Chapter 558 Confidence in domestic equipment

Earlier, on the other side of the exercise area, slightly closer to the middle.

underwater.

Inside the command cabin of the Great Wall No. 298 submarine, it was as quiet as death.

In fact, no submarine search equipment is sensitive enough to detect conversations in a submarine. The prohibition of talking in a silent state is just an exaggerated description in some literary works.

But in a war situation, it is indeed necessary to ensure that there are no unnecessary conversations in the command module.

Captain Ma Jie lowered his head and looked at the stopwatch in his hand. After completing one revolution, the minute hand on it was about to reach three-quarters of the dial for the second time.

This means that nearly an hour and 1 minutes have passed since their dive.

Although as an "imaginary enemy", the Great Wall 298 boat entered the exercise area earlier than the two warships, the waiting time was too long.

"Captain, isn't this right? The participating fleet should have been here a long time ago, right?"

Political commissar Yang Shan, who was also wearing cool clothes next to him, whispered.

When a conventional submarine is completely silent, the battery can last about 8-10 hours underwater, so it does not encounter the problem of insufficient energy.

However, according to the exercise plan set before the voyage, the submarine search process should only last for about 20 minutes at most.

What's more, they almost parked the submarine slightly east of the middle of the predetermined sea area, without sitting on the bottom.

Whenever an active sonar comes over, the target should be found.

When the time comes, just struggle a little and then float up.

But after such a long time, nothing seemed to happen around them.

"Did we make a mistake in our positioning?"

Vice Captain Liu Changlin immediately thought of the worst possibility.

It was now a critical stage before he was promoted to trainee captain. If he made such a big mistake during a joint external exercise, he would not be able to expect any development.

"How is it possible? The sextant I personally saw is absolutely correct."

The captain frowned and denied.

Yang Shan also felt that the deputy captain's idea was too outrageous, but it was not a problem to hold it underwater like this all the time, so he suggested:

"How about we go up to periscope depth and take a look?"

After finishing speaking, he added another sentence:

"It's been such a long time anyway. Even if we get found if we go up, we won't lose anyone."

Ma Jie lowered his head and thought for a moment, and felt that Yang Shan was right.

"Drain the ballast tanks and float to periscope depth!"

A few seconds later, the reply came:

"The ballast water tank has begun to drain and is floating!"

Floating by inflating a compressed gas bottle is a relatively quiet method.

However, some buzzing drainage sounds can still be heard on the 033, an old submarine.

For modern high-performance sonar, this sound is still relatively easy to detect.

But in this case, it didn't matter that Ma Jie was discovered.

"Periscope depth has been reached!"

As the boat operator's report came.

Ma Jie strode to the search periscope at the front of the command module, held the operating handles on both sides, and pressed his forehead against the eyepiece gasket.

The 033 submarine is theoretically equipped with H/SQ2-262A type sonar, but this thing only solves the problem of availability. In fact, unless another 033 or similar old ship is sent to the opposite side, it will be difficult to hear anything useful.

So usually the most effective reconnaissance equipment is the optical periscope.

The captain still remembered that when he dived before, the bow of the boat was pointed to the west, which was the direction of the fleet's sailing.

However, after searching for half a week, he still could not find any trace of the two destroyers.

Ma Jie felt a little strange and switched to the air search channel again.

Sure enough, I saw an anti-submarine helicopter in mid-air.

However, unlike what he imagined was flying towards him, the target became smaller and smaller in his field of vision, and soon disappeared directly from the skyline.

"Old Ma, what's going on?"

Yang Shan and Ma Jie have been partners on the Great Wall 298 boat for some years, and they are very familiar with every move of the old friend. When he saw the latter holding a periscope and looking in the same direction for a long time, he also felt that something was wrong.

The latter took a step back and returned the periscope to its original position:

"I saw the submarine search helicopter gain altitude and fly away very quickly."

"what?"

Generally speaking, if an old submarine like the 033 is really tracked nearby by a modern anti-submarine unit, there will be basically no room for a comeback other than sitting on the bottom and waiting for a miracle.

But just now they didn't hear the sound of the sound waves from active sonar hitting the side wall of the submarine.

The three members of the command team looked at each other, and they all saw a bit of confusion in each other's eyes.

Logically speaking, as the imaginary enemy in the exercise, they should face the joint strangulation of surface ships and helicopters in this case.

But now it seems that the whole world has forgotten them.

"Snorkel status navigation, maintain current heading, forward two."

Ma Jie took a deep breath and gave the car clock command to start the main engine:

"Go and see what they're doing."

……

Just when the few people in the submarine were completely confused, the CIC on the Daocheng ship was already very busy, and indeed no one cared about there being one of their own submarines in the exercise area.

When they first received the news that the helicopter had discovered the underwater target, everyone just regarded it as a normal acting process, and followed the previous arrangement and called for the Barr to go for reinforcements.

Although the performance of the French military helicopter is not as good as the upgraded Z-9C, the several active and passive sonobuoys on board are still very effective equipment for searching for submarines in a large area.

China's agreement to arrange joint anti-submarine exercises this time also has the purpose of examining how developed countries use sonobuoys.

However, before everyone could breathe a sigh of relief, another shocking news came from the helicopter.

"The sonar operator of aircraft 9686 reported that the detected target characteristics were not Type 033 submarines."

The radio operator's words instantly made the atmosphere in the entire cabin become solemn.

Yang Shuyu, who was joking with the captain, instantly sat upright.

"Can you determine who the target belongs to?"

Captain Luo Zhangming was the first to ask.

Yang Shuyu is the Chinese commander-in-chief of this joint exercise, but the situation at hand has obviously gone beyond the plan, so the command has defaulted to the captain who is more familiar with the ship's situation.

"No. 9686 said it is not possible yet, but it should be a conventional submarine that is not very large. They are continuing to track it."

Luo Zhangming's brain was running rapidly.

The only conventional submarines that can appear in the East China Sea, apart from our military, are South Korea or Japan.

Today's joint military exercise involves the use of weapons, so the scope of the exercise must be publicly announced in advance.

Type 052 is China's most advanced surface battleship currently.

It's normal for some underwater villains to sneak around and try to collect some information.

"Confirm, how long can No. 9686 last?"

In the past, the Daocheng was equipped with two AS565 anti-submarine aircraft that were exactly the same as those of the French army. According to Luo Zhangming's experience, the fuel would basically be exhausted by this time.

For things like anti-submarine, if you can't continue to put pressure on the search, then once the opponent runs away in a certain space, it will be difficult to find him again.

"The pilot said that he should be able to conduct a submarine search mission for 15 minutes before returning home."

The radio operator reported something that shocked Luo Zhangming:

"Can we still fly for 15 minutes?"

The navy's ship units and carrier-based aircraft units are organized separately and are only together when they go to sea to perform missions.

These two Z-9Cs were both new machines delivered at the beginning of the year. Originally, he was a little worried about the performance of the domestic models.

But now it seems that the performance is even better than the original product...

At this time, the naval aviation officer next to him interjected just right:

"When the Z-9C was delivered before, according to the technical manual given to us by the Ice Aircraft Group, the range and take-off weight were indeed much better than the imported AS565."

As if to confirm this statement, the liaison officer responsible for communication between the two ships immediately reported:

"The Jean Bart contacted us and stated that their helicopter needs to return after launching the sonobuoy, and it will take at least twenty minutes to prepare before taking off again."

Obviously, Luo Zhangming's judgment just now was correct.

This newly delivered domestic model indeed performs better than the original.

At this moment, he was suddenly full of confidence in the new equipment in his hand.

For a new piece of equipment, especially domestically produced new equipment, it takes a process for commanders and fighters to go from being able to use it, knowing how to use it, to daring to use it.

Generally speaking, this confidence needs to be achieved slowly during use and training.

But this time, due to the stark comparison with the French army next door, the process was completed in one step.

As a result, a bold idea gradually formed in my mind——

Allowing a submarine in submersible state to approach within 20 nautical miles of the fleet in exercise state can already be said to have shown considerable hostility.

After all, this is already within the range of quite a few anti-ship torpedoes.

Moreover, if it weren't for some mistake, and the helicopter used active sonar to search for a location near the border, they might have succeeded.

Therefore, we must teach this sneaky opponent some lessons, otherwise we may have to push further next time.

But having said that, this is not a territorial waters area after all, and it cannot really be sunk by others...

"Notify the aviation department... to prepare to release aircraft 9696."

Luo Zhangming organized his thoughts and quickly issued combat instructions:

"Also, hang two torpedoes and dispatch."

"One live bomb, and one mine!"