How to rescue the wrecked submarine

A tugboat towed a "wrecked submarine".

In a certain sea area of the South China Sea, "a certain submarine snorkeling in the deep sea suddenly fell into danger, sneaked into the bottom of the sea and lost contact with the outside world". One day in the middle of 5438+ 10, a number of lifeboats and tugboats of a rescue detachment of the South China Sea Fleet, which received the "rescue" mission, quickly stepped forward and went to the "suspected incident area". A submarine rescue drill under actual combat conditions began immediately.

The submarine did not release the "wrecked" buoy.

In this exercise, because the buoy used to indicate the position of the wrecked submarine was not released before the submarine "crashed and sat on the seabed", it was called a suspected incident sea area. Facing the vast sea, after more than six hours of high-speed navigation, the detachment rescue officers and soldiers arrived at the scheduled sea area as required. They were a little uneasy: in previous submarine rescue drills, the indicator buoy would be released when the submarine "crashed". With the indicator buoy, the location of the "wrecked submarine" is generally known.

However, it is not uncommon for submarines to release wrecked buoys in case of sudden danger. For example, on the morning of1October 201715, the Argentine navy submarine "San Juan" disappeared after sending the last communication signal, leaving no information related to its position.

"Most of the wrecked submarines we are familiar with have not released the wrecked buoys. Therefore, the focus and difficulty of submarine rescue is how to find the location of the wrecked submarine. " Wang, the commander and team leader of the exercise, said that the submarine would not make any noise when diving to the bottom of the sea. It is no exaggeration to say that it is "looking for a needle in a haystack". What surprised the officers and men even more was that due to the influence of strong cold air, the waves in the exercise area were as high as 3 ~ 4 meters, which made it more difficult to search for the target.

"This is a tough battle." The participating officers and men understand.

The detachment is a newly formed unit in this round of military reform. As the only life-saving troops in the South China Sea, they have accelerated the transformation and construction of the troops through drills under actual combat conditions in the face of increasingly heavy tasks. Letting "wrecked submarines" not release buoys as usual is a microcosm of their promotion of transformation and development in actual combat.

At the drill site, in the face of huge waves, a lifeboat quickly attacked and used sonar to survey and scan the suspected sea area. This type of lifeboat is equipped with advanced sonar detection equipment. Due to the influence of meteorological conditions, the advantages of equipment are limited. Once, twice, three times ... in the end, there was no result.

Where is the submarine sitting at the bottom?

While the lifeboat was being surveyed and scanned, the rescue command post quickly adjusted the search scheme: according to the last communication time and location of the submarine and the flow direction of the sea area, they redefined three suspected sea areas. The lifeboat and tugboat of the detachment are divided into three search groups, each of which conducts a search in its own mission sea area.

Between the peaks and valleys, Luo Zhouyou, the sonar operator of a lifeboat, walked quietly, catching one signal after another from the deep sea, climbing his face with joy again and again, but disappearing again and again. Luo Zhouyou is an experienced sonar operator. He used his equipment to find underwater targets many times. He told the author that there are many signals from the seabed, and how to distinguish useful information is a big problem for sonar operators. A small discrimination error may miss the target.

"Suspected target location found, bearing ×××." After many comparisons, He Wei, the operator of lifeboat sonar, captured a weak abnormal signal in the chaotic signal. The command post immediately organized troops to confirm, however, the confirmation result once again disappointed the officers and men. The maritime command post adjusted the search plan again, taking the designated area as the center, expanding the search scope, and the three search and rescue teams launched a dragnet search for the designated sea area again from three different directions.

"Report the ship's finger and find the target position, bearing ×××!" Sonar operator Luo Zhouyou's report broke the peace of the command room. At the same time, other search and rescue forces also sent information about the target location: pointing to the same water area.

The submarine was discovered. However, finding the submarine's underwater position is only the first step to rescue the submarine.

Divers are going to explore the "wrecked submarine".

Diving to save people is a complex system engineering.

Finding the sea area of the target location does not mean knowing the comprehensive situation of the submarine, because more information is needed to rescue it: what is the state of the submarine underwater? How does it dive? These factors are the key to rescue. Immediately, divers Hu Zhucheng and Zhang Wei listened to the order to dive and accurately locate the submarine.

"Found the target submarine, bearing ××××, visibility less than two meters!" Divers sent information about submarines from the bottom of the sea.

"The submarine rescue operation team will set up an operation site to prepare for towing rescue." After accurately determining the submarine's position, all kinds of rescue boats of the detachment quickly completed the deployment action: the water warning towing force group, the underwater submarine signal transmission force group and the air defense warning force quickly arrived, laying a safety protection net for submarine rescue. When the rescue equipment such as rescue bell of a lifeboat and related equipment and materials are ready, the maritime command group shall determine the operation mode and procedure of submarine rescue according to the submarine situation. At the same time, the lifeboat got in touch with the crew inside the submarine and got a comprehensive understanding of the crew's survival and the internal situation of the submarine.

After careful deployment, eight divers rushed into the water to carry out underwater operations: power supply, ventilation, food delivery and submarine emergency lighting; Supply air to the main ballast tank of the submarine. At the same time, the diver guided the crew to climb out of the submarine torpedo tube.

"When rescuing submarine crew members, the rescue crew disembarkation plan is generally determined according to the depth of rescue." Wang, the commander of the drill, said that when the submarine sank shallowly, we directly guided the crew out of the water through escape passages such as torpedo tubes through divers. When the seabed is deep, professional equipment such as deep diving lifeboat or deep diving rescue bell is generally used to build life passages for submarine crew.

As a kind of underwater lifesaving equipment, the deep submersible lifeboat or lifesaving bell has the general characteristics of submersible: it can sail, dive and float autonomously underwater, and is mainly used to rescue submarines hundreds of meters deep. It forms a hard seal by docking with the rescue platform of the wrecked submarine, equalizing pressure with the submarine, establishing a rescue transfer channel between the submersible lifeboat and the submarine, transferring the wrecked crew to the submersible lifeboat or rescue bell, and then to the rescue mother ship.

At the drill site, dozens of crew members, escorted by divers, slowly surfaced and walked out of the "dilemma".

Drag the "damaged submarine" away and "rescue" the crew out of the water at the same time.

After the crew was safely transferred out of the submarine, four divers, with the help of special equipment, connected the air supply hose at the special interface of the submarine, opened the cut-off valve of the water tank, and then the air system of the lifeboat provided air supply. Subsequently, the inflated submarine began to float slowly. A tugboat quickly occupied the towing position, adjusted its course and speed, and towed the floating submarine away.

"Submarine towing is also a technically difficult job. It is necessary to find a towing balance point in many factors such as wind direction and waves. " Captain Wang said that towing at sea is also part of the team's key training. At the drill site, Cao Peng, the captain of a tugboat, carefully adjusted the course and speed of the tugboat according to the wind direction and waves, and towed the "wrecked submarine" to the scheduled sea area.

While towing away the "damaged submarine", the crew of the submarine was "rescued" from the water: the crew who were taken out of the boat were sent to compression chamber for decompression at the first time. Decompression sickness is another difficult problem in submarine rescue, and how to prevent the occurrence of decompression sickness of rescued personnel is the key and difficult point in submarine rescue. Decompression disease is a systemic disease in which the dissolved gas in the body exceeds the saturation limit after working in a high-pressure environment, forming bubbles inside and outside blood vessels and tissues, which directly leads to death in severe cases.

"We check every crew member very carefully, and we can't afford to be sloppy." Gu Deqian, a military doctor, told the author that in the process of hyperbaric oxygen chamber pressurization treatment, other treatment measures should be supplemented if necessary, such as fluid replacement or plasma injection to treat shock. Patients should be observed for 6-24 hours after leaving the cabin. If the symptoms recur, they should be treated with compression again immediately. In view of the fact that the illness of individual crew members may be aggravated, the detachment has established a joint rescue mechanism between the military and civilian departments to ensure that the wounded can be sent to relevant hospitals for professional treatment at the first time.

In the pressurized cabin, the "crew who escaped from the submarine" was gradually decompressed. After a detailed physical examination of the vital signs of each crew member, an emergency plan was launched for "three crew members with abnormal vital signs" and "sent to the rear hospital for timely treatment".