Thunder Strikes Back

Chapter 91 Sea and Air Search
"What a nuisance. It seems they have no clue. Send a report to the headquarters to make the patrol boat ahead go faster."

The colonel moved behind the periscope, from which he could see the two patrol boats ahead slowly picking up speed.Then the colonel ordered the ballast tank to be filled with water, and slowly submerged the submarine to a depth of 70 meters, which is almost the maximum water depth at the edge of the continental shelf. Now he has also lost communication, but he can generally follow the patrol ship ahead.After everything was done, Captain Manush returned to the chart table and used a compass to calculate the approximate area where the enemy might appear at different speeds.He judged that the enemy submarine was unlikely to be facing north, maybe it was heading due east, and if his predictions were correct, the chances in his hands would slip away little by little, and only when the helicopter came back after refueling to intercept would there be new opportunities.In fact, he has a mystery in his heart. He has never been able to figure out how the Navy Command knew there was a Chinese submarine there. With such an inefficient search by anti-submarine helicopters, he did not believe that they could find a submarine lurking nearly 2000 nautical miles east of India. The nuclear submarine on the long coast, the facts in front of it are obvious, even if they search for the submarine in a relatively small area, those helicopters are powerless.Perhaps this situation will not change until the American-made P81 anti-submarine aircraft arrives, but this matter is no longer important. The important thing is that you must attack before others.

A few hours later, in the 411 boat, Marin was watching from the electronic chart the two suspected frigates coming towards him from north to south. At present, the passive sonar on the boat has completed the measurement and tracking of these ships. , They are still far away from the 200 chain, and they are sailing almost in a straight line. They have not corrected the course once, but have speeded up once during the period. It sounds like the main engines of these two boats are very old. After accelerating to 16 knots, the two ships The sound it made suddenly increased a lot, and it was probably the highest speed it could reach.

"Captain, shall we speed up?" the political commissar said.

"No, it doesn't look like they are coming for us. The characteristics of these two ships seem to be very old, maybe they are early Godavari-class ships. If so, they are likely to carry Sea King helicopters, maybe It’s just a normal movement of the Indian Navy towards Pakistan, and we may startle them by speeding up.” Marin said, judging from the current situation, the enemy is in the lead without correcting the course, although there will be a staggered pass in a few hours, It was very close to the stern of the 411, but as long as these boats did not change their course, there was no need to worry too much. He knew the current situation, and rash actions were the enemy.

"I don't think it's a Godavari-class frigate. The characteristics of the main engine seem to be wrong, and the speed is too low." The monitor said on the side, 411 boats have a fine tradition of military democracy, and it is not uncommon to raise objections to the commander.

"Well, maybe it's just an ordinary offshore patrol ship sailing close to the coastline. In short, we should be on the safe side. It's not wrong to expect the enemy to be lenient. Let's assume that he has an anti-submarine helicopter..."

A loud noise suddenly exploded on the bottom of the sea.The sound wave passed through the thick steel plate of No. 411 and entered the boat, interrupting Marin's words. Everyone on the submarine was stunned by the sudden explosion.

"What's the situation?" Marin was the first to react and shouted, he didn't know if he was attacked.He saw the monitor not far away grinning and tearing off the earphones, probably shocked by the amplified explosion.

"1.5 nautical miles away, bearing 277, an unknown object exploded, and the depth is ominous; it looks like a mine." The sergeant came to a preliminary conclusion from the voiceprint map.

"Damn it, we will definitely be exposed." Marin yelled. No matter how concealed the submarine itself was, it couldn't hide the reflection of the active sound waves from the nearby explosion source on the submarine's hull. It was obvious that this was an explosive dropped by an enemy aircraft. Although the shot is a little far away, the 411 boat hidden deep in the seabed can still be completely exposed.

The two Sea King helicopters of the Indian Navy, tens of meters above the sea, had just finished refueling and rushed to the vicinity, and one of them put down the pendant sonar. The pilot was startled by the huge explosion ahead. After the water spray fell slowly, several pilots realized that this huge explosive device was not thrown by their companions; but they had no extra time to be surprised, because immediately, from the sonar display, 2 nautical miles due east, about 10 The reflected sound waves of a submarine at a depth of 80 meters showed that it was obviously the submarine designated by the Eastern Naval Command.With no time to consider who had detonated the explosive device, the pilot decided to find the precise location of the submarine immediately and sink it.

The Neptune who led the team turned around and went straight to the submarine. During the period, it kept dropping the buoy sonar, and the latter quickly used the winch to retract the sonar, and then followed closely.There are also two SA2 Skylark III helicopters nearby to join in the fun. They only have magnetic detectors, which have no effect on submarines at greater depths, and they flew over like headless flies.

"Turn on the turbo speed, UHF data link switch." Lieutenant Pruitt, who was in the driver's seat, shouted to his companions.At the same time, he pressed the navigation correction key to reset a new route.

"What about our anti-submarine torpedoes?"

"It can be launched at any time, but the distance is a bit far away, and the enemy's position is not accurate enough. We have to wait for their data." The recoil sonar operator/weapon operator said, referring to another Sea King dedicated to search behind, Only after they drop active buoy sonar or pendant sonar can they get more accurate position data; due to the different division of labor in anti-submarine missions, the latter Sea King carries active and passive buoy sonar to focus on search, while this main He carried anti-submarine torpedoes and several passive buoy sonars, which were responsible for firing, so he had to wait for further information from the data link to coordinate firing.

"There's no need to wait, let's launch a torpedo first. Turn on the radar altitude hold mode, and we're ready to fire."

The Neptune pilot impatiently selected an anti-submarine missile on the weapon selection panel, selected the mode as active sonar search, set the distance from the torpedo to 7.5 nautical miles from the booster rocket, and set the delay mode of active sonar to: "shortest time"

The lieutenant waited for the helicopter to stabilize for a while, and then decisively pressed the launch button.As the helicopter shook, an anti-submarine missile on one side spewed white smoke and flew towards the general sea area to the east.He did this a little recklessly, because the torpedo's own search cone range is very small, and it is expected that it can find the target on the bottom of the sea, either with a more accurate landing position, or by luck, but the pilot is very worried that the enemy boat will slip away, after all, she It will also drive on the seabed, and Sea King carries 4 anti-submarine missiles, so the hit rate can be ignored for the time being.

The rocket-assisted torpedo flew through an arc to the sky above the set departure, and immediately separated from the rocket, pulled backward by a white parachute, and fell obliquely towards the sea. With a sound of "Pu!", the torpedo dived into the sea.

The interior of Submarine 411.The sonar listener picked up on the situation immediately.

"Azimuth 175, distance 35 chains, an object fell into the water."

"specific situation?"

"Judging from the sound characteristics, it is likely to be a light torpedo with a parachute."

"Well, the distance is a bit far, wait and see." Marin didn't react immediately, he was still waiting to see the track and other new features of this thing.

"Listen, active sonar."

The sonar monitor said that the captain was right behind him, and immediately issued an order: "Two air curtain bombs at the rear, ready." Then he pulled an earphone aside and listened.Sure enough, what was dropped was a lightweight torpedo with active sonar activated, which began pulsing almost as soon as it hit the water.

"Very good! It's looking in the wrong direction. But with active sonar, it will still threaten us." Marin said, he now knows that the torpedo is far away and is swimming in the wrong direction. However, the screams from its active sonar are likely to form a launch with the uneven seabed, and it is very likely to affect nearby submarines. Advanced sonar systems can also rely on these clues to find themselves.

"The captain on duty, adjust the route, increase the speed, and try to stay away from it. Also, try to make the route as twisty as possible. It needs to add some trouble to their weapon operators," Marin said.He left these matters to other people, took out a stopwatch from his pocket, pressed it, and the stopwatch started to move, and now he had to concentrate on staring at the torpedo.

"Captain, I heard the sound of the booster rocket falling into the water. To the east."

"Never mind the useless ones, I think we have at least 2 helicopters above us, but they don't know where we are yet, which is in our favor."

"What if they use active sonar?" asked the watch overseer.

"Probably, it depends on whether we can deal with it calmly." Marin changed his previous suspicion and became calm. After all, the enemy's attack objectively caused an increase in 411 intelligence collection. Now he at least knows the enemy's There is a small deviation in the search, and I can use this deviation to make their search more difficult. These helicopters search for submarines in the mode of short-stop/search dipping sonar on a large area of ​​​​the sea, which consumes a lot of fuel. Just drag it for a while. They can only go back to refuel, and they are far away from the coast. The next time they come back, they can stay on the sea for a shorter time, but they must not be careless now.

"What will they do next?" Political Commissar Su Changjin came over and asked.

"Who knows, maybe an idiot will fan out the rest of the torpedoes at an angle, but we can't count on anything like that. Don't you?"

"Hehe, I know, as you often say, the enemy will be lenient." The political commissar laughed at the side, and the captain of the boat belittled an opponent he had never met through the 80-meter-thick sea water, which made him feel very positive and very happy. interesting.

"How is the situation of the Northwest frigate?" Marin asked.

"Turning in progress. The new course has been marked on the chart."

"Turning us?" asked the captain, not bothering to glance back at the chart, for the answer was almost certain.

"Yes, towards here."

"Look, they've been staring at us." Marin said proudly, as if all the mysteries had been solved at once.

"Sooner or later, these ships will overtake us, after all, they are faster than us."

"That's right, the helicopter above may belong to them, if that's more troublesome. We still can't escape the radius of these damn helicopters."

(End of this chapter)