Argentinian sub missing

[DaveMac]

I hope this ends well

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/11/17/argentine-navy-loses-contact-submarine-carrying-44/

[Sharpnel]

After seeing some different pictures of the San Juan I'm surprised she's still in service. The conning tower/sail looks like someone repeatedly struck it with a 16 lb. sledgehammer. There was some plating on the bow that gave me concern as well. Hopefully they were old pics from before her last refit. Godspeed to all of those aboard her, including Argentina's first (only?) female officer to serve aboard a sub.

[marauder648]

I fear the worst, no comms for several days now. :(

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQ3MkrSc5yY

[JadeHellbringer]

After seeing some different pictures of the San Juan I'm surprised she's still in service. The conning tower/sail looks like someone repeatedly struck it with a 16 lb. sledgehammer. There was some plating on the bow that gave me concern as well. Hopefully they were old pics from before her last refit. Godspeed to all of those aboard her, including Argentina's first (only?) female officer to serve aboard a sub.

Their navy hasn't been funded particularly well over the past 20 years or so- their ships tend to have a lot more rust and maintenance issues than similar navies' seem to have. Which may or may not be a factor here, but would explain the dings in the hull at least.

[glitterboy2098]

well all the pictures in the articles i've looked at are dated to 2014, when dated at all, so i could believe that the pics are pre-refit. that said, i suspect that the following 3 years probably haven't been kind to the sub.

and apparently the US navy and NASA are lending aid to the search.
https://news.usni.org/2017/11/17/nasa-aircraft-joins-search-missing-argentine-submarine-44-sailors-u-s-navy-submarine-rescue-crews-equipment-mobilizing

[hoosierhick]

I saw somewhere this morning that they had found her on the bottom in about 200ish feet of water and they think she had a battery fire.  I'll see if I can dig up a link.

[Liam's Ghost]

I saw somewhere this morning that they had found her on the bottom in about 200ish feet of water and they think she had a battery fire.  I'll see if I can dig up a link.

The Argentine navy has denied a press report that the ship had a fire aboard, so that might be a false report.

[hoosierhick]

The Argentine navy has denied a press report that the ship had a fire aboard, so that might be a false report.

Yeah, I found on another board where I saw that and there was no link to the story.  I'm thinking it was probably a false report too.

[ANS Kamas P81]

Hopefully she's just floating around with a catastrophic electrical casualty to the boat and everyone's waiting around to be found and rescued.  Otherwise...god, I hope she went down in the deep.  At least that's quick.

[Wrangler]

There a report that a signal may have been received by Argentinans. So there maybe hope. The signal had issues, so their not certain if it was the submarine's crew or not.

[garhkal]

Wow.  Dats gotta suck..

[glitterboy2098]

hopefully the sub's crew is OK.

[DaveMac]

Not looking good

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/19/missing-argentina-submarine-sent-seven-failed-satellite-calls-search

[Wrangler]

Wow, this is tragic.  If they can't find them.  Aside from terrible loss of the crew, Argentina's first submarine officers was aboard the ship.

[I am Belch II]

So very sad, hope everyone is ok.

[glitterboy2098]

Wow, this is tragic.  If they can't find them.  Aside from terrible loss of the crew, Argentina's first submarine officers was aboard the ship.

you mean first female sub officer. pretty sure they've had a number of sub officers before.  ;)

[Nightlord01]

Not looking good

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/19/missing-argentina-submarine-sent-seven-failed-satellite-calls-search

Ok, there's some pretty bad info in that article, not unusual, but not helpful. That submarine either had no EPIRB, or the PIRB wasn't functional. They can be a bit twitchy, but are pretty robust and the usual issue with PIRBs is that they tend to sound when there's no emergency, not fail to sound in an actual release. PIRBs are observable by satellite, other ships, and aircraft, so if no one observed the PIRB, it never sounded.

If the sub could make seven satellite calls, they would need to be at PD or on the surface, you can't use SATCOM underwater, the signal is blocked. So either the boat was underway on Sunday, or this is simply unexplained activity from an unknown platform.

Historically, survival on a stricken submarine is hideously rare, the greatest irony of submarine life is that the functions of a submarine that keep it alive in war time are the same functions that inhibit crew survival in peace time. :-(

[Kidd]

Good update here: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-argentina-submarine/satellite-calls-yield-no-clues-on-missing-argentine-submarine-idUSKBN1DJ0GT

Key extracts:

As waves of up to 8 meters (20 feet) and winds reaching 40 knots complicated the search by sea, authorities spent Sunday trying to trace the submarine’s location through data from the satellite calls without significant progress, a navy official told reporters.

“We analyzed these signals, which as we know were intermittent and weak,” said Gabriel Galeazzi, a naval commander. “They could not help determine a point on the map to help the search.”

U.S. satellite communications company Iridium Communications Inc, which was brought in to help analyze the calls, said they did not originate with its device aboard the vessel and may have been from another satellite communications company’s equipment.

It said the last call it detected from its device was on Wednesday, the same day the government said the vessel vanished.

More than a dozen boats and aircraft from Argentina, the United States, Britain, Chile and Brazil had joined the effort. Authorities have mainly been scanning the sea from above as the storm made the search difficult for boats, navy Admiral Gabriel Gonzalez told reporters.

“Unfortunately these conditions are expected to remain for the next 48 hours,” Gonzalez said from the Mar del Plata naval base, about 420 km (240 miles) south of Buenos Aires where the submarine had been heading toward before vanishing.

A search of 80 percent of the area initially targeted for the operation turned up no sign of the submarine on the ocean’s surface, but the crew should have ample supplies of food and oxygen, Balbi said.

The navy said an electrical outage on the diesel-electric-propelled vessel might have downed its communications. Protocol calls for submarines to surface if communication is lost.

Three boats left Mar del Plata on Saturday with radar detection probes and were following the path that the submarine would have taken to arrive at the base in reverse, Balbi said.

“Those probes allow the boats to sweep the ocean floor during their journey and try to make a record of the floor in three dimensions,” Balbi said.

The U.S. Navy said its four aircraft were carrying a submarine rescue chamber designed during World War II that can reach a bottomed submarine at depths of 850 feet and rescue up to six people at a time. The chamber can seal over the submarine’s hatch to allow sailors to move between the vessels.

It said it also brought a remote-controlled vehicle that can be submerged and controlled from the surface.

[DaveMac]

Day four and no progress

A total of 13 ships and six aeroplanes are braving strong winds and high waves over an area of 66,000 sq km (25,500 sq miles) more than 400 km (250 miles) east of the bay of San Jorge off the coast of Patagonia

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/19/search-for-missing-argentinian-submarine-fails-to-find-any-clues

[HobbesHurlbut]

Just saw on CNN that the ships sonars may have picked up sounds that are associated with tools banging on hull.

[garhkal]

I saw that yesterday on the ticker.  BUT i'd like to know why no station are givig this story MORE air play than just being on the ticker??

[Feenix74]

Not a US Navy sub. Not happening in US continental waters.

Unfortunately your news can be a bit American-centric.

[garhkal]

True dat.. 
But isn't that the same most other countries?

[Sabelkatten]

Not knowing how much US news covers it... News papers in Sweden have an update daily, thought given how much information is available the updates have usually been rather short.

[JadeHellbringer]

Not knowing how much US news covers it... News papers in Sweden have an update daily, thought given how much information is available the updates have usually been rather short.

Unfortunately that's kind of how it's going to be outside of Argentina- there's no news, and 'no news' makes for a pretty short and simple news segment. As I recall, the same happened with Kursk years ago- the only real coverage was of the back and forth between Moscow and other countries on whether assistance would be sent or not, but actual reports from the site were limited to 'it hasn't come back up still' up until the submersibles finally headed down (far too late).

[Kidd]

Without venturing further into Rule 4 zone, I'll just note FYI that as expected, some people did take advantage of this incident to attempt some politicking with regards to certain participants in the search efforts. (Saw it coming, was really hoping that it would not be an issue.) Happily, it seems the attempt backfired spectacularly.

True dat.. 
But isn't that the same most other countries?

IMHO as a citizen of the Internet-connected world, anybody should be capable of getting a relatively balanced worldwide news coverage these days. CNN, BBC/Sky, and Channel News Asia adequately covers the headlines from America, UK/Europe, and SE-Asia.

Its more the esoteric nature of this event that leads to reduced news coverage or public awareness. Without belittling the impact of the incident, its no more meaningful to the general public who don't follow defence-related news than, say, a mine collapse in some other corner of the world... and how many of us know of the last such disaster?

The submariners here are anxiously watching their ISMERLO feed though. It's a shocking event that strikes very close to home, as nobody here in the SEA operates nucs...

[Feenix74]

Update from Australian national news website:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-11-22/oxygen-fears-for-missing-argentine-submarine-as-search-continues/9179526

[JadeHellbringer]

I was thinking about that last night while reading some of the news on it. At this point, unfortunately, it's a recovery op. Either they're out of air, or they're afloat and would have been in contact with SOMEONE by now. Even in the most optimistic scenario, hope is pretty well out realistically.  :-\

[DaveMac]

I was thinking about that last night while reading some of the news on it. At this point, unfortunately, it's a recovery op. Either they're out of air, or they're afloat and would have been in contact with SOMEONE by now. Even in the most optimistic scenario, hope is pretty well out realistically.  :-\

Sadly I agree with you

[Wrangler]

If it does end bad, i hope they can find the ship so they can be with their love ones.

[marauder648]

I was watching a live stream by this chap called Jive Turkey and hes an ex US SSN sonar man.  Folks on the stream are often veterans and one Brazilian sub guy said that his subs when they go out on sea trials don't take many oxygen candels with them, and assumes the ARN does the same.  Apparently the Sub was cut in half to have work done on her batteries before being put back together and then sailing.

[Wrangler]

I was watching a live stream by this chap called Jive Turkey and hes an ex US SSN sonar man.  Folks on the stream are often veterans and one Brazilian sub guy said that his subs when they go out on sea trials don't take many oxygen candels with them, and assumes the ARN does the same.  Apparently the Sub was cut in half to have work done on her batteries before being put back together and then sailing.

OMG
Hope that's not what it sounds like. it could have happened.

[ANS Kamas P81]

There were reports she was having trouble with her batteries.  USS Cochino and USS Bonefish both suffered battery explosions and fires aboard, Cochino was lost (with only one fatality) while Bonefish was towed back in with 18 dead.  Clinically, I'm betting it was something like this - though I do wonder; you'd think an implosion would be something SOSUS could pick up.  Noone's mentioned such a thing, at least not publicly, so I wonder if the sub never crossed crush depth.

[Wrangler]

Won't depend on what's monitoring of the ocean they normally be doing.

Sure they got ears in the water since the sub's reported missing.  However, i was under the impression that most of the area won't have been setup with such devices.   It's sort a cold war thing, how the approaches to the Atlantic and Pacific possible were laid out on the ocean floor with cables to listen for inbound Soviet subs.

There won't be anything like that off the coast of Argentina i would think.  They only have 3 submarines, no real rivals to worry about with exception of smugglers maybe issues with the Brazilians.

[Kidd]

Russia joins the search. Hints of the blame game starting up as survival hopes fade.

Argentina is a poor country, its unlikely to have those kind of sonar sensors... and even if they did, they might not reveal its existence.

[marauder648]

In all honesty, we're over the 1 week mark, and at this point it has become a recovery operation rather than a rescue :(

[DaveMac]

In all honesty, we're over the 1 week mark, and at this point it has become a recovery operation rather than a rescue :(

Sadly I agree with you

[marauder648]

Yeah apparently the work on her batteries was done by a local firm and they basically cut the ship in half to get at the battery compartment before putting her back together again with new batteries.  Battery changes on SS's are slow complicated, expensive, dirty tasks and not obviously something done lightly. And they rarely involve halving or cutting off a quarter of a sub to get at the battery compartment.

[DaveMac]

Explosion detected near site of missing Argentinian submarine, navy confirms

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/23/explosion-detected-near-site-of-missing-argentinian-submarine-navy-confirms

Just hope it was quick

[Sharpnel]

Rest in peace, brave submariners.

[Stormlion1]

Has it been confirmed the explosion was the submarine?

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

No, but it matches the sub's last known coordinates and there aren't a lot of plausible alternatives for what could have caused it.

[Baldur Mekorig]

Has it been confirmed the explosion was the submarine?

Not confirmed yet, but almost. It was a shame. And sadly i am almost sure it was the product of the last goverment institucionalized corruption. :'(

[ANS Kamas P81]

That's what I was looking for, hydrophone networks picking up anything.  The sharp violent 'explosion' I'm betting is the sub passing crush depth and then finally imploding; the incredible amount of pressure at those depths was enough to (in USS Scorpion's case) rip the sub literally in half and shove the engine room fifty feet forward into the hull behind the torpedo room.  Very likely the same happened here, after some sort of catastrophic electrical casualty to the boat followed by a loss of power and a trip straight down.

Thank god the end came quick, is all I'm going to say.

What I said before about the SOSUS hydrophones (and NOAA's), those things are serious business.  When Thresher went down, their recordings were good enough to hear the sound of water hitting the reactor core of the sub despite it being half an ocean away.  That they didn't hear the sound let them rule out a failure there, so the listening capabilities of the USN (and others) are terrifying.  Don't fart in the ocean, they'll know you did it.

[marauder648]

This might prove interesting, sad, but interesting.  Jive Turkey is an ex USN sonar man and served aboard Los Angeles and Ohio class boats, and has a lot of experience with sonar patterns

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bc39NVy1v20

[Wrangler]

It's really looking like they may have gone down.

A international nuclear test-ban monitoring organization,who usually monitors through their network detected the explosion near where the ARA San Juan was last reported from.  I wonder if Argentina doesn't want to admit she lost.  I'd like keep trying, but i don't know anymore.  :(

[Kidd]

The Argentinian navy has already informed the families the crew are considered to be lost at sea.

Naturally the families are distraught and blaming the govt, not that I blame them, and the newspapers will make hay of the whole matter, and them I do blame...

[marauder648]

The problem is that the Argentinian navy has very little money to maintain ships/subs.  And really, sending out out even after a 'refit' is iffy.

[I am Belch II]

So very sad, to lose a ship with no real reason why.

[marauder648]

So very sad, to lose a ship with no real reason why.

I'd not be surprised if it wasn't a battery fire/explosion.

[Baldur Mekorig]

I'd not be surprised if it wasn't a battery fire/explosion.

That is the current theory.

[DaveMac]

Sadly yes

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/27/argentinas-missing-submarine-water-caused-battery-to-short-circuit

[Liam's Ghost]

The article says they would continue submerged when they were ordered home. Why would they do that? Why not return home on the surface?

[marauder648]

The article says they would continue submerged when they were ordered home. Why would they do that? Why not return home on the surface?

Modern subs are terrible on the surface, and the sea conditions in that part of the world at this time of year would be damn near suicidal for the sub to run on the surface.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VreYpuvqXpE

A sub on the surface in that would capsize or roll hard enough to cause some severe issues with stuff inside, torpedoes rolling about, fuel sloshing and causing her to roll, all terribly bad stuff.  It was safer to keep her under the water  because surfacing WOULD have killed them, the battery problem, MAY have, but in this case it did.

[Wrangler]

Must been alot water leaking through the periscope... Wow, what terrible thing to happen. It's too bad they didn't surface when first signs trouble with first battery happened.

[marauder648]

They basically couldn't surface, those waves would have capsized the sub.Surfacing was suicide :(

[ANS Kamas P81]

Must been alot water leaking through the periscope...

The snorkel isn't the periscope.  It's an air intake for the diesel engines so that you can run them while submerged, and use the diesels to recharge your batteries.  Clearly the wave action was pretty serious to flood the thing, which killed said diesels and any chances she had.

I wonder if the snorkel's floatation system failed, putting it into the sea directly and letting pressure do the rest.  Certainly would explain why it flooded so badly it took the main batts with it.

[Nightlord01]

The snorkel isn't the periscope.  It's an air intake for the diesel engines so that you can run them while submerged, and use the diesels to recharge your batteries.  Clearly the wave action was pretty serious to flood the thing, which killed said diesels and any chances she had.

I wonder if the snorkel's floatation system failed, putting it into the sea directly and letting pressure do the rest.  Certainly would explain why it flooded so badly it took the main batts with it.

Commissioned in 1985, wouldn't have been a float for the check valve it would have been a simple flapper. Even if they didn't flood that way, they would have choked their engines without air. :-(

Rest in peace sailors, your watch has drawn to an untimely close.

[HobbesHurlbut]

Commissioned in 1985, wouldn't have been a float for the check valve it would have been a simple flapper. Even if they didn't flood that way, they would have choked their engines without air. :-(

Rest in peace sailors, your watch has drawn to an untimely close.

Worse than you think. If the air intake was incapacitated without an auto shutoff for the diesel engines, it would consume all air INSIDE the sub, potentially killing the crew.

[Kidd]

There were reports she was having trouble with her batteries.  USS Cochino and USS Bonefish both suffered battery explosions and fires aboard, Cochino was lost (with only one fatality) while Bonefish was towed back in with 18 dead.  Clinically, I'm betting it was something like this - though I do wonder; you'd think an implosion would be something SOSUS could pick up.  Noone's mentioned such a thing, at least not publicly, so I wonder if the sub never crossed crush depth.

Seems you were right on the money with this one.

Has anything been said about search and recovery of the presumed wreck?

[JadeHellbringer]

Seems you were right on the money with this one.

Has anything been said about search and recovery of the presumed wreck?

Not that I've heard, but that's not surprising regardless. There may not BE a plan yet, really.

The good thing here in that regard- and I admit, 'good thing' is on a sliding curve- is that this boat is going to be a hell of a lot easier to actually bring up than last time something like this happened. The Kursk was a behemoth, lifting her- even after removal of her shattered bow section- was a herculean task. This boat weighs a fraction of what an Oscar does- so the kind of specialized recovery gear that put in a hell of a lot of work to get Kursk back to the surface probably won't need to be taxed quite as much here.

Same other issues apply, of course- the weather and currents down there aren't any easier than where Kursk sank, bringing up a sunken submarine is never an easy task to begin with, and I sure wouldn't want to be one of the men who have to go aboard afterwards to see the aftermath. But, at least it'll be easier on the actual crane barges and such.

[garhkal]

Seems you were right on the money with this one.

Has anything been said about search and recovery of the presumed wreck?

Nope.  Tv news is all about NK, and other stuff...  Not even a mention on the TICKER about the sub in a week to my recollection..

[cavingjan]

not really any news to report on it except that the rescue mission has been abandoned.

[ANS Kamas P81]

The good thing here in that regard- and I admit, 'good thing' is on a sliding curve- is that this boat is going to be a hell of a lot easier to actually bring up than last time something like this happened. The Kursk was a behemoth, lifting her- even after removal of her shattered bow section- was a herculean task. This boat weighs a fraction of what an Oscar does- so the kind of specialized recovery gear that put in a hell of a lot of work to get Kursk back to the surface probably won't need to be taxed quite as much here.

Have they even found the wreck yet?  As far as condition, that really depends.  Kursk basically suffered a torpedo hit and lost hull integrity, and went down in shallow waters.  If the theory's correct, then San Juan suffered a catastrophic implosion in the deep, unlike the Kursk's situation.  This would, if the Argentines are lucky, be a recovery effort akin to the K-129.  If they aren't, well...there's always the final fate of Scorpion.

The boat was broken in two by massive hydrostatic pressure at an estimated depth of 1,530 feet (470 m). The operations compartment was largely obliterated by sea pressure, and the engine room had telescoped 50 ft (15 m) forward into the hull due to collapse pressure, when the cone-to-cylinder transition junction failed between the auxiliary machine space and the engine room. (...) The sail was ripped off, as the hull beneath it folded inward. The shaft came out of the boat...

[DaveMac]

Rescue mission officially discontinued

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/30/argentina-calls-off-missing-submarine-rescue-effort

[garhkal]

That sucks.  I wonder how long it will be before someone does a dive for the remains of the sub and makes a film of it?

[ANS Kamas P81]

They'll be diving for a while with robot subs; at the very least there's classified communications material onboard that the Argentine government would like back (and probably without British help) and lord knows what else.  Even if they don't retrieve it, they'd probably like to make sure noone else gets their hands on whatever it is.

[cavingjan]

i think the first question is how long until the wreck is found.

[DaveMac]

No luck so far

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/03/blurry-image-could-be-missing-argentine-submarine-says-navy

[Kit deSummersville]

i think the first question is how long until the wreck is found.

Before or after MH 370? It could be like a race....

[Kidd]

Before or after MH 370? It could be like a race....

ARA San Juan is (at this point) far more localised than the possible sites of MH 370

Plus the 3 stakeholder govts most involved in the 370 search have basically given up and moved on. The latest news is that a private company will continue the search, but only on a "no find, no fee" basis with the Msian govt, which has a lot more pressing things to spend money on.

[ANS Kamas P81]

The IO's a big place, unfortunately...and 370 is going to be a complete mystery until the boxes are recovered.  At least we know some things about San Juan and have enough evidence to compile a working theory of her loss.

[Nightlord01]

The IO's a big place, unfortunately...and 370 is going to be a complete mystery until the boxes are recovered.  At least we know some things about San Juan and have enough evidence to compile a working theory of her loss.

Recovery from that depth is highly unlikely. Recovering a sub is difficult enough, doing so from deep water, with questionable structural integrity? Not likely. This is a very delicate and expensive operation, and since there's not much that can be gained vice exploration with ROVs, it's probably better to leave her there and mark it as a grave site.

MH 370 is a total mystery, but more is known as highly probable than will ever be proven, even if the black box is recovered, they only have four hours of record time and are in an overwriting loop, the plane was in the air longer than four hours after it started unguided flight, so no recordings of what happened are ever going to be found.

[ANS Kamas P81]

Straying a bit off topic, but I'll tie it back in in a moment.  As far as 370 goes, that's still 4 hours of the plane's captain and crew talking to the passengers, because they had to realize at some point "hey we've been flying for a lot longer than usual and there's not a damn thing out there, what's going on" - did anyone attempt to get into the cockpit, was there any post-deviation communication to the FLIGHT CREW who absolutely would know something's wrong, things like that.  Even if it doesn't have a word from the guy behind the wheel, SOMEONE's gotta be on tape.  Or did the whole plane depressurize, everyone passed out/died from O2 deprivation, and was it a flying tomb the entire time?  It'd at least answer some questions.

Bringing it back to the San Juan, are there systems like that on a modern sub?  At least something to monitor the bridge audio, listen to the commands being given, and should there be an Incident either serve as a solid timeline of everything that happened or else at the very least a grave marker for a lost boat with her last hours recorded.  I grant such things are probably deeply classified, and certainly the contents would be, but I do wonder if they exist.

[Nightlord01]

Bringing it back to the San Juan, are there systems like that on a modern sub?  At least something to monitor the bridge audio, listen to the commands being given, and should there be an Incident either serve as a solid timeline of everything that happened or else at the very least a grave marker for a lost boat with her last hours recorded.  I grant such things are probably deeply classified, and certainly the contents would be, but I do wonder if they exist.

There are, sort of. All naval vessels have a log, in which every command decision made is recorded. It's not anything like the aviation black box, just a simple written log, but it's the same idea in principle. Aviation black boxes are a simple looped recording device which records everything said in the cockpit, all of the sensor data and all of the machinery status updates. They are an excellent system that is effectively tamper proof, and fail proof to every reasonable measure, but that is just for an aircraft. A sea going ship is far too large and complex to make that sort of equipment possible, although certain functions are replicated by automated systems throughout the ship, unlike aviation, these systems are not mandatory, and are very expensive. It's highly unlikely that the San Juan would have them fitted.

Straying a bit off topic, but I'll tie it back in in a moment.  As far as 370 goes, that's still 4 hours of the plane's captain and crew talking to the passengers, because they had to realize at some point "hey we've been flying for a lot longer than usual and there's not a damn thing out there, what's going on" - did anyone attempt to get into the cockpit, was there any post-deviation communication to the FLIGHT CREW who absolutely would know something's wrong, things like that.  Even if it doesn't have a word from the guy behind the wheel, SOMEONE's gotta be on tape.  Or did the whole plane depressurize, everyone passed out/died from O2 deprivation, and was it a flying tomb the entire time?  It'd at least answer some questions.

I don't think I was clear, it's a looped recording. As in, it overwrites itself every four hours, thus since the aircraft remained in the air for greater than four hours it would not hold the data of whatever caused the loss of comms. :-(

[ANS Kamas P81]

I don't think I was clear, it's a looped recording. As in, it overwrites itself every four hours, thus since the aircraft remained in the air for greater than four hours it would not hold the data of whatever caused the loss of comms. :-(

Yeah, it won't have the audio of the deviation from flight and the audio of the various communication failures.  But there would still be four looped hours of someone at the controls, as well as what those control inputs were.  And there is no way you can take a five and a half hour flight, most of which is going to be over land, and drag it out to seven and a half hours (based on fuel loading) over the ocean without someone noticing and trying to bring it up to the pilots - which would have been caught on the loop at some point.  I mean, I can't imagine - short of, like I said, catastrophic depressurization and 100% blackout/death of all aboard at altitude - there being nothing on that tape at all, especially as the airliner runs out of fuel and begins its descent into the water.

[Nightlord01]

Yeah, it won't have the audio of the deviation from flight and the audio of the various communication failures.  But there would still be four looped hours of someone at the controls, as well as what those control inputs were.  And there is no way you can take a five and a half hour flight, most of which is going to be over land, and drag it out to seven and a half hours (based on fuel loading) over the ocean without someone noticing and trying to bring it up to the pilots - which would have been caught on the loop at some point.  I mean, I can't imagine - short of, like I said, catastrophic depressurization and 100% blackout/death of all aboard at altitude - there being nothing on that tape at all, especially as the airliner runs out of fuel and begins its descent into the water.

Uhh, I'd hate to tell you this, but the cockpit on commercial aircraft shares air supply with the rest of the aircraft. If there was, as I suspect, smoke and fumes in the aircraft, it wasn't just the flight crew that ran out of clean O2. :-(

[DaveMac]

Blame gane starts

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/12/10/german-firms-investigated-faulty-batteries-link-missing-argentine/

[Bosefius]

We just had to pull several posts joking about this situation. This is unacceptable and will result in warnings. If you can't pay respectfully don't post.

[ANS Kamas P81]

I'm reminded of the current scandal in the USN over repairs, port facilities, and whatnot turning into a truly massive bribery case.  So far we haven't lost any ships because of that, or crew lives, but for the Argentines this is going to really be a nasty investigation.  Here's hoping they find the source of the problem damned quick, and that it's not nearly as endemic to the fleet as ours is.  Have they announced any plans for a fleetwide standdown and inspection?

Also, I note that they're ballparking 1000 meters of water for the San Juan's resting place.  That's easily reachable with modern deep-dive subs, it shouldn't be hard to ascertain her final remains and what happened to cause it all.  Seems she went down over a relatively shallow area and it could have been a lot worse; if San Juan had ended up in the Ross Deep not so far away she'd be a good six to eight times that.

[Kidd]

I'm reminded of the current scandal in the USN over repairs, port facilities, and whatnot turning into a truly massive bribery case.

Fat Leonard?

there is 1 big keyword in Ferrostaal's statement in that article above that leaps out to me. But that's all I'm gonna say about that...