Deep Salvage Raising The Ehime Maru

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disaster at sea an American fast attack submarine collides with a Japanese fisheries training vessel in Hawaiian waters I was watching the captain his face turned white and he said what the hell was that and then as I increase the magnification on the periscope I could see High School and I thought to myself oh my god you know this is a this is a school boat beach we've had a vessel with kids in Jemez Maru sinks within minutes and the submarine is damaged somebody go up go up so I did 29 survivors are rescued nine students and crew are missing the Hema Morrow is now under 2,000 feet of water on the bottom of the Pacific Ocean in an unprecedented operation the US Navy decides to raise the vessel and return the missing Japanese crewmen to their families it is a complicated and difficult recovery operation one that will challenge an international Salvage to you to the limits of their ingenuity skill and technical expertise deep Salvage raising the [Music] there's really no no way to adequately describe the sensation of taking a submarine to see when the Greenville got underway on the morning of February 9th 2001 right after 8 a.m. we had the colors that's when we raised the flag and this ship's whistle blasted in the background the USS Greenville is a Los Angeles class nuclear-powered attack submarine this class of submarine is one of the most advanced in the u.s. Navy 360 feet long and six thousand nine hundred tons they're equipped with highly accurate sensors weapons control systems and central computer complexes their arsenal includes Tomahawk cruise missiles torpedoes and mines we had a number of our visitors topside and it select few joined me on the bridge of the ship that's the sail the very top part the conning tower of the submarine aboard the submarine our 106 crewmen and 16 guests the civilians are part of a long-running Navy program known as the distinguished visitors embark a way to show civilians how their tax dollars are spent there on the trip of a lifetime Susan snare and her husband Tony are two of the guests once we got up on top and we could see Pearl Harbor and we were moving and you could see the waves rushing behind the sub from the hall it was breathtaking I was excited in just the opportunity to see something that extraordinary a nuclear submarine Honolulu Harbor 1220 later that same day commander he sandy she takes his Fisheries training vessel the a he may Maru out to sea the ship is a floating classroom for high school students our training vessel was headed 12 to marine area area 7 35 men are aboard the Japanese fisheries training vessel 20 crew two instructors and 13 high school students most of whom are only 17 years old this is their first major sea voyage and they've been at sea for almost a month after leaving Japan on January 10th to hunt for tuna swordfish and shark these diesel-powered training vessels are almost 200 feet long and weigh in at some 500 tons they're sophisticated training ships designed to withstand the rigors of normal deep-sea fishing but this isn't a normal day at sea the AMA Morrow is about half the length of the USS Greenville and in sheer tonnage the Greenville weighs about fourteen times more for all US Navy ships it's standard operating procedure to keep track of and monitor other shipping 12:31 p.m. the sonar operators aboard the Greenville monitor and track a surface contact its assigned the number s 13 the Greenville and contact s 13 are operating in an area about nine miles south of the Hawaiian island of Oahu 1:31 p.m. aboard the greenville the day trip for the civilian guests is coming to an end but commander Scott Waddell has one last exercise he wants to demonstrate to his guests Mei Bao saying blow is a manoeuvre that a submarine performs in the event of an emergency say a flooding condition or a condition that requires it to rapidly ascend to the surface one thing about the emergency main ballast tank blow is once the procedure is initiated the submarine is going in one direction and that's up 1:37 p.m. before this manoeuvre can be carried out the Greenville comes to periscope depth to check for any conflicting surface traffic but I took the periscope not expecting and not anticipating that there was a close contact such as the Jemez Maru and when I looked down the lines of bearing to wear contacts were based upon fire control system I saw nothing did a low power sweep and didn't detect the vessel sonar believes contact s13 is miles away at a range of 16,000 yards in fact it's much closer actually only 3,000 yards away and closing at a speed of 11 knots [Music] commander Waddell invites a few civilian guests to participate with the emergency main ballast blow but only under close supervision of the crew 142 p.m. the Greenville is 400 feet below the surface when I was confident that there were no ships in close proximity to our vessel that would be a hazard they ordered the initiation of the emergency blow the 6910 submarine is heading towards the surface at a speed of 14 knots and at a 15 degree angle the current students aboard the Heymann Maru are going about their normal business it was at 100 feet when the first bang that first sensation when that took place it felt as if the stern of the ship was being lifted up [Music] as I was watching the captain his face turned white and he said what the hell was that fucking a dick man they need food me submarine was rising from the rear portside and then as I increase the magnification on the periscope I could see high school those were the first words that I could plainly read and then I read or jima and I thought to myself oh my god you know this is a this is a school boat we've we've hit a vessel with kids we got out I looked immediately outside and so something like submarine right next to a wall and our ship was already starting to go down the Greenville puts out an emergency call to Navy headquarters who in turn radio the Coast Guard someone off shouting go up go up so I did the rest I don't remember that's all I thought about thinking it was almost in a vertical position it was probably two to three minutes as our submarine was racing and trying to get to that position when the he me Mario Stern went beneath the surface and more rapidly the bow as I would say the four third of the vessel pointed up and then within seconds disappeared a damage assessment is carried out aboard the Greenville it's discovered the driveshaft has been knocked out of alignment but the sub is still seaworthy the US Coast Guard is on its way to rescue the survivors the seas are too rough for the Greenville to attempt a mid-ocean rescue the Greenville stands by and monitors the survivors who are all in life rafts within 50 minutes 26 men from the Jemez Maru are rescued nine are missing including four seventeen year old students for unity after getting into the life raft I saw so much degree I thought that somebody might have been hanging on to those pieces of debris my search to heart is getting more for the survivors you like people the Greenville and other rescue ships continue searching throughout the night for the missing Saturday morning in February 10 2001 the damaged USS Greenville returns the Pearl Harbor commander Scott Waddell is relieved of his command pending a u.s. Navy investigation aimed at the accident I can tell you it was a very lonely moment a very dark moment in my life and knowing that the likelihood of survivors was diminishing with each minute as time passed it was a heartbreaking moment anxious family members arrived in Hawaii hoping for further news about the missing the search for survivors will continue for days we've searched throughout the night we have Coast Guard helicopter out there a Coast Guard c-130 Navy aircraft Navy ships Coast Guard cutters out there looking diligently hoping to find those nine crew members after 20 days the search for survivors is given up there's now no hope of ever finding the missing man alive it's believed the men were unable to escape the sinking vessel and remain trapped inside distraught family members want their loved ones brought home and laid to rest professor George Tanabe advised the US Navy it was very important for the Japanese families to have the physical remains of their loved ones brought home because in Japanese funeral rites the the body it is important to have the bodies as part of the ritual and the reason why it is important to have the bodies is because the dead are understood to still have a a physical reality and having bodies they need to be fed if the feeding rights cannot be carried out then the Japanese believe that the dead will become hungry go and they exist forever in torment and agony and this would be unacceptable to the Japanese families to think that their loved ones would become hungry ghosts for not having been fed it's my pleasure that you let me express at the very start my deepest regrets over this tragic answer but I've seasoned all right if there's nothing under pressure from the Japanese government the US Navy orders an extraordinary sixty million dollar salvage operation the AHIMA morale will be raised from an impossible depth 2,000 feet below the surface of the Pacific Ocean the Navy knows it will be an unprecedented and complicated salvage mission and even if the a he may Marlow has successfully recovered it's possible the missing men may not be aboard deep Salvage raising the a-team a morrow the collision between the USS Greenville and the he may Morrow has turned into an international incident the Navy must find the nine missing men and return them to their families for burial it orders its scorpio ii submersible airlifted to hawaii it will be used to locate the ahi maru on the sea bottom six days after the accident the Scorpio to using its onboard sonar detects a sunken vessel at 11:25 p.m. then four minutes later positive identification the RV's video camera picks up the stern plate of the he memorial [Music] the clock on the bridge is frozen in time stop forever on the moment of the collision a survey of the ship is carried out it's discovered the bowel area was severely damaged when the he may Maru hit the ocean bottom the extreme 2,000 foot depth and 750 tons sunken weight of the Eagle May morrow makes the salvage operation unique the recovery of TWA flight 800 off Long Island was in 125 feet of water even the sunken Russian submarine Kursk was in a mere 350 feet of water the decision raised has been made but how will it be done the Navy needs a plan and decides to bring in the experts the Dutch deep-sea salvage companies Schmitt gets a call from the US Navy can they salvaged the he may Maru miksa Haussmann's is the salvage master put in charge of the project he knows from personal experience that ocean salvages tough and dangerous work he was the last man off this crippled ship but raising the AHIMA Maru will present its own unique set of problems for house marks it was interesting with course it was such a challenge it had never been done before and and was just such a thing that it gives you the the shivers you think well this has never been done before we like to do that yeah the salvage operation will be carried out in three phases phase one de Hema Mauro will first be raised from the bottom of the Deepwater recovery site phase two this ship will next be moved to a shallow water site near Honolulu Airport where divers will search for the bodies Phase three finally the ship will be moved offshore and released in eight thousand feet of water where she won't be a marine hazard the salvage team ships and equipment must be in place for a September lift ladies and gentlemen this is a Rear Admiral bill Klem he is in charge of the ME muru recovery operations what makes this operation unique is the fact that with 2,000 feet of water it's a fairly large ship to be raised from such a deep water birth that has not been done we're well beyond the capacity the depth that divers can operate and as a consequence everything has to be done by remote control it's successfully the he may morrow recovery will be a milestone in deep ocean salvage history the entire underwater lift must be carried out using remote operated vehicles for our Ovie's it will be an extreme technical challenge to lift the 750 ton vessel from 2,000 feet of water even though the Deep Water Salvage will be carried out by civilians the US Navy will be along every step of the way the Navy is worried about the strength of the AHIMA Morrow's hull they're concerned she may snap in half if lifted by traditional methods it's a risk the Navy doesn't want to take the Navy and the salvagers come up with a unique plan Rene was chosen for the doing method was because of the bow of the Aymara was heavily damaged and they were very afraid that by lifting the stern that did bow might fall off and they expected to be bodies in there as well and it was the whole aim of the recovery operation recover the bodies the decision is made to drill under the e he may morrow and then pull two huge lifting plates under the ship in Houston Texas the unique underwater drill is designed built and tested buried in dirt a mock hull plays the role of the Jemez Mauro the drill had successfully bores underneath and out the other side heavy-duty lifting plates are pulled back underneath the McCall the lifting plates are outfitted with special pressurized water jets to blow away silt and mud as the plates are pulled under the ship the concept works on land but will it work 2,000 feet below the surface of the Pacific the deep water dive ship the rock water to is reconfigured for the lifting operation she's a multi-purpose diving support vessel 323 feet long 59 feet wide and draws 17 feet of water the specialized Salvage equipment is loaded aboard the ROV czar also being prepared their cutting-edge technology and are critical for the success of the lifting operation underwater robots that are the hands and eyes of the surface operators canyon Offshore's ROV project leader marks tiger it allows us to stay in the water longer it's water divers there's more of a hazard to divers where is we have an ROV down there working on a job something bad happens piece of equipment falls on the ROV you lost an oral D but you never got anybody hurt or killed six months after the deadly collision the salvage ships specialized equipment and technicians gather in Hawaii all the designs assisted everything has been fairly well thought of and and and we were very well prepared August 8 the rock water is now more Dover the evening Amaro a global positioning system linked to the rock water steering and propulsion systems keeps the ship in place the ROV czar given their pre dive checks and a lowered over the side we didn't land directly over the boat we were up up location about 50 meters at flying onto the vessel when you're using sonar to come up on the vessel and you see the debris field and there was lots of things down there life rafts shirts shoes that's one it was really sad to see all that August 15th the drilling system along with the unit that will be powering it has been lowered into place near the a he may morrow now it's up to the ROV pilots to bore underneath the e he may morrow and out the other side Robert Forbes of cut pressure control the first attempt that we did we got out about 25 to 30 feet and we we hit something we attempted to do that I'm going to say seven or eight times and each time we felt sort of reaching the other side of the event room we were really we wanted that to work really bad because that was the easiest means of getting underneath the boat pulling the lifting plates through it was sad like many plans the drilling concept looked good on paper it even functioned perfectly on land but the salvagers discovered the situation wasn't what they had expected an unforeseen hollow impact crater under the wreck caused the drill head to lose directional control August 21st after six difficult and disappointing days of trying the coil tube drilling plan is shelved at this very heart it was not a fine decision but we were confident that we were going to recover this ship with other means it's been almost seven months since the deadly collision between the a Hema Morrow and the USS Greenville the Japanese submarine rescue ship the cahaya arrives in Pearl Harbor she's equipped with her own ROV and will help with the salvage operation we are into family members and their feelings their sadness loneliness and how they feel but if incident finding the victims is our top priority the he he may morrow salvage operation isn't going as planned plan a drilling under the ship has failed the salvagers are prepared and go to plan B they'll now attempt to lift up the hem a morose Stern positioned messenger wires and pulled the to lifting plates into position under the ship very straightforward very simple but all had to be done on 2,000 feet without human intervention which made it very complex visual acuity when you're running the manipulators you don't have that that's its if I just move my arm out I just close my jaws you have to see it and that's that's what's really tricky is being able to see it with a little bit of delay dealing with currents the salvagers will have to proceed very carefully no one knows if the EMA Mauro is still structurally sound after the collision it's possible the damaged ship could break into transponders electronic measuring devices are placed on the bow and on the bridge if the distance between the transponders changes the salvage team will know the ship is starting to break apart [Music] the ROV the stipulated lifting sling through the stern of the e he may morrow it's a difficult and time-consuming task that's a 24 hour a day operation the salvagers work in shifts sleeping when they can using the very powerful winches on the rock water to salvagers successfully lift the ahem a Maru stern the ship is stronger than first thought she doesn't break apart the salvagers are able to see the collision damage on the bottom of the EMA morrow for the first time who literally looked like somebody taking a butter knife and cut a slice of butter clean through the boat it was almost big enough to fit one of our obesity the initial collision point was just behind the Greenville sail the submarines rudder then sliced through the e-team a morrow from right to left breaching the ship's watertight bulkheads the collision left a lethal 50 foot long and 2 foot wide gash explaining why the ship sank within minutes August 31st a major setback with the eh-hem Amaro's Stern suspended some 24 feet above the ocean floor the stern lifting sling breaks those wouldn't like that that snapped and she came down in a big dust cloud and at that moment you're flabbergasted placing the cables underneath the ship isn't proving as simple as the salvagers had hoped the rock water returns to port for a new reinforced stern lifting strap September 4th 28 days into the salvage operation frustration levels are rising the stern is raised once again in an effort to place the messenger cables under the ship nothing is going as planned the cables keeps nagging on the MA MA rows jagged hull and again there are problems with the lifting sling the lifting plate broke and she was held by the cables which were underneath lifting plate and so we lowered him back into the seabed and and we really discovered something what was very sad to see that she was proudly sitting with her bow buried in the seabed and the bow was completely gone the soft ocean bottom apparently couldn't support the transfer of weight to the a hem Amaro's bow while the stern was being lifted the salvage team must regroup Plan B lifting the stern and placing the lifting plates isn't going to work the clock is ticking the salvagers know they have a limited window of time to raise the ship the rock water too moves back to Honolulu Harbor the salvagers will have to come up with a different plan when the filled with but be I was concerned for a moment we had all the sudden to come up with another plan and it was only short time but he felt like this is done going to work and it was only for a very very short moment September 7th the salvage team knows they have to complete the operation before the winds change to onshore in early November they can't risk fouling any of Oahu's beaches with oil and fuel from the a Hemi Morrow the pressure is on plan a and Plan B assailed the salvage team must now improvise the new plan calls for the a Hemi Morrow to be lifted out of the muck using the stern lifting plate and cables attached to the bow putting even more stress on the already damaged ship she will then be positioned on the front lifting plate before the final lift and voyage to the shallow water recovery site the ama Morrow's two hose pipes will be used to place the bow lifting cables the hospice are the steel tubes in the bow through which the anchor chains are let out but first the bow must be dredged out of the silt we use these dredge pumps to actually do all the sucking we suck equivalent of two swimming pools that were approximately 10,000 to 15,000 gallons each sucked equivalent to swimming pools from each side of the vessel the anchors must be cut off before the bow lifting cables can be placed the people were stressed no and they were tired because this was an unusual thing for those our Afiya practices not to be constantly on the chop they were making lots and lots of hours continuous diving with the arrow feet the cable system used to raise the bow had to be designed and assembled by the team and threaded through the hose pipes using the ROV z-- October 5th 59 days into the lifting operation the risk of failure is high the salvage team knows this could be their last chance all these are used to position the stern lifting plate the team will now attempt to lift the ship by the stern lifting plate and the cables that have been attached to the bow [Music] after weeks of trying the jury-rigged lifting system succeeds in pulling the ehi me morrow free from the bottom for the first time that was quite a feeling you know it was just a good feeling that we were at least able to live this whole ship and that we had in our hands that we had her in control or ru Eureka moment was the first time we actually physically got the whole vessel op cement that was a great moment the AHIMA maru is next placed on the front lifting plate and attached to the lifting frame the lifting frame has been designed to spread the weight of the helium ro evenly over the to lifting plates it will also compensate for any underwater movement during the journey to the shallow water site October 12th with the e he name arose suspended under the rock water and a flotilla of escort ships she begins her slow journey from the deepwater site to the shallow waters near Honolulu Airport where the search for the missing crew members will take place October 14th the ahima Morrow is slowly lowered 100 feet onto the sea floor near Honolulu Airport it was a big relief that we were there and nothing could happen anymore she was safe down there divers could do the jokes and that we were able to put her down it was very nice a good feeling the job of the Deepwater salvagers and the rock water is over [Music] the recovery operation will now move into Phase two divers from the US and Japanese Navy's will search the Agena morrow for the missing men deep Salvage raising the Jemez Maru the AHIMA Morrow's salvage operation is now moving into its most dangerous phase divers will have to search the ship compartment by compartment for the nine missing men the Crowley marine barge will act as the main dive platform [Music] [Music] [Music] the job of searching the hanamaru is risky business the divers were contains at 100 feet below the surface it's still a very dangerous environment [Music] inclinometers are installed on the rack they will show if the vessel moves on the ocean floor a potentially dangerous situation for the divers retired Navy diver Jim Santo has worked on similar missions basically just going inside the ship is a danger in itself so when the diver does go inside there's another diver on the outside of that hatch or doorway or wherever he's going in at the diver will stand out there and Tans his umbilical for him obviously when he's going inside he's going around corners and there may be jagged edges just in itself just just going into a place you haven't been in before there's a a lot of areas that he can get hurt family members of the victims begin to arrive in Hawaii they're hoping the divers will find their missing sons brothers husbands working in low to zero visibility conditions recovery divers clear blocked passageways of debris the divers have to enter deep into the damaged ship in their search for the missing very soon the divers begin to find what they're looking for some ten months after the accident eight of the nine missing men are found [Music] the body of the ninth victim 17 year old Takeshi Mizoguchi isn't found 37 year old teacher Hiroshima Kazama was one of the men found aboard the ship [Music] the AHIMA Morrow's still has one last journey to her final resting place in the deep waters of the Pacific two months after the collision with the emag Morrow and some two million dollars worth of repair work the USS Greenville leaves drydock in Hawaii this time without commander Scott Waddell a u.s. navy court of inquiry puts the blame for the ahem a moral collision firmly on the shoulders of the Greenville's commander and crew manny officer USS greenville created an artificial sense of urgency in preparation for surfacing his ship when prudence seamanship the safety of his submarine and good judgment dictated otherwise at the same time the courts report did not produce any evidence of criminal intent or deliberate misconduct on commander Wallace part I think this is an important point additionally commander Waddell upheld the principle and tradition of accountability and took full responsibility for his actions the Navy inquiry also concludes the civilians aboard the Greenville didn't play a role in the collision a promising naval career comes to an abrupt end Scott model is forced to retire from the Navy they were highly skilled highly trained highly qualified individuals on board that ship that day myself included that through actions and inactions resulted in the culmination of a loss of life in a loss of vessel and that's that's the horror and that's the tragedy of this this accident in December of 2002 Scott Waddell makes a painful journey to Japan to meet with the families of the men who died it is my personal hope and prayers that my visit today will help the spirits of those who lost their lives reach peace for the survivors of the AHIMA Maru and the families of the victims the salvage operation was a sad success the Navy did a very thorough job of retrieving not just the bodily remains but the personal belongings as well and I think in the end the Japanese were able to have the bodies cremated as is the custom with Japanese who knows to take the remains back to Japan November 25th 2001 the Jemez maru takes its final journey almost ten months after colliding with the USS greenville suspended under the crowley marine salvage barge she's moved to a location approximately 12 miles south of Barbers Point Oh wahoo she will be sunk in eight thousand feet of water family members of the men who died witnessed the release from the Japanese submarine rescue ship JDS Chihaya [Music] one of the Jemez Morrow's anchors is part of this monument on Honolulu's waterfront it's a touchstone for many of the Japanese visitors who come to Hawaii this group of Japanese fisheries students came to pay respect to their dead countrymen the monument names those who died on February 9th 2001 hirotaka segawa hiroshima Tschida Toshi Michi who Booya hero she Mac Izawa June Nakata you skate Terada Toshiya sakushima Katsuya no moto and the ninth victim who was never found Takeshi Mizoguchi [Music] every week the monument is cleaned by students from the local japanese-american school the flowers are gathered and taken to the Honolulu Harbor violets they are then scattered in the blue waters of the Pacific paying tribute to the nine men who died so quickly and unexpectedly you [Music]

Info

Channel: Nowhere Man

Views: 127,069

Rating: 4.6596861 out of 5

Keywords: Submarines, US Navy, Ehime Maru, Hawaii

Id: d0ebAtx_LDc

Channel Id: undefined

Length: 44min 52sec (2692 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 17 2018

Reddit Comments

i just watched all of this video thanks for sharing. Very sad but interesting.

👍︎︎ 2 👤︎︎ u/AeroFX 📅︎︎ May 22 2018 🗫︎ replies

it did seem impossible! the drill idea seemed extremely clever i fully expected it to work. i found it quite eery imagining the ship sailing but underwater instead of above i have to say

👍︎︎ 1 👤︎︎ u/AeroFX 📅︎︎ May 23 2018 🗫︎ replies