Military and Other Interesting Aircraft Tracking: adsbexchange

Sub hunter -- Eastern Med.

Four sub-hunters -- FL, GA, SC, NC


One location unknown.


Another in KY.



Again focus seems to be on the American Southeast.

Three Special Operations Command planes -- GA, Panhandle of FL and one unknown location.

Five sub hunters -- FL, panhandle of FL, GA, VA and one unknown location.

Naval Air Systems Command plane airborne -- could be a test of P8-A's (sub-hunters).

From less than a month ago:


Russia says it snuck nuclear attack submarines near US bases undetected
Alex Lockie
Mar. 16, 2018, 5:28 PM


Russian media reported on Friday that its military snuck nuclear attack submarines near US military bases and left undetected.
Russia has been increasingly touting its nuclear capabilities.
Even though the alleged submarine patrols near the US are militarily meaningless, Russian media reports they will air a TV series on the event.

Russian media reported on Friday that its military snuck nuclear attack submarines near US military bases and left undetected just weeks after Russian President Vladimir Putin hyped up his country's nuclear capabilities.

"This mission has been accomplished, the submarines showed up in the set location in the ocean and returned to base," Sergey Starshinov, a Russian navy submarine officer, told Russian state-owned media. Starshinov said the vessels came and went "undetected" and that without violating the US's maritime borders, they got "close enough" to US military bases.


continues at source:

[link to www.businessinsider.com]

And this from two months ago:


How new Russian submarine tactics are threatening to overwhelm aging U.S. fleet

By Carlo Muñoz - The Washington Times - Tuesday, February 13, 2018

Russia’s increasingly active submarine fleets in the Atlantic and Arctic have the Trump administration scrambling to respond amid fears that miles of underwater fiber-optic cables that crisscross the ocean floor transmitting the Pentagon’s most sensitive military secrets could be at risk...

Russian President Vladimir Putin is increasingly challenging U.S. security interests, and his submarine fleet’s “operational tempo is reaching Cold War-era levels,” said Magnus Nordenman, director of the Transatlantic Security Initiative at the Washington-based Atlantic Council. “Clearly, there is more attention being paid by the U.S. Navy in the Atlantic due to the Russian threat.”...

Adm. John Richardson, chief of naval operations, acknowledged this month that the numbers represent an uptick in traditional submarine operations, but he declined to comment on what, specifically, warranted the shift.


entire article at source:

[link to www.washingtontimes.com (secure)]

And from even earlier this year:

Why Are Russian Nuclear Attack Submarines Firing Torpedoes At Each Other?
Dave Majumdar

January 24, 2018


“If you look across the design of the Russian Federation Navy, where they have put their resources and their research and development efforts has primarily been in the undersea domain and in the submarine force,” Vice Adm. James G. Foggo III, who at the time was simultaneously commander of the U.S. Navy’s 6th Fleet, Joint Force Maritime Component Commander Europe and NATO’s Naval Striking and Support Forces NATO, told The National Interest back in 2016..

Back in May of 2016, the Russian nuclear-powered attack submarine Obninsk fired a torpedo against one of Moscow’s newest nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines, Yuri Dolgoruky.

The massive Project 955 Borei missile boat in turn launched a torpedo back at Obninsk, a smaller Project 671RTMK Schuka-class vessel more commonly known as a Victor III in NATO parlance. But unlike in the Tom Clancy’s classic novel The Hunt for Red October, Dolgoruky’s skipper was not planning to defect to the United States along with his crew; rather the torpedo duel was part of a Russian naval exercise.



"The crews of the strategic missile cruiser Yuri Dolgoruky and the multipurpose nuclear submarine Obninsk performed this exercise in a duel option," the Russian Northern Fleet’s press office told the TASS news agency.

According to TASS, the torpedo shootout was conducted using inert weapons with each vessel launching one weapon. The two torpedoes were later recovered after the exercise.

The present day Russian Navy, which is a shadow of the once mighty Soviet fleet, has focused most of its limited resources on its still powerful submarine fleet. Senior U.S. Navy commanders have said that in recent months, the Russian undersea force has been the most active it has been since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991.

continues at source:

[link to nationalinterest.org]

How effective are the P8-A Sub hunter planes?


from the wiki:

QUOTE

During exercises in 2012 and 2013, and an overseas deployment to Japan, the P-8 reportedly exhibited radar, sensor integration, and data transfer problems, leading to additional testing. In January 2014, the Pentagon's Director of Operational Test and Evaluation office called the P-8A "ineffective" for large area ISR and anti-submarine warfare missions, and said that the initial aircraft were not ready for deployment.[63][64] The same report found that the P-8 was effective at the small-area search mission, and with much better range, speed, and reliability than older aircraft.[65] Pentagon acquisition undersecretary Frank Kendall disputed the report, saying that although its findings are factual, it did not acknowledge future capability upgrades for anti-submarine and wider-area surveillance

OP: what is your overall sense of the situation?

As to the activity you are seeing, specifically, along the Gulf of Mexico region. Is this just "going through the motions" and standard procedure? Or, is there more?

Bump this baby up !

It is quite possible our military expect a possible backlash from a strike on Syria -- by the Russians -- up to and including an attack on the CONUS. And we know they have RECENTLY sent subs near our bases. Focus is on the Atlantic and Arctic and this corresponds to P8-A patrols and/or testing on the Atlantic coast -- particularly around Northern FL where the P8-A was introduced and the Pacific Northwest.


It is crunch time and the question is: is the plane up to the task?

TY

Special Operations Command plane -- northern Columbia.

Sub hunter P8-A -- WA.

Another sub hunter -- northern Germany.

Sub hunters -- Central Med., ID, VA, panhandle area of FL, GA, AL, FL, and AR.

Two location unknown.

Another sub hunter -- WA

Lots of sub hunters up all over the coasts

Must be nuclear subs all over

Quite possible.

Sub-hunter -- Mediterranean (Tyrhenian Sea)

Sub hunters -- Tyrhenian Sea, GA, ID, and one unknown location.


Special Operations Command plane -- panhandle area of FL.

Four Special Operations Command planes -- two in the FL panhandle. Another in FL and one more in GA.

Two sub-hunter P8-A's -- GA and FL panhandle.

One more sub-hunter in WA state.

Five Special Operations Command planes -- GA and FL.

Four P8-A sub hunters -- two in FL, one in GA and one unknown location.

Three Special Operations Command planes -- One NC, two -- FL panhandle.