A Croatian fisherman caught a new NASA device while fishing

http://alugy.com/europe/a-croatian-fisherman-caught-a-misterious-nasas-device-while-fishing/

by RayMan1 • 7 years ago

184 37 7 years ago

HillRat2• 7 years ago

Note that it’s almost certainly not a “NASA device;” the Navy’s oceanographic office is located at the Stennis center, so it would make sense for it to be returned there.

nicoburns• 7 years ago

That ship route sure looks like it was looking for the lost item, whatever it is.

seiferteric• 7 years ago

Either that or they were using it. Possibly towing it behind. Maybe it's some sort of sonar scanner.

HillRat2• 7 years ago

Oceanographic sensor array of some kind — they may have been sampling ocean characteristics near the coastline for research purposes.

Covzire• 7 years ago

It is bright orange with white, my first thought when I saw the title was something you'd want to hide on the ocean floor but this doesn't appear to be the right color or shape.

mhandley• 7 years ago

According to MarineTraffic, most of that track is from today. Unless the found article was only given back to them this afternoon, they wouldn't have still been looking for it today. Seems more likely they're doing a sonar survey of the seabed, given it's an oceanographic survey vessel.

chabes• 7 years ago

Based on the link provided in another comment, it looks like some sort of underwater surveying

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22003320

The bottom of page 11 shows a similar pattern. Not sure if it’s related

davidw2• 7 years ago

What's the shipping waybill from?

perlgeek• 7 years ago

It was shipped by DHL, and had a bar code with the tracking ID on it.

davidw2• 7 years ago

Ah oops, yeah, I was scanning the article and by the time I scrolled down to the DHL printout I had gone past the photo at the top.

somesortofsystm• 7 years ago

From the looks of it, this device was shipped from the US to Croatia, where it was (theoretically) brought onboard the US ship, then used in some operation where it was (possibly) lost, and/or not recovered during a search operation, which is (maybe) shown in the ship activity log ..

netsharc• 7 years ago

Huh, it's a waybill stickered to the device; in the picture with the man, you can see the shipping sticker on the front left of the orange cube.

Which makes the device boring. If it had secrets inside or it was for military use, they would not have sent it naked, using DH-effing-L!

At first I thought they sent something to the fisherman, and since he was complaining about his fishing net, I thought the article was about to tell me that he got a replacement fishing net straight from "NASA", as we can see from the DHL package he got... but sadly that wasn't the case.

anon73044• 7 years ago

Much easier to hide things in plain sight than say a big box that says "Classified" or "Government Only"

pixiemaster• 7 years ago

Navy Oceanographic research is an euphemism for submarine hunting, right?

greglindahl• 7 years ago

No. They support surface ships, too, and it's not just sub hunting, it's also hiding our boomers.

hprotagonist• 7 years ago

NAVOCEANO does all sorts of stuff. some of it's even unclassified.

I've taken fleet money and gotten peer reviewed open access open source publications and code out of it before.

akiselev• 7 years ago

Oceanography research supports a lot of different functions like navigation which requires maps of the seafloor and how they change, waste disposal so that toxic waste doesn't end up in civilian water ways and bays, maintenance which depends on the environmental conditions, and so on.

mr_overalls• 7 years ago

Stennis Space Center is also the location of a Naval Research Lab, and specifically the Naval Oceanographic Office and Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command.

https://www.usno.navy.mil/NAVO https://www.public.navy.mil/fltfor/cnmoc/Pages/home.aspx

"CNMOC is focused on providing critical environmental knowledge to the warfighting disciplines of Anti-Submarine Warfare; Naval Special Warfare; Mine Warfare; Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance; and Fleet Operations (Strike and Expeditionary), as well as to the support areas of Maritime Operations, Aviation Operations, Navigation, Precise Time, and Astrometry."

This is almost certainly some kind of sensor array.

rmetzler• 7 years ago

What kind of sensor would be useful for finding submarine internet cables?

sansnomme• 7 years ago

Try using OpenCV on some images of stretched uncoiled rope and attempt to segment out the rope if you can. You will get the idea pretty quickly. Think ultrasound, that sort of thing.

lazyguy2• 7 years ago

A phone would probably be the most useful sensor. You call the people that laid the internet cables and ask.

ajaalto• 7 years ago

150 pounds is quite heavy. It could be a seismic air gun. They may float just below the surface.

The route of the ship also matches that of a seismic or some other kind of survey.

ainiriand• 7 years ago

It is a HiPAP device, used for submarine positioning:

https://www.kongsberg.com/globalassets/maritime/km-products/...

jb7753• 7 years ago

High accuracy positioning for deep-sea structure placement.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvxeWCoAZPw&feature=youtu.be

Accujack2• 7 years ago

This plus the search pattern ("mowing the lawn") the ship is running in that area tells me that they're surveying the region accurately with sonar. There must be something on the bottom they want to find or build.

That's fairly near the location of Adria-1 submarine cable, so it's possible they are looking at something related to that.

huhtenberg• 7 years ago

This fisherman might be a tough negotiator, but clearly not a keen businessman. Could've gotten a top coin from the Russians for the same. I'm sure they even have a sub in the area already.

lb1lf• 7 years ago

The Russians could just buy one if they were so inclined; I don't think HIPAP devices like the one pictured are under export control. (The HIPAP is just the yellow pipe - the orange thingy looks like flotation whereas the glide pads on the sides are to make launching the device simpler.

(I haven't worked on such kit myself, but my customers do and I encounter them several times a year.)

whalesalad• 7 years ago

Funny that the guy only asked for 3 grand. Could have probably asked for 30 and gotten away with it.

gewa• 7 years ago

Probably, but he's lucky anyways. For a Croatian fisherman, asking for 20,000 Kuna is like asking for 30 grand in the US.

ivanblagdan• 7 years ago

From what the fisherman says, he’s really only asking for the repair costs of his fishing nets.

A Croatian fisherman caught a new NASA device while fishing

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