“I doubt it, Sir, it’s only thirty meters deep, they could still just about stay submerged in that, but only just.”
“Yes, they could come through on the surface but there’s a good Moon tonight so I doubt they’ll risk being seen.” Luke lowered his voice. “What I’m thinking is that we get into the narrow channel, sit on the bottom so we don’t need to make a noise fighting the outflow. I think they’ll come through fairly deep so they’ll have to put on more revs to fight the inflow pushing them back in, that’ll make them noisier. When they're behind Perim Island we leave to the north, come around the island and get into their baffles.” Mark smiled.
“Sounds like a plan, you devious bugger.”
“We’ll have to catch them quickly though, they’ll soon be in the Gulf of Aden and then they could go anywhere. Plenty of sea room there.” The Exec nodded.
The baffles are an area directly behind the submarine, where sonar is much less effective. It can interfere with the detection of any pursuing submarine. In the cold war, an abrupt about turn and charge to clear its baffles by a Soviet submarine was called a “Crazy Ivan.” The use of towed array sonar has reduced the effectiveness of a baffle hidden approach.
Long minutes dragged on. Ratty played with his set, a frown on his face.
“Possible contact Sir. I think a boat’s broke surface. Thirty three degrees, range thirty six kilometres.” Luke waited, come on Ratty, come on.
“Lost him.” Damn. An hour dragged on by, like a snail at a funeral.
“I have them, Sir. Definite contact, it sounds like a boat’s broke surface heading our way range twenty five kilometres, bearing thirty four degrees. I’m optimising the search for that range.” The scan took long minutes. “Possible second contact Sir, depth one four five, speed approx. sixteen knots.” Luke punched the air.
“Designate surface contact Tango one.”
“Too early to be sure on the second contact Sir. A screw count isn’t possible yet.”
“Keep up the grid search Exec, maintain speed.” Time passed by, the clock seemed to have ground down almost to a stop.
“Sir, I’ve got faint but good classifications on the contacts now. They’re bearing thirty six degrees, range twenty two kilometres, depth eight zero meters. Screw count and vibration profiles identify the lead contact as the Nahang and the second contact is the Siyah Bambak. The Iranian navy library shows both ratings are above eighty five percent probable.”
“Good work Ratty, you’ve snared yourself two black holes. Weps, designate contacts as Tango’s one, and two.”
“None of them are showing any sign of having detected us, Sir.”
“Good, watch out for any signs of coasting.”
“Way aye, Sir.”
Sometimes a boat will turn off its drive and coast, listening for any other vessels in the area.
“Weps.”
“Yes Sir,” said Lt Commander Savita Kapoor. She looked up at him. He couldn’t help but smirk at her deep beautiful black brown eyes, framed in the white anti-flash hood.
“In your professional opinion Weapons officer, what would you think appropriate?” It was obvious he knew, but it was the usual boat’s banter. Luke couldn’t see her mouth, but her eyes smiled, for him it was as though the sun had come out.
“Captain, I think they’d like to get closely acquainted with a Spearfish.”
“Then load em up.”
She activated her headset and spoke to the torpedo room. “Check Spearfish tubes status.” A few minutes went by.
Savita turned to Luke “Sir, tubes one, two, five and six are loaded and ready in all respects. The fish are greedy today.”
“Sonar Sir, we have a coast,” said Ratty.
“All stop, disengage drive,” snapped Luke. Holy Ghost coasted silently through the dark depths. After several minutes, Southworth spoke up.
“They’ve re-engaged their drive. They’ve bunched up a little, Nahang’s putting on a few more knots to compensate. It looks like they’re trying to maintain a separation of one kilometre.”
“Planesman come to eighty degrees, blow one and two, up angle fifteen.”
“Exec, let’s get into the narrow channel. They’re going right down the middle of the main channel. Rewind the tail. The towed array sonar retracted back into the boat. HMS Holy Ghost rose almost to the surface and made her way east towards the Yemeni coast. After fifteen minutes, Luke thought the time was right. He raised the periscope and did a full three sixty and then returned to look at the east and north. His fingers found the night vision control, the scope returned a green glowing view of the coastline and to the north a low Island coastline.
“Planesman come to fifteen degrees, twelve knots.”
“Fifteen at twelve aye Sir.”
Sir.” The Ghost moved into the channel. When the time was right and she was approaching the north end of the channel, he lowered the scope.
“Flood forward one, come to zero knots. make your depth four zero”
“Zero aye Sir.” The Ghost sank slowly in the dark shallow channel, the current flow out from the Red Sea through the narrow channel slowed her quickly. With a muffled but firm crump, she soon came to rest on the seabed. The Ghost waited for its prey like a patient but deadly Eel.
“Can you hear them Ratty?”
“Yes Sir, not as good as before, but good enough.” Luke waited, come on boys, come to Mother. As the minutes ticked by Luke took what felt like his three hundredth look at the clock.
“Conn sonar, Siyah Bambak’s disappeared.” Luke’s jaw dropped.
“Disappeared?”
Chapter 4
“THE SIYAH BAMBAK’S just disappeared?” asked Luke.
“Yes Sir, Nahang’s bearing two nine two, eighteen knots. But Siyah Bambak’s gone.” He looked to his executive officer. Commander Mark Davis shrugged.
“Hard to say, Sir. They must have come to a stop, whether it’s a tactical move or a mechanical problem,” he shrugged again and raised his palms, “who knows?” This was a problem. A bloody great mother of a problem.
“Bastard,” Luke cursed.
The Nahang was moving into the area where she could best be tracked and followed. He could do that but then the Siyah Bambak’s behind and potentially in his baffles. He shook his head in frustration, he could leave the channel go out and follow Nahang but risk having a Kilo chasing him. On the other hand, if he waited for the Siyah Bambak them the Nahang may get out into the Gulf of Aden where it’d be very hard to find. What to do? That little mischievous Imp called fate was always out there throwing you a wobbler. Like facing a spin bowler in Cricket, you never knew what to expect. Come on MacArthur, think. Luke bowed his head deep in thought. Finally, he reluctantly came to a decision.
“Blow two and four slowly. Come to twenty five meters.” The Ghost rose slowly from the channel seabed.
“Forward six knots.” Luke waited until they were clear of the channel.
“Come to two six zero, speed fifteen knots. Flood one and two, ten degrees down angle, make your depth one hundred.”
“Two six zero, one hundred down aye Sir.” The deck angled down, the crew leaned back to compensate. HMS Holy Ghost was on the hunt and sensing the kill.
“Depth one hundred Sir, zero bubble.” The boat levelled out.
“Stream the Lure fish.” The Lure trailed out behind the boat and listened with its sonar array. Signals flowed back to the boat’s sophisticated computer where Fourier transformation analysis categorised the machinery noises. The high frequency, focused beam, multi-element imaging-search sonar fed the computer. It employed fifth order spatial processing techniques for location data. What all this meant is that Holy Ghost had a serious amount of data about what was going on around her. But it wasn’t infallible.