• Abstract and Figures
• Public Full-text

http://oceanusmag.whoi.edu/v43n1/pittenger.html For the Navy, the Coast Isn’t Clear Oceanographers mobilize to help the Navy operate effectively in complex, shallow waters By Rear ADM (Ret.) Richard F. Pittenger marine force throughout the world’s deep soldiers use the landscape to their advan- Vice President for Marine Operations (Ret.) oceans. A year later, the first Persian Gulf tage. The key is understanding the ocean’s Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution War shifted the Navy’s interests to land- physical and geological properties, a basic very so often, circumstances can con- ing troops and operating ships in shallow, research endeavor promoted and funded Espire to make a battleship turn on a often mined, coastal waters. The research by the Navy for six decades. dime. Fifteen years ago, two geopolitical focus changed from “blue water” to what Columbus O’Donnell Iselin, second di- events prompted the U.S. Navy to abruptly the Navy dubbed “littoral” warfare. rector of the Woods Hole Oceanographic change long-standing research priorities Institution, was quick to realize the po- and steer rapidly in a new direction. Oceanography for national defense tential symbiosis between oceanographers When the Berlin Wall collapsed in One of the strengths of the U.S. Navy and the Navy. In August 1940, he wrote a 1989, so did the Navy’s Cold War necessity has been its ability to exploit the ocean letter to Frank B. Jewett, a member of the to counter the Soviet Union’s huge sub- environment in the same way land-based newly created National Defense Research WHOI Archives A LIFE-SAVING LECTURE—During World War II, WHOI scientist Dean Bumpus teaches a class of Navy submariners how to use bathythermographs to avoid detection by enemy sonar. The instruments, developed at WHOI, measure ocean salinity and temperature, which affect the propagation of sound under water. 60 Oceanus Magazine • Vol. 43, No. 1 • 2004 • oceanusmag.whoi.edu Committee, whose charge was to marshal the Navy’s highly successful SOund SUr- with widely different temperatures and the nation’s scientific resources for an in- veillance System (SOSUS), which could salinity levels, and the properties of these evitable global war. detect submarines by their faint acoustic water masses are constantly affected by a “The Woods Hole Oceanographic In- signals. SOSUS, and more advanced sys- wide variety of coastal factors and process- stitution…has been engaged in oceano- tems derived from it, allowed U.S. forces es—including tides, wind-driven currents, graphic research since 1931,” Iselin wrote. to track and, if circumstances warranted, inflows from rivers, changing air tempera- “This memorandum sets forth some engage Soviet submarines. tures, and mixing between water masses. suggestions as to how the personnel and Countering the Soviet submarine As the water masses shift, so does the equipment of this laboratory can be bet- threat was a daunting task, prompting a structure of the ocean’s water column and ter utilized for the national defense, for it Navy research investment of about $14 the transmission of sound through it. seems likely that the training and experi- billion per year, but it was a primary Cold The result is a highly complex and dy- ence of oceanographers will enable them War mission. Being able to accurately keep namic—and highly unpredictable—struc- to attack successfully various problems track of Soviet submarines whenever they ture inimical to the Navy’s cold, deepwater having a naval consequence.” operated created a powerful deterrent to a acoustic tools and techniques. Shipping Thus began WHOI’s long and con- shooting war. noise, fishing activities, and shallow, rever- tinuing tradition of research for the berating seafloor topography add further Navy. During World War II, Institution A new theater of operations acoustical complications. scientists investigated many aspects of The end of the Cold War brought a These acoustic difficulties in coastal underwater explosives. They found ways shift in priorities and a major reduction in waters make it hard to detect mines. Dur- to prevent fouling of ships’ hulls by bar- Navy research funding. But new conflicts ing the first Persian Gulf War, Iraqis used nacles, seaweed, and other marine life emerged, as well as renewed attention to World War I-era mines deployed from that caused turbulence and increased old ones in the Middle East, Yugoslavia, small boats to staunch the movement of fuel consumption—research that lowered Korea, and Taiwan. These served to refo- U.S. amphibious forces. the Navy’s fuel bill by 10 percent. They cus the Navy’s attention on learning how Another uniquely coastal danger is bio- showed how salinity and temperature to operate safely and effectively in coastal luminescence. Nutrient-rich coastal waters changes in the ocean affected the propa- waters, which are extraordinarily challeng- are full of marine life that glows when gation of sound under water. They built ing for naval warfare. excited by movement and can reveal the instruments (bathythermographs) to The properties of the waters from the presence of ships, subs, or Navy SEALs. measure these changes and trained sailors continental shelf to the coast are funda- As they have since the days before Pearl to use them to avoid detection from so- mentally different from the cold, deep Harbor, WHOI scientists have mobilized nar, which “saved many of our ships,” the ocean. The simple, stable, and predict- to conduct basic oceanographic research Navy reported. able structure of water masses in the deep funded by the Navy in this new theater of Such wartime research successes led ocean (such as the SOFAR channel) does operations. The four articles that follow in 1946 to the creation of the U.S. Office not exist in the shallows. highlight some of their work related to lit- of Naval Research (ONR), which funds Coastal waters contain water masses toral warfare. instrument and technology development and wide-ranging basic research on ocean ick Pittenger was born in Nebraska during the worst of the Dust properties and processes, particularly in DBowl/Depression era of the mid-1930s. His family moved west, even- ocean acoustics. tually settling in Tacoma, Wash. Pittenger was attracted to the sea and actively participated in the Sea Scouts and Sea Cadets. He joined the U.S. Naval Reserves during the Korean War and earned an appointment to the Listening for submarines Naval Academy through the Reserves. Graduating in 1958, Dick was com- As in World War II, oceanographic re- missioned an ensign and went on to serve for 32 years, rising to the rank of rear admiral. He earned a master’s degree in physics (underwater acous- search proved valuable to the Navy during tics) at the Naval Postgraduate School. His duties included mostly destroy- the Cold War. Research begun at WHOI WHOIGraphic Services Gray, Dave ers, and he specialized in anti-submarine warfare (ASW). He commanded by Maurice Ewing and J. Lamar Worzel a minesweeper in Vietnam, a fast frigate that was a member of the then-revolutionary “ASW Squad- culminated in the discovery of the SOund ron,” and a destroyer squadron. His last duties in the Navy were as director of ASW for the Chief of Naval Operations, and as the Oceanographer of the Navy. Upon retirement, Pittenger came to Fixing And Range (SOFAR) channel, a WHOI where he led the Institution’s Marine Operations Division. His era at WHOI saw the addi- layer of water in the ocean that acts like a tion of Atlantis to the WHOI fleet, the retirement of Atlantis II, the mid-life conversions of Knorr pipeline for efficiently transmitting low- and Oceanus, the construction of the coastal research vessel Tioga, the revitalization of deep sub- mergence, including bringing the tethered vehicles Argo/Medea/Jason/DSL-120 into the National frequency sound over vast distances. Deep Submergence Facility and, in 2004, the award of a grant to build a replacement for Alvin. The discovery enabled the creation of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution 61.

Load more

  2

Copy Link