U.S. Sub Collides With Fishing Boat

A nuclear-powered U.S. submarine surfacing during routine operations Friday off the coast of Hawaii struck and sank a Japanese fishing vessel carrying 35 people, including 13 students from a fisheries high school, authorities here said.

Coast Guard teams rescued 26 of those who had been aboard the 150-foot fishing boat, identified as the Ehime Maru, but nine people were still missing as rescue efforts continued into the evening.

The stern of the attack submarine Greeneville struck the fishing vessel at 1:45 p.m. Hawaiian time, about 10 miles south of Honolulu, according to Lt. Cmdr. Cate Mueller, a Navy spokeswoman at the Pentagon. The Japanese vessel sank quickly, leaving the water full of debris and covered with a sheen of diesel fuel.

Hours after the accident, a search party of seven Navy and Coast Guard ships and four aircraft combed the scene for more survivors, according to a Coast Guard spokesman, Lt. Greg Fondran. The Greeneville also remained on the scene, officials said, to help in the search. Japanese television said that four students, three crewmen and two teachers still were missing.

After the first survivors were rescued from life rafts, “we haven’t found any others,” Fondran said. “But we’re continuing to look.”

Survivors were taken to the Coast Guard station at Honolulu Harbor’s Sand Island. Four were taken to Queen’s Medical Center in Honolulu with apparently minor injuries. Some of the victims were able to walk on their own, while others were being carried on stretchers.

Coast Guard Petty Officer Chris Johnson said the survivors were rescued by a 41-foot Coast Guard utility boat and a smaller Coast Guard rubber inflatable.

The fishing boat was a training vessel carrying high school students from the Uwajima Fisheries High School in Shikoku in southwestern Japan. It was observing tuna stocks near Hawaii, had left Japan on Jan. 10 and was scheduled to return March 23.

The 360-foot submarine, which can carry Tomahawk cruise missiles, did not appear to be damaged. It is more than twice as long and about 14 times as heavy as the Japanese vessel. Both the Navy and the Coast Guard will investigate the accident, authorities said.

“The riskiest evolution [maneuver] that a submarine can conduct is returning to the surface,” said retired Vice Adm. Bernard Kauderer of Carlsbad, who commanded submarine fleets in the Pacific and Atlantic. “Even with training, it is very dangerous.” Cmdr. Bruce Cole of the Pacific Fleet in Hawaii said that the submarine “would not have surfaced” if it had seen the fishing boat. The U.S. Weather Service reported intermitent thunderstorms, gusty winds up to 20 mph and sea swells up to 8 feet in the area where the collision occurred. A small craft advisory had been issued.

Former submariners said that rain or temperature changes can “confuse” sonar, and sea swells of that magnitude can make it difficult to see through a periscope. Sonar also can have “deaf spots.”

The ability of a submarine captain to avoid collisions while surfacing can also be affected by such factors as what kind of vessels may be in the area as well as the weather.

Procedures call for a submarine captain to begin probing the surface with sonar when he is about 100 feet below the surface as his boat begins its slow ascent at a speed of about 10 mph.

But even the most advanced sonar can fail to detect a boat on the surface if, for example, that boat is not using its engines or is powered only by sails and thus does not make sounds that sonar can detect. Acoustic phenomena also can render a submarine’s sonar “deaf” to a ship directly steaming toward the undersea craft.

A captain can check the ocean’s surface with his periscope when the surfacing sub is about 60 feet under water. With ideal weather and calm sea conditions, a periscope can allow a captain to see several thousand yards or more. But sea swells, rain or cloudiness can hamper the effectiveness of a periscope.

“It’s one of those risks that come with the job,” said retired submarine captain Harry Mathis in San Diego.

A collision with a submarine can be devastating for another vessel. A submarine’s steel hull is one of the strongest and thickest of any Navy vessel because it must withstand undersea pressures. The hull is also rounded, giving it additional strength.

“You don’t want to collide with a submarine,” Mathis said.

Mueller said that collisions between subs and surface vessels are “not common, but not unheard of either.”

It was not immediately known how many crew members were aboard the Greeneville, which is based in Pearl Harbor. A Los Angeles-class sub, the Greeneville was commissioned in February 1996. It has a diameter of 33 feet and displaces 6,900 tons submerged. The Japanese fishing vessel displaced 499 tons.

The Greeneville is one of the Navy’s 55 fast-attack submarines split based in Hawaii, San Diego, Norfolk, Va., and Groton, Conn. During the Cold War, when the Navy had 98 fast-attacks, the boats would search out and trail submarines of the Soviet Union.

Since the fall of the Soviet Union, the fast-attacks, armed with a variety of weapons, have been assigned to monitor the remaining Russian submarines and the increasing number of submarines being purchased by Third World countries.

One of the biggest debates within the Pentagon is whether the Navy has reduced its fast-attack fleet too drastically to keep pace with changing threats posed by Third World “rogue” nations.

In Washington, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said that President Bush had been informed of the incident.

The crash is the second major mishap involving a Navy vessel near Hawaii in seven months. In July, the Denver, a 570-foot amphibious transport dock ship, was preparing to receive fuel from the Yukon, a Military Sealift Command oiler, about 180 miles west of Oahu when the two vessels collided.

No one was injured, but the 677-foot Yukon sustained heavy damage to its right side and the Denver had a 25-foot-deep gash in its bow.

A Navy investigation reportedly found the captain and first officer of the Denver should have realized they were on course to hit the Yukon.

In a submarine accident off Southern California, the nuclear-powered attack submarine Houston was operating just below the surface in the San Pedro Channel before dawn on June 14, 1989, when its antenna snagged a cable between a civilian tugboat and barges the tug was towing.

The Houston, which was involved at the time in the filming of “The Hunt for Red October,” dragged the tugboat Barcona underwater, killing one of three crewmen on board.

The National Transportation Safety Board cited the Houston for failing to sweep the area with its active sonar detection gear before approaching the surface. The NTSB recommended that all Navy subs use sonar in the active mode while operating in U.S. coastal waters, except when national security is threatened.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

FATAL VOYAGE

The Navy submarine involved in the accident was a nuclear-powered attack vessel, based at Pearl Harbor. It has a low profile in the water and a blunt bow. The Japanese ship was a training vessel from a vocational high school.

Weather at time of accident

Seas were 4 to 8 feet in coastal waters south of Oahu. Honolulu weather was partly cloudy, with scattered showers.

The Submarine

Name: Greeneville

Class: Los Angeles

Beam: 33 feet

Weight: 6,082 tons

Crew: 146

Commissioned: Feb. 16, 1996

*

The Fishing Vessel

Name: Ehime Maru

Type: Longline fishing training vessel

Weight: 499 tons

Crew: 35 on board

(13 students, 2 teachers and 20 staff)

Sources: Jane’s Fighting Ships, Associated Press, Uwajima Fishery High School Web site, National Weather Service

Researched by JULIE SHEER / Los Angeles Times

LORENA INIGUEZ / Los Angeles Times *

Richter reported from Washington and Perry from San Diego. Times staff writers Valerie Reitman in Tokyo and Eric Malnic in Los Angeles and special correspondent Janet Snyder in Hawaii contributed to this story.