls (between the swaths) can be used to determine target depth.
 
Essentially all detections of Lloyds Mirror (bathtub) effects from US nuclear submarines involve ranges of less than 10 nautical miles because, as noted above, they require detection of broadband energy. Air-dropped acoustic sensors (sonobuoys) are the almost exclusive source of Lloyds Mirror detections of US nuclears and most of the involved ranges are significantly less 2-3 nautical miles, often in the hundreds of yards.
 
The statement in this thread that the SCORPION detection on the ASW Training School tape exhibited a bathtub effect establishes conclusively that the detection was NOT made by a SOSUS array at a range of one thousand nautical miles or more. Further, it is stated the acoustic sources that formed the bathtub were dropping in frequency. This could only have occurred if the target had been on a steady course and had significantly changed aspect relative to the sensor in a relatively short period of time, i.e., 10-20 minutes. Neither circumstance would be possible if the detection had occurred, as maintained by Offley, at ranges of 1000 nautical miles or more and had involved frequent course changes while involved in the purported underwater dogfight..
 
As concluded in the Amazon.com book review, the ASW Training School tape was a composite of separate detection events with the most probable source of the SCORPION (or other 585/588 Class hull) detection from a sonobuoy at a range not greater than several nautical miles.
 
Bottom line: the ASW Training School tape viewed in 1982 was a composite tape put together at the ASW Training School, probably for training purposes, but passed off to students – and one junior instructor as a real event. This conclusion further refutes the basic contention by Offley that a Soviet submarine sank SCORPION.
 
There was no SOSUS detection of an underwater dogfight between SCORPION and an ECHO-II Class Soviet nuclear submarine nor was there any effort by the Office of Naval Intelligence to confiscate and destroy any such detection. Fifteen analysts with a total of 400 years of SOSUS experience signed off on that conclusion.
 
SCORPION was lost because hydrogen produced by the main storage battery exploded at 18:20:44Z on 22 May 1968 instantly killing or incapacitating the entire crew. There was no one left to maintain depth-control. SCORPION slowly sank to a depth of 1530-feet where the pressure-hull collapsed at 18:42:34Z.

There was no Soviet involvement, no SOSUS detection of an underwater dogfight with a Soviet nuclear submarine, no SOSUS detection of a torpedo, no explosions external to the SCORPION pressure-hull, and no deus ex machina. There was only a terrible accident (the battery explosion) that occurred while SCORPION was transiting the east central North Atlantic toward its home-port of Norfolk.

If you are entertaining the possibility SCORPION was lost due to undersea seismic activity, you should consider the following:

- Sea-floor acoustic sensors (hydrophones), which are essentially geophones, are extremely sensitive to seismic activity. As previously stated, an exhaustic review of the Columbia University Hydroacoustic Station, Canaries acoustic data idenitied no even extremely low level (1-2 dB signal rise) energy attributable to any seismic source during a 23.4-hour period that included the time of the disaster. Only the precursor events and the 18+ main sequence acoustic events (the first of which was hull collapse) came from the deep-ocean to the west of the sensors.

The SCORPION-associated acoustic events were detected by Canary Island hydrophone A, located at 26-36-48.8N, 18-01-02.1W at a depth of 3960-feet and by hydropnone D located 4.76 nautical miles to the east of A at 28-35–53.6N, 17-55-42.9W at a depth of 2574-feet. The bearing from D to A was 281-degrees. The sound travel time from A to D was 5.90-seconds. The measured difference in arrival times of all SCORPION signals, first at A and then at D, was 5.8-seconds which agrees with the correction made by applying the co-sine of the angle of 11-degrees to the “end-fire” value of 281-degrees (D to A).

You should also be aware that the Petropavlovsk-Kamchatka submarine complex, one of the worlds largest submarine bases since at least the mid-1960s, is locate in one of the world’s most seismically active areas: on the Pacific Rim of Fire. In 1968, Petro was home base to almost 40 Soviet diesel and nuclear.submaines. Although there have been many hundreds of seismic events in the Petro and approaching areas in the nearly 50-years since the base became a major installation, none has resulted in the loss of a Soviet submarine.

Be advised, as in the case of the K-129 lost because of missile-associated event, the Soviets make no attempt to hide search and rescue activities when they believe they have lost a submarine. All radio transmissions directly associated with search activities are in the clear.

In the early 1970s, I was at the Adak, AK SOSUS station when a 4.5 seismic event occurred 30 miles south of the island. Although the Adak sea-floor sensor was more than 120 naurical miles from the epicenter, the acoustic spectrum received by the sensor was completely over-ridden below 50-Hz for about six-hours. Bottom line: any seismic event in the east-central Atlantic on 22-23 May 1968 would have been detected by the Canary Island hydrophones. NO SUCH EVENT OCCURRED.

Again, save yourself a lot of effort and wait to read The Death of A Submarine in the North Atlantic, out this fall, which included six letters written to various naval activities including the ÇNO, COMSUBFOR and the DNI.. Yet again, in no way do I profit from sales of this book. My only objective has been to get the techically-based assessments of the SCORPION acoustic data into the public domain.

Bruce Rule

The wreck was found of 28 Oct, that's a little more than 4 months from the time MIZAR got on station, not 8 months.

Have you read my one-star Amazon.com review of Offley's SCORPION
DOWN. For almost 25-years, Offley was obsessed with the theory the Soviets sank SCORPION and he listened only to those few who supported his theory to which he added the wild conjecture that ONI confiscated all SOSUS detections of an event that was never detected
by SOSUS or the Canary Island hydrophones: an encounter with a
Soviet ECHO-II Class submarine. Never detected because it never
occurred. The Amazon.com review says it all. I suggest you read it carefully and remember Carl Sagan's classic statement: extraordinary
claims require extraordinary evidence.

I must add that there is NO connection between SCORPION and the K-129. That Soviet submarine was lost on 11 March 1968 while near 40-06N, 179-57E because three onboard explosions incapacitated the crew and allowed a dual missile launch training event to become the actual firing of both missiles within their launch tubes.

Read AZORIAN, the CIA and the Raising of the K-129 by Norman Polmar and Michael White for a detailed discussion of the recovery
operation and the acoustic data upon wnich the above assessment is based.

Bruce Rule

In posting 166 on this site, you stated the following: (quote) What I (say) with 100% confidence is that the wreck is not 400 miles SW of the Azores! That location is indeed a big fat lie (falsification). I'm even surprised you believe the navy would identify the wreck site.(end quote)

COMSUBLANT message Date-Time-Group (DTG) 271946Z May 1968 provided the Sound Surveillance System (SOSUS) with the following information on SCORPION extracted from SCORPION’s last message DTG 212345Z May 1968: position at 220001Z: 31-21N, 27-36W, course for the remainder of the transit to Norfolk, VA: 290 degrees; speed: 18-knots. ETA Norfolk: 271700Z (1300 EDT)

The position of the wreck (32-55N, 33-09W) was derived from a time-difference fix that compared the arrival (detection) times of the pressure-hull collapse signal at Canary Island hydrophone A, and SOSUS arrays 3141 and 3131 near the Grand Bank, Newfoundland. That position was the basis for the search by the USNS MIZAR that located the wreckage.

The wreck position lies 297 nautical miles from SCORPION’s 220001Z position of a bearing of 290 from that position which required a transit speed of 16.1 knots. So, SCORPION was lost while on her planned course of 290 and had been operating at a speed close to the planned value of 18-knots.

If the position of Lajes (38-48N, 27-06W) is used as the position of the Azores, the position of the SCORPION wreckage (32-55N, 33-09W) lies 466 nautical miles southwest (bearing 221 degrees) Lajes.

Does D. Williams care to comment on this information versus his stated belief that a SCORPION position (quote) 400 miles SW of the Azores is indeed a big fat lie (end quote)?

Best regards,

Maybe she was sent to the Canary Island but her mission was canceled as soon as she was finally able to communicate her mechanical condition. She was then order to hobble home.

But this changes very little in my overall work.

I still intended to spend a month in deep research before I finalized the final draft. Maybe I'll find some more mistakes.

Thanks… no I'm glad I made the post.