Comment by danso | Hacker News Reader

Comment by danso | Hacker News Reader

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My assumption is that hearing this kind of long distance noise is well within the laws of physics and what we know of the U.S.'s capability. So I don't see this as "additional capability", but rather, am asking from a mindset of "How did they not hear a suspicious sound at the time of the missing sub?"

Whether they did or not, nothing would presumably change about the Coast Guard conducting search-and-rescue/recovery operations (since they still don't know for sure what happened). Worth pointing out that private explorers, led by Richard Garriott (aka Lord British, apparently), complained that they had optimal rescue equipment but got pushback from the U.S. officials:

https://archive.is/HXtFn

> “Magellan has received mixed signals, first hearing from US Gov to get ready, waiting for plans, then getting told to stand down,” Garriott wrote in an email sent to Vice Admiral William Galanis, commander of Naval Sea Systems Command, U.S. Coast Guard Rear Admiral John W. Mauger, who is leading the recovery mission, Congressman Lloyd Doggett, and Representative Eric Swalwell on Wednesday afternoon.

Again, hard to know if this is just standard operating procedure or not. If it's the case the U.S. govt already had things figured out by now, then it makes sense they weren't going to expedite Garriot's group, given that the search effort had already resulted in the loss of 1 (maybe 2) search vehicles:

> In addition, at least one ROV, possibly two, was damaged or destroyed during the search-and-rescue mission—a testament to the difficult conditions currently facing rescuers.

Given military subs operate around a maximum of 500msw why would the USN have randomly coverage of hydrophones to detect implosions at depths no military sub would be at? This sub probably imploded around 1500 msw.

A lot of people are saying sounds travel far under water that's true.. but laterally and not between the typical layers of the sea.

Not to mention that these hydrophone systems are at critical choke points not littering the ocean floor uselessly.

It seems motivated by a sci-fi understanding of the physics.

Don't get me wrong things like this happen as cover ups. In this specific instance it seems driven by nonsense.

Hydrophones don't need to be nearby or even at a similar depth. The SOFAR channel acts as a waveguide and will duct sources from other depths as long as the bottom is below the critical depth. As others have said, this part of the North Atlantic is one of the most heavily monitored parts of the ocean as well. No sci-fi physics necessary — this has been done continuously since the 1950s.

So basically you think that the USN should be able to detect the implosion and so must be hiding that they can do so.

Rather than any information specific to this event leading to the conclusion that USN can.

This is the same reasoning "UFOlogists" use to insist area 51 has aliens.

1. Aliens must exist.

2. US must be able to detect any aliens.

3. The US must be covering up that aliens exist.

> and so must be hiding that they can do so

I don't believe I said that. You can draw your own conclusion from the fact that it is within their capabilities to detect, localize, and to some extent classify a wide range of sources in this region of the ocean.

What you won't find is a lot of information about those capabilities in the public domain. Just consider that what _is_ known tells us that we had these capabilities in the 1950s, and that they were continuously improved upon throughout the cold war. This is not Area 51 conspiracy speculation; it is bread-and-butter NRL stuff that is more than half a century old at this point and is classified for good reasons.

I'll rephrase. What about this incident supports your claim?

As far as I can see not only is the answer to that is "nothing" but the claim itself is non-falsifiable.

Maybe there's a miscommunication here; detecting underwater sound from hundreds, even thousands of kilometers away, is made possible via the publicly known laws of physics.

Detecting extraterrestrial aliens requires technology that is not publicly known. Therefore, it is not at all logical to compare "hearing an imploding submersible in the Atlantic" to "detecting aliens/UFOs"

Really you'd need advanced technology to detect aliens if Roswell was indeed an crash landing?

You've got to be kidding!

I fail to see the analogy between "aliens must exist" (a statement for which there is no evidence) and "the submersible imploded" (which is substantiated by debris). The syllogism is simple:

* submarines make loud noises when they implode

* the navy can hear loud noises underwater

* the submersible is thought to have imploded based on debris

therefore,

* the navy heard the submarine implode

I'm not a physics expert, but sound seems to travel for long distances extremely well underwater. So even if they have a buoy at 1000 ft, hearing a loud sudden sound at 10000 feet (the sub's last communication was 1h45m into a roughly 2hr descent) would not require "sci-fi" physics?

[0] https://oceanexplorer.noaa.gov/explorations/16challenger/wel...

Yes because if you have a buoy there you need one everywhere...

Doesn't matter, I was curious why people were speculating this and that's clarified.

You believe that USN would detect this, and it's not motivated by any factor in the story. And a conspiracy to cover up capabilities is the only way you can sustain that belief.

Here's my question for you:

Let's assume that in our current reality, U.S. agencies did not detect an anomalous sound. So what we've observed is how they would operate if they had zero foreknowledge or data other than the initial report to the Coast Guard.

Now imagine the alternate scenario in which Navy or NOAA buoys pick up a suspicious sound near the Titanic. There might be a flurry of U.S. gov activity (e.g. communication between NOAA, the military, and intelligence agencies) to make sure it's not a Russian sub, but that would be completely hidden to the public, and for all we know, is something that happens relatively routinely.

In this alternate scenario, what would change about how the Navy, Coast Guard, or any other U.S. official has responded? Coast Guard rescue ships would still conduct search-and-rescue, the Navy would still send a deep sea salvage ship. You honestly think the Navy would volunteer information about an intelligence report that, as far as they know, may or may not be related to a now-missing civilian sub?

In the second scenario the Russell's teapot satellite the Soviets put into space would have picked up the uptick in US military Comms.

Maybe they kept it quiet to not reveal the satellite was still operational? I doubt it given the current situation, mostly likely it'd be all over telegram and we'd have known about it.

What would that have to do with anything?

Russell's teapot is a criticism of non-falsifiable claims

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%27s_teapot#Analysis

Ok, but for posterity’s sake, the Navy has now said that they did in fact hear the implosion:

https://archive.is/pSpem

> The Navy began listening for the Titan almost as soon as the sub lost communications, according to a U.S. defense official. Shortly after its disappearance, the U.S. system detected what it suspected was the sound of an implosion near the debris site discovered Thursday and reported its findings to the commander on site, U.S. defense officials said.

Don't you think it's weird how you'd thought it'd be secret capability and never disclosed.

Instead they leaked it once the debris was found?

LOL. C'mon man, you're the only one here who thought this was some kind of super secret capability. My entire premise is that this was a logically foregone conclusion based on what we know of their decades-old systems and the laws of physics with respect to how sound travels in water.

As for why they revealed their foreknowledge now? I don't speak for the military, but admitting to it vaguely, well after the fact is a significantly different situation than talking about it at the time and making it actionable intelligence. Furthermore, something may have leaked to a journalist, who then pressed them to make some kind of answer.

I am a bit mystified at your apparent belief that the military has any obligation to proactively tell anybody anything, or find it shocking that a military would ever hide things from anybody, to the point that you would attack people claiming that they might do so.

Are you aware that there is, in fact, a such thing as "classified" information? If you'll pardon me linking to that hotbed of conspiratorial thinking, the Cornell Law School, here's some of the basic, completely open, law covering such things: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/798

Where on Earth do you get the idea that everyone in the world is operating in a regime where they tell you everything you want to know simply because you want to know it?

You are operating at personally dangerous levels of naivety, like, levels that are going to cost you money when you fall for a big scam because you thought someone was just informing you of a great money-making opportunity, as everyone always does when they find a way to make money. Or worse. You're light years beyond "rejecting conspiracy theories", you're operating on a Theory of Mind that has no visible correspondence to the real world. This is not how the world works. People and organizations do not rush to reveal everything they are, everything they can do, everything they know, to everybody, all the time, for free, simply because it would be really nice, and the military least of all!

You're misreading me.

I asked what about that link made them think that. The answer nothing.

They were making up explanations about how to maintain a pre-existing belief.

A fully justified, well-established pre-existing belief, not one that they just pulled out of the blue. Mere "pre-belief" is not intrinsically bad, certain sloppy and popular statements to the contrary.

Which also happened to be correct: https://www.cnn.com/videos/world/2023/06/23/exp-navy-implosi...

I've seen a bit of discussion around time of release, especially around it being a putative "distraction" from the Hunter Biden news stories, but that doesn't make any sense; those have been going on for a while now and will continue to go on for a while regardless of this. What I see here is roughly the expected speed of the military internally deciding this is safe to release, through several layers of bureaucracy, all of which are concerned about being court martialed if they are too excited to say "yes" without making sure their butts are 100% covered. I'd even call this a surprisingly fast release, honestly, probably because the physics of this are such that they weren't fooling very many people (and none of the ones who really mattered), except, apparently, psychphysic.

Sound reflects off thermoclines. If there's a thermocline at say 1000ft and you have a hydrophone at 900ft, a sound originating at 1500ft will reflect off the thermocline and won't be detected by the 900ft hydrophone above the thermocline (frictionless pulleys and spherical cow assumptions).

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