The U.S. Department of Defense faced the prospect of losing crucial defense technology to a rival when a military aircraft with highly classified systems was destroyed in the South China Sea. The disappearance of the F-35C Joint Strike Fighter triggered a major search-and-recovery effort by a little-known Navy organization. The mission was a high-stakes race to save a Pentagon crown jewel from the extreme depths. The Navy wants to be able to dive even deeper.
The fighter tried to land on the Carl Vinson. It slammed its underside on the edge of the ship, careened across the short runway and plummeted over the edge into the sea. The pilot ejected and was taken to Manila for treatment. A photograph of the stricken aircraft, which appeared to float evenly on the turquoise sea before sinking, was leaked online within days. The plane went down quickly, with its engine suffocating. The jet descended more than two miles to the bottom, where it remained at a Titanic-like depth of 12,400 feet.
The F-35C is a state-of-the-art machine with systems and components that U.S. taxpayers have invested over two decades. It is crucial to nearly all Pentagon war plans, as well as those of more than a dozen allies, including NATO nations, Japan and Australia. The loss of this aircraft was particularly dangerous because it was within the grasp of a nearby nation with deep-ocean prowess: China.
Beijing's ability to develop stronger weapons relies heavily on absorbing foreign technology and know-how, says Tai Ming Chung, an expert on China's military modernization.
Steven Honigman says that the plane is considered property of the United States under general international law. David Concannon, a maritime attorney and deep-sea explorer, notes that the letter of the law is not a guarantee against skullduggery on the high seas. If China wanted to pick it off the bottom before the United States could get to it, the F-35 would not be safe.
When the technological prize is large, the status of a sunken object is often overlooked. In 1974, for instance, the CIA built a special ship for deep-sea mineral mining but actually hauled up a sunken Soviet submarine in the Pacific.
The importance of the technological treasure sitting on the seabed was gargantuan in 2022, as the swim fin was on the other foot. The most expensive weapon system acquisition was the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. The U.S. military plans to procure 2,456 F-35s at a cost of $322 billion over the course of decades.
After five weeks at the bottom of the sea, the U.S. Navy was able to locate and recover the F-35C.
The F-35C recovery was a team effort, according to Capt. Jay Young, director of ocean engineering.
In the wake of the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, the Navy formed a organization called SUPSALV that supports marine salvage operations, provides pollution abatement expertise and helps with underwater repair vessels. A team of 10 Navy sailors and civilians are in charge of about half a dozen ocean-floor object recovery missions each year at depths between 330 and 20,000 feet. They use a collection of deep-ocean equipment owned by the Navy and a family of vehicles that can pull up gear as large as a school bus. Phoenix International is a marine services company based in Largo, Md.
Phoenix has to contract with a commercial ship in the vicinity of the missing object. The Picasso was retained by Phoenix after the F-35C sank. The company has to bring specialized tools and experts to the scene; it takes time to transport Navy-owned salvage equipment from Maryland by truck or military air and find welders who can temporarily affix that equipment to a host ship. This part of a mission can take a long time.
Scientific American newsletters are free to sign up for.
When the aircraft fell into the water, the Carl Vinson crew took latitude and longitude coordinates, which Phoenix used to begin its hunt. The pattern of adjacent scans that search and recovery experts call a "mowing lawn" was used in March to help find Ernest Shackleton's ship. Young wouldn't give more information about the mission. He says that the Navy can locate a submerged asset within a 25 square mile area in 24 hours. On March 2, a remotely operated vehicle called CURV-21 attached a hook to the newly found F-35C and lifted it.
38 days and 37 nights is the total time between crash and recovery. This would be considered a success by the Navy. Technology for moving through the deepest parts of the ocean has improved in recent years. Equipment that used to be at the bottom of the ocean will be more accessible to other organizations in the future.
Victor Vescovo is a record-setting civilian deep-sea explorer and former naval intelligence officer.
The question is important because of the fact that only 2 percent of the world's ocean is deeper than 20,000 feet. The valleys formed when the plates have collided and created the inverse of a mountain range have long attracted explorers. Vescovo set a record for the deepest ocean dive when he piloted his personal sub to 35,853 feet in the Mariana Trench. The Fendouzhe was sent to a point nearly as deep as a scouting mission that included prospecting for new mineral sources.
The U.S. Navy decided that it needed the ability to search and recover in such trenches. The Navy provides few details about how it plans to achieve this goal, but spokesman Alan Baribeau says the Navy will need to integrate several key technologies.
Young says they want to be prepared to recover items from the depths when something goes down. Investing in faster and deeper underwater response technology could help prevent a future scenario where other nations beat the Navy to valuable lost equipment. Do you end up with a conflict near the bottom of the ocean, where people want to take the very sensitive electronics and other things from it? It is completely unknown.
All Rights Reserved © 2024
