The Bedford Incident as an ATL

[stevep]

Sept 29, 2022 11:03:44 GMT oscssw said:

Sept 28, 2022 13:55:13 GMT lordroel said:

Only have moved the thread you made to The Media Fandom Hub as it is about a movie as a TL, otherwise everthing is fine.

So before i start saying what i think of this, what about Ice Station Zebra, Senior Chief (oscssw ).

Not the first movie i have seen where somebody mistakes a sentence for Fire.

Four nuclear torpedoes, what would their kiloton be and is it not a bit overkill, one would do.

Ice Station zebra is, IMNSHO   a very good movie.  I am a big fan of Alistair Maclean and enjoy seeing his novels on the Big Screen.   Ther are a lot of inaccuracies in the movie but the plot and the cast more than make up for those minor annoyances.

Ok here we go into the things that used to give me nightmares, especially when I was in a PacFleet DD, DDG, FF or FFG.

My best guess is, given that the movie takes place in 1963 one year after the Cuban Missile crisis, I' bet the Soviet nuclear "fish" would be a Type 53-58 (operational version of the T-5) that had a 4.8 kiloton.   This bastard was a standard load out (usually two fish) on most Soviet subs well into the 80's.  The  Type 53-58 had a  quickly substitutable dual warhead.  The Sewer Pipe CO AND political officer had a choice of either a nuclear, most likely a RDS-9, or high explosive "Warshot".

We were told not to worry because our Pig Boats carried the 11 kiloton Mark 45 ASTOR ASW fish, an early nuke tipped, wire guided (I bet it was a very long wire)  Torp for use against high-speed, deep-diving, Soviet subs.  Like hand grenades ASTOR did not have to hit it's target to rip the boat to apart; close and not all that close, was more than good enough.  I bet our sewer Pipe sailors hated the damn things as much as we Real Sailors did our  RUR-5 ASROC (for "Anti-Submarine Rocket")
tipped with our W44 nuclear depth charge.   We much preferred our ASROC carry the Mark 44/46 torpedo, with it's 96.8 pound Torpex punch.  That might sound like a lot of HE but many of our bast ASW operators doubted it was powerful enough to generate a single hit kill against the Soviet, later double hulled, SSNs and SSGNs.   I am not so sure.  More than likely the fish will home on the stern of the sub (prop and engine room make the most noise usually) and shatter the prop shaft seals.  the stern areas of a sub because it is penetrated by the shaft is not a particularly strong section of the hull.  That would mean a mission kill at the least and at even moderate depth, probably the quick end of boat and it's entire crew.   

Speaking of nightmare scenarios especially nuke tipped ASROCs.  By 1967,when I joined the fleet, the 1962 ASROC Nuclear Test shot from USS Agerholm DD826 was no longer a secret, at least among the ASW types.  Agerholm was a Gearing FRAM I DD,  fired one Nuke tipped ASROC at a target 2.5 miles away. The W44 nuclear depth charge separated and flew a ballistic trajectory to the target. After impacting the water, the warhead sank to around 650 feet for the before detonating. 

There was a lot of Scuttlebutt about what the test shot did to the DD:

1. It seared off the topside paint on the stbd side of the Can

2. It did some topside structural damage. 

3. The salt water wash down system had been activated prior to the shot and worked pretty well but not perfectly and the ship and crew got a mild dose of radiation.

4. The test caused an acoustic phenomenon called, "Blue-out" where the massive sound reverb from an underwater nuclear explosion can blank out broadband SONAR for days at a time. "Blue Out" is NOT scuttlebutt. However the W-44 10 kiloton warhead was not big enough to effect a very wide area or last for "days";  maybe a day at the detonation spot and more likely 6-12 hours.    

And now my friend, you know a lot more about Navy Nukes than you ever wanted to.  Enough said? 

  Very interesting thanks. 

[miletus12]

Sept 29, 2022 11:03:44 GMT oscssw said:

Sept 28, 2022 13:55:13 GMT lordroel said:

Only have moved the thread you made to The Media Fandom Hub as it is about a movie as a TL, otherwise everthing is fine.

So before i start saying what i think of this, what about Ice Station Zebra, Senior Chief (oscssw ).

Not the first movie i have seen where somebody mistakes a sentence for Fire.

Four nuclear torpedoes, what would their kiloton be and is it not a bit overkill, one would do.

Ice Station zebra is, IMNSHO   a very good movie.  I am a big fan of Alistair Maclean and enjoy seeing his novels on the Big Screen.   Ther are a lot of inaccuracies in the movie but the plot and the cast more than make up for those minor annoyances.

I did not like that movie. It goes to a third rail subject I will not discuss except to note that Hollyweird took a real foreign navy submarine loss incident and did not represent it accurately. Let us just say, that the author knew about how that defective obsolete foreign sub worked and failed  and killed its crew, but not about American boats?   

Ok here we go into the things that used to give me nightmares, especially when I was in a PacFleet DD, DDG, FF or FFG.

Only nightmares? No cold sweats?

My best guess is, given that the movie takes place in 1963 one year after the Cuban Missile crisis, I' bet the Soviet nuclear "fish" would be a Type 53-58 (operational version of the T-5) that had a 4.8 kiloton.   This bastard was a standard load out (usually two fish) on most Soviet subs well into the 80's.  The  Type 53-58 had a  quickly substitutable dual warhead.  The Sewer Pipe CO AND political officer had a choice of either a nuclear, most likely a RDS-9, or high explosive "Warshot".

The Zulus and Whiskeys had two stations to handle "special" fish. The Foxtrot had one. 

We were told not to worry because our Pig Boats carried the 11 kiloton Mark 45 ASTOR ASW fish, an early nuke tipped, wire guided (I bet it was a very long wire)  Torp for use against high-speed, deep-diving, Soviet subs.  Like hand grenades ASTOR did not have to hit it's target to rip the boat to apart; close and not all that close, was more than good enough.  I bet our sewer Pipe sailors hated the damn things as much as we Real Sailors did our  RUR-5 ASROC (for "Anti-Submarine Rocket")
tipped with our W44 nuclear depth charge.   We much preferred our ASROC carry the Mark 44/46 torpedo, with it's 96.8 pound Torpex punch.  That might sound like a lot of HE but many of our bast ASW operators doubted it was powerful enough to generate a single hit kill against the Soviet, later double hulled, SSNs and SSGNs.   I am not so sure.  More than likely the fish will home on the stern of the sub (prop and engine room make the most noise usually) and shatter the prop shaft seals.  the stern areas of a sub because it is penetrated by the shaft is not a particularly strong section of the hull.  That would mean a mission kill at the least and at even moderate depth, probably the quick end of boat and it's entire crew.

The Mark 45 had / has a published run-out of about 10,000 meters +. The wire attached to it was primarily for positive control of the warhead. There is no steer to target merge track function.  Though not tested for effect under real warshot conditons (at least not officially), the W34 warhead was expected to achieve a mission kill within 200+ meters of detonation zero. A kill-kill depended on the target robustness and presentation aspect to the blast wave. This torpedo was an electric seawater battery propelled quiet fish with a deep absolute floor later deemed inadequate, though if your effector radius is officially 400 meters + in diameter, what the...? 

Anyway, let us say in the era that the Mark 45 was "in service" the real expected detection range and engagement range thresholds for a target were two different things. Obviously you would want to swim out your W34 tipped fish as far away from you as possible! But the actual effector radius definitely set a myopic limit on the fish. Theshhold detection, engagement detection and effector radius could make for an unfortunate Venn diagram overlap. Inverse square law for all three. How noisy is the background? 

About prop chasers. You know how a SIDEWINDER works? It kind of nose wanders a bit (Dutch rolls) before it settles down and steers to chase signal until it hits something on the target, usually aft of the main wing spar?  That is an air to air missile that searches for the hottest signal it sees. BUT, before SIDEWINDER, there were torpedoes. These use either passive or active signal chase logics and either predict lead or predict lag target signal pursuit. This goes back to 1933 for the Germans and 1939 for the Americans. The Germans used lag, the Americans used lead, or 2 point 1-d search (left right) or 4 point 2-d search (up down / left  right) respectively. The Germans wanted to sink freighters, the Americans wanted to sink subs.  The German torpedoes S nose wandered, the American torpedoes CORKSCREWED.  The fish might hit a prop, but it could hit the loudest noise it hears. On a lousy Russian sub, that noise "might" be the screw or the pumps and pop the shaft seals or rupture the engine compartment. Emphasis on "might". It depends on Murphy.              

Speaking of nightmare scenarios especially nuke tipped ASROCs.  By 1967,when I joined the fleet, the 1962 ASROC Nuclear Test shot from USS Agerholm DD826 was no longer a secret, at least among the ASW types.  Agerholm was a Gearing FRAM I DD,  fired one Nuke tipped ASROC at a target 2.5 miles away. The W44 nuclear depth charge separated and flew a ballistic trajectory to the target. After impacting the water, the warhead sank to around 650 feet for the before detonating. 

What about the waterspout and the bubble?

There was a lot of Scuttlebutt about what the test shot did to the DD:
1. It seared off the topside paint on the stbd side of the Can
2. It did some topside structural damage. 
3. The salt water wash down system had been activated prior to the shot and worked pretty well but not perfectly and the ship and crew got a mild dose of radiation.
4. The test caused an acoustic phenomenon called, "Blue-out" where the massive sound reverb from an underwater nuclear explosion can blank out broadband SONAR for days at a time. "Blue Out" is NOT scuttlebutt. However the W-44 10 kiloton warhead was not big enough to effect a very wide area or last for "days";  maybe a day at the detonation spot and more likely 6-12 hours. 

a.c.c.u.r.a.t.e.

And now my friend, you know a lot more about Navy Nukes than you ever wanted to.  Enough said?

Fizzles, burps and weapon duds?   
  

[lordroel]

Sept 29, 2022 11:03:44 GMT oscssw said:

Sept 28, 2022 13:55:13 GMT lordroel said:

Only have moved the thread you made to The Media Fandom Hub as it is about a movie as a TL, otherwise everthing is fine.

So before i start saying what i think of this, what about Ice Station Zebra, Senior Chief (oscssw ).

Not the first movie i have seen where somebody mistakes a sentence for Fire.

Four nuclear torpedoes, what would their kiloton be and is it not a bit overkill, one would do.

Ice Station zebra is, IMNSHO   a very good movie.  I am a big fan of Alistair Maclean and enjoy seeing his novels on the Big Screen.   Ther are a lot of inaccuracies in the movie but the plot and the cast more than make up for those minor annoyances.

Ok here we go into the things that used to give me nightmares, especially when I was in a PacFleet DD, DDG, FF or FFG.

My best guess is, given that the movie takes place in 1963 one year after the Cuban Missile crisis, I' bet the Soviet nuclear "fish" would be a Type 53-58 (operational version of the T-5) that had a 4.8 kiloton.   This bastard was a standard load out (usually two fish) on most Soviet subs well into the 80's.  The  Type 53-58 had a  quickly substitutable dual warhead.  The Sewer Pipe CO AND political officer had a choice of either a nuclear, most likely a RDS-9, or high explosive "Warshot".

We were told not to worry because our Pig Boats carried the 11 kiloton Mark 45 ASTOR ASW fish, an early nuke tipped, wire guided (I bet it was a very long wire)  Torp for use against high-speed, deep-diving, Soviet subs.  Like hand grenades ASTOR did not have to hit it's target to rip the boat to apart; close and not all that close, was more than good enough.  I bet our sewer Pipe sailors hated the damn things as much as we Real Sailors did our  RUR-5 ASROC (for "Anti-Submarine Rocket")
tipped with our W44 nuclear depth charge.   We much preferred our ASROC carry the Mark 44/46 torpedo, with it's 96.8 pound Torpex punch.  That might sound like a lot of HE but many of our bast ASW operators doubted it was powerful enough to generate a single hit kill against the Soviet, later double hulled, SSNs and SSGNs.   I am not so sure.  More than likely the fish will home on the stern of the sub (prop and engine room make the most noise usually) and shatter the prop shaft seals.  the stern areas of a sub because it is penetrated by the shaft is not a particularly strong section of the hull.  That would mean a mission kill at the least and at even moderate depth, probably the quick end of boat and it's entire crew.   

Speaking of nightmare scenarios especially nuke tipped ASROCs.  By 1967,when I joined the fleet, the 1962 ASROC Nuclear Test shot from USS Agerholm DD826 was no longer a secret, at least among the ASW types.  Agerholm was a Gearing FRAM I DD,  fired one Nuke tipped ASROC at a target 2.5 miles away. The W44 nuclear depth charge separated and flew a ballistic trajectory to the target. After impacting the water, the warhead sank to around 650 feet for the before detonating. 

There was a lot of Scuttlebutt about what the test shot did to the DD:

1. It seared off the topside paint on the stbd side of the Can

2. It did some topside structural damage. 

3. The salt water wash down system had been activated prior to the shot and worked pretty well but not perfectly and the ship and crew got a mild dose of radiation.

4. The test caused an acoustic phenomenon called, "Blue-out" where the massive sound reverb from an underwater nuclear explosion can blank out broadband SONAR for days at a time. "Blue Out" is NOT scuttlebutt. However the W-44 10 kiloton warhead was not big enough to effect a very wide area or last for "days";  maybe a day at the detonation spot and more likely 6-12 hours.    

And now my friend, you know a lot more about Navy Nukes than you ever wanted to.  Enough said? 

Thanks Senior Chief, i will know where to send the men in black suits when they come knocking at my door.

Just kidding, nice information.

[oscssw]

Sept 29, 2022 14:11:06 GMT lordroel said:

Sept 29, 2022 11:03:44 GMT oscssw said:

Ice Station zebra is, IMNSHO   a very good movie.  I am a big fan of Alistair Maclean and enjoy seeing his novels on the Big Screen.   Ther are a lot of inaccuracies in the movie but the plot and the cast more than make up for those minor annoyances.

Ok here we go into the things that used to give me nightmares, especially when I was in a PacFleet DD, DDG, FF or FFG.

My best guess is, given that the movie takes place in 1963 one year after the Cuban Missile crisis, I' bet the Soviet nuclear "fish" would be a Type 53-58 (operational version of the T-5) that had a 4.8 kiloton.   This bastard was a standard load out (usually two fish) on most Soviet subs well into the 80's.  The  Type 53-58 had a  quickly substitutable dual warhead.  The Sewer Pipe CO AND political officer had a choice of either a nuclear, most likely a RDS-9, or high explosive "Warshot".

We were told not to worry because our Pig Boats carried the 11 kiloton Mark 45 ASTOR ASW fish, an early nuke tipped, wire guided (I bet it was a very long wire)  Torp for use against high-speed, deep-diving, Soviet subs.  Like hand grenades ASTOR did not have to hit it's target to rip the boat to apart; close and not all that close, was more than good enough.  I bet our sewer Pipe sailors hated the damn things as much as we Real Sailors did our  RUR-5 ASROC (for "Anti-Submarine Rocket")
tipped with our W44 nuclear depth charge.   We much preferred our ASROC carry the Mark 44/46 torpedo, with it's 96.8 pound Torpex punch.  That might sound like a lot of HE but many of our bast ASW operators doubted it was powerful enough to generate a single hit kill against the Soviet, later double hulled, SSNs and SSGNs.   I am not so sure.  More than likely the fish will home on the stern of the sub (prop and engine room make the most noise usually) and shatter the prop shaft seals.  the stern areas of a sub because it is penetrated by the shaft is not a particularly strong section of the hull.  That would mean a mission kill at the least and at even moderate depth, probably the quick end of boat and it's entire crew.   

Speaking of nightmare scenarios especially nuke tipped ASROCs.  By 1967,when I joined the fleet, the 1962 ASROC Nuclear Test shot from USS Agerholm DD826 was no longer a secret, at least among the ASW types.  Agerholm was a Gearing FRAM I DD,  fired one Nuke tipped ASROC at a target 2.5 miles away. The W44 nuclear depth charge separated and flew a ballistic trajectory to the target. After impacting the water, the warhead sank to around 650 feet for the before detonating. 

There was a lot of Scuttlebutt about what the test shot did to the DD:

1. It seared off the topside paint on the stbd side of the Can

2. It did some topside structural damage. 

3. The salt water wash down system had been activated prior to the shot and worked pretty well but not perfectly and the ship and crew got a mild dose of radiation.

4. The test caused an acoustic phenomenon called, "Blue-out" where the massive sound reverb from an underwater nuclear explosion can blank out broadband SONAR for days at a time. "Blue Out" is NOT scuttlebutt. However the W-44 10 kiloton warhead was not big enough to effect a very wide area or last for "days";  maybe a day at the detonation spot and more likely 6-12 hours.    

And now my friend, you know a lot more about Navy Nukes than you ever wanted to.  Enough said? 

Thanks Senior Chief, i will know where to send the men in black suits when they come knocking at my door.

Just kidding, nice information.

Not to worry my friend The frock. All that is NOW NonClass so we are both safe

[lordroel]

Two questions i have, if the USS Bedford is sailing in the Greenland, Iceland, and United Kingdom gap would anybody have seen the explosion and second question would the USS Bedford be in contact with US/NATO Naval Command that it was in pursuit of the Foxtrot.

[oscssw]

Sept 30, 2022 6:48:23 GMT lordroel said:

Two questions i have, if the USS Bedford is sailing in the Greenland, Iceland, and United Kingdom gap would anybody have seen the explosion and second question would the USS Bedford be in contact with US/NATO Naval Command that it was in pursuit of the Foxtrot.

1. Bedford is not in the GIUK Gap my friend The Rock.  There are two scenes where Finlander is addressing a wall chart and it sure looks like the North East Coast Greenland.   Therefore, IMO FWIW, she is operating off Greenland alright but it is much further North than the Denmark straight in the Greenland Sea.   I think it is around Jokel Bay, near the Achton Friis Islands.  As I understand it the GIUK Gap refers to the Denmark Strait between Greenland and Iceland, the Norwegian Sea and the North Atlantic between Iceland, the Faroe Islands and Scotland.  But what would I know? I was a PacFleet not a LantFleet sailor my whole career.

2. Several times in the movie CO Finlander signals "NatoNorth".  I think that was Hollywood speak for Allied Naval Forces Northern Europe (NAVNORTH)  CincNAVNORTH.

Now melitus12 can rip me a new one.  

[lordroel]

Sept 30, 2022 9:22:03 GMT oscssw said:

Sept 30, 2022 6:48:23 GMT lordroel said:

Two questions i have, if the USS Bedford is sailing in the Greenland, Iceland, and United Kingdom gap would anybody have seen the explosion and second question would the USS Bedford be in contact with US/NATO Naval Command that it was in pursuit of the Foxtrot.

1. Bedford is not in the GIUK Gap my friend The Rock.  There are two scenes where Finlander is addressing a wall chart and it sure looks like the North East Coast Greenland.   Therefore, IMO FWIW, she is operating off Greenland alright but it is much further North than the Denmark straight in the Greenland Sea.   I think it is around Jokel Bay, near the Achton Friis Islands.  As I understand it the GIUK Gap refers to the Denmark Strait between Greenland and Iceland, the Norwegian Sea and the North Atlantic between Iceland, the Faroe Islands and Scotland.  But what would I know? I was a PacFleet not a LantFleet sailor my whole career.

2. Several times in the movie CO Finlander signals "NatoNorth".  I think that was Hollywood speak for Allied Naval Forces Northern Europe (NAVNORTH)  CincNAVNORTH.

Now melitus12 can rip me a new one.  

First thanks you for the responds Senior Chief (oscssw ).

So if the USS Bedford was in communication with "NatoNorth" and they find out about the nuclear explosion, they will assume the Foxtrot attacked the USS Bedford and sank here.

[stevep]

Sept 30, 2022 9:37:56 GMT lordroel said:

Sept 30, 2022 9:22:03 GMT oscssw said:

1. Bedford is not in the GIUK Gap my friend The Rock.  There are two scenes where Finlander is addressing a wall chart and it sure looks like the North East Coast Greenland.   Therefore, IMO FWIW, she is operating off Greenland alright but it is much further North than the Denmark straight in the Greenland Sea.   I think it is around Jokel Bay, near the Achton Friis Islands.  As I understand it the GIUK Gap refers to the Denmark Strait between Greenland and Iceland, the Norwegian Sea and the North Atlantic between Iceland, the Faroe Islands and Scotland.  But what would I know? I was a PacFleet not a LantFleet sailor my whole career.

2. Several times in the movie CO Finlander signals "NatoNorth".  I think that was Hollywood speak for Allied Naval Forces Northern Europe (NAVNORTH)  CincNAVNORTH.

Now melitus12 can rip me a new one.  

First thanks you for the responds Senior Chief (oscssw ).

So if the USS Bedford was in communication with "NatoNorth" and they find out about the nuclear explosion, they will assume the Foxtrot attacked the USS Bedford and sank here.

  Well they will note they can no longer contact Bedford, which will make them suspicious even if their not cut off in mid conversation which they might be.  1962 is rather early for a lot of satellite coverage so they might not know immediate and a relatively small blast might not be picked up by seismographs so it could be a bit of time before they confirm that a nuke has been used.  Then s**t hits the fan in a number of possibly very dangerous ways.

[miletus12]

Sept 30, 2022 6:48:23 GMT lordroel said:

Two questions i have, if the USS Bedford is sailing in the Greenland, Iceland, and United Kingdom gap would anybody have seen the explosion and second question would the USS Bedford be in contact with US/NATO Naval Command that it was in pursuit of the Foxtrot.

Shrug. 

Achotel Friis is as good a guess as any.  (See map.)



Communications...

Nearest NATO or US communications node is THULE (west) and Reykjavek (east). If this was supposed to have happened in 1962-1966  the satcom network that far north was "spotty". Earliest system would have been "Lincoln" or something in the Syncom series, about 1965. The other alternative is HF radio. It has problems.

  

More than you ever wanted to know about the subject. 

The fictional USS Bedford because of its purported location will be in intermittent contact with "NATO North".

Would anyone see or hear the blast? 

Yes. Acoustically that sound would reverb in the oceans and be picked up by detection gear designed for it for hundreds to thousands of kilometers. You would hear it in the mid Atlantic if you had the proper hydrophones in ~1962-1966. Seismic stations as far away as the eastern US would know something had happened and if the equipment operators were good enough, would be able to generate a true bearing and rough distance even in 1962-1966 era.  I presume the closest seismic / acoustics detectors would be in Daneborg or Scorebysund. Reytjkavek would know for sure. They were pinballed for this kind of thing. They would get on the radio and ask for Greenland station data and use that to triangulate and locate the event with a CEP of about ~100-150 km radius.   

See the blast? 



Yes. If not civil aviation, USAF patrols would detect it by flash and SOUND. And then there is the radiological debris. There is no way this event could be hidden, not even in 1962. 

[stevep]

Sept 30, 2022 13:19:12 GMT miletus12 said:

Sept 30, 2022 6:48:23 GMT lordroel said:

Two questions i have, if the USS Bedford is sailing in the Greenland, Iceland, and United Kingdom gap would anybody have seen the explosion and second question would the USS Bedford be in contact with US/NATO Naval Command that it was in pursuit of the Foxtrot.

Shrug. 

Achotel Friis is as good a guess as any.  (See map.)



Communications...

Nearest NATO or US communications node is THULE (west) and Reykjavek (east). If this was supposed to have happened in 1962-1966  the satcom network that far north was "spotty". Earliest system would have been "Lincoln" or something in the Syncom series, about 1965. The other alternative is HF radio. It has problems.

  

More than you ever wanted to know about the subject. 

The fictional USS Bedforf because of its purported location will be in intermittent contact with "NATO North".

Would anyone see or hear the blast? 

Yes. Acoustically that sound would reverb in the oceans and be picked up by detection gear designed for it for hundreds to thousands of kilometers. You would hear it in the mid Atlantic if you had the proper hydrophones in ~1962-1966. Seismic stations as far away as the eastern US would know something had happened and if the equipment operators were good enough, would be able to generate a true bearing and rough distance even in 1962-1966 era.  I presume the closest seismic / acoustics detectors would be in Daneborg or Scorebysund. Reytjkavek would know for sure. They were pinballed for this kind of thing. They would get on the radio and ask for Greenland station data and use that to triangulate and locate the event with a CEP of about ~100-150 km radius.   

See the blast? 



Yes. If not civil aviation, USAF patrols would detect it by flash and SOUND. And then there is the radiological debris. There is no way this event could be hidden, not even in 1962. 

  Definitely agree it wouldn't be hidden.  If nothing investigations of the ship's disappearance would pick up on the debris.  Didn't think there were many or that advanced satellites at this point and would they still have relied on dropping film capsules for returning information at this date.  Thought Seismic stations might pick it up.  Not sure if there would be much a/c flying in that region at that date, both because northern Asia would be no go and also a/c lacking the range of latter planes but some military units might be about IF the weather was good.

[miletus12]

Sept 30, 2022 14:15:15 GMT stevep said:

Sept 30, 2022 13:19:12 GMT miletus12 said:

Shrug. 

Achotel Friis is as good a guess as any.  (See map.)



Communications...

Nearest NATO or US communications node is THULE (west) and Reykjavek (east). If this was supposed to have happened in 1962-1966  the satcom network that far north was "spotty". Earliest system would have been "Lincoln" or something in the Syncom series, about 1965. The other alternative is HF radio. It has problems.

  

More than you ever wanted to know about the subject. 

The fictional USS Bedforf because of its purported location will be in intermittent contact with "NATO North".

Would anyone see or hear the blast? 

Yes. Acoustically that sound would reverb in the oceans and be picked up by detection gear designed for it for hundreds to thousands of kilometers. You would hear it in the mid Atlantic if you had the proper hydrophones in ~1962-1966. Seismic stations as far away as the eastern US would know something had happened and if the equipment operators were good enough, would be able to generate a true bearing and rough distance even in 1962-1966 era.  I presume the closest seismic / acoustics detectors would be in Daneborg or Scorebysund. Reytjkavek would know for sure. They were pinballed for this kind of thing. They would get on the radio and ask for Greenland station data and use that to triangulate and locate the event with a CEP of about ~100-150 km radius.   

See the blast? 



Yes. If not civil aviation, USAF patrols would detect it by flash and SOUND. And then there is the radiological debris. There is no way this event could be hidden, not even in 1962. 

  Definitely agree it wouldn't be hidden.  If nothing investigations of the ship's disappearance would pick up on the debris.  Didn't think there were many or that advanced satellites at this point and would they still have relied on dropping film capsules for returning information at this date.  Thought Seismic stations might pick it up.  Not sure if there would be much a/c flying in that region at that date, both because northern Asia would be no go and also a/c lacking the range of latter planes but some military units might be about IF the weather was good.

That was the Discovery series of overflight photo-birds; the basis for "Ice Station Zebra". Mid-air recovery method of the capsule by C-130 or a KC-series, was seen in a James Bond film LONG after the method was abandoned as unnecessary.

"Lincoln" and its Russian opposite used an uplink from the transmitting unit, a delay timer based on estimated time to reach the receiver station below the satellite in the orbital path and then a rebrodcast as close to overhead as could be achieved.   
 
Geo-synchronous communication satellites removed the delay timer element, but that specific system was not in place and really secure until around 1970.

The Americans had recon and armed birds in the air to support the DEW line; which was active during those years. It was the 24/7 SAC cycle and the weather did not matter. If you crashed, tough. That was the day of LeMay.  

  
 

[575]

a) Even in late 1960's the ionosphere played games with HF-radio; living in East Greenland we would often be off the air.

b) The Thule crash of a B-52 carrying 4 thermonuclear bombs happened 1968 and was a pain getting to and begin rescue operation on the sea-ice.

My dad worked on two Loran stations - Angissoq in the south close to Nanortalic and Orssuiassuak close to Tasiilak on the east coast - the latter the smaller one and being more observing I knew well a) but b) eluded me - possibly my folks didn't want to worry us children..