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Trident missile test fails for a second time in a row
- sinuhe69 3y agoThe thing is mission critical. The test is extremely expensive so test will not conducted regularly. The whole process is highly sensitive but opaque at best. Why do I see a recipe for utter failure?
- zmgsabst 3y agoThis seems hugely destabilizing. Is one of the US nuclear triad non-functional? — how would we know? Edit: Apparently the US can successfully launch them — and lets everyone know. https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2023/09/u-s-navy-ssbn-uss-louisiana-tests-trident-ii-ballistic-missile/ https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2023/09/u-s-navy-ssbn-u... https://www.stratcom.mil/Media/News/News-Article-View/Article/2781494/uss-wyoming-successfully-tests-trident-ii-d5le-missiles/ https://www.stratcom.mil/Media/News/News-Article-View/Articl... https://www.stratcom.mil/Media/News/News-Article-View/Article/1616651/uss-nebraska-successfully-tests-trident-ii-d5-missile/ https://www.stratcom.mil/Media/News/News-Article-View/Articl...
- RandomLensman 3y agoThe US tested successfully in October 2023, I think, and regularly before - this was the UK. The US has something like close to 200 successful launches so far on D5.
- arethuza 3y agoThe UK and US missiles come from the same stockpile though - mind you it does rather remind me on Beatty at Jutland "There seems to be something wrong with our bloody ships today".
- RandomLensman 3y agoThe US seems to get the missiles to work consistently. On the whole, the UK's nuclear deterrence is kind of "ish" anyway.
- arethuza 3y agoYes - it does rather look like the problem is at the UK side of things. Edit: regarding the "ish" comment one thing that makes the UK deterrent a bit more credible is that they don't have PALs - the crew have everything they need to launch should they decide to.
- RandomLensman 3y agoWhat I meant by "ish" is that having a few submarines isn't a particularly strong way of creating a nuclear deterrence against a large and capable adversary (there is a reason triads evolved) - not that the individual launch capability might not be there.
- arethuza 3y agoWell, in the case of the UK its going to be submarines or nothing.... Now you could question whether it is worth it - but that's a completely separate question.
- RandomLensman 3y agoThat is what the UK has now. If you mean by "worth it" is it sufficiently effective and robust, yes, that is indeed a question to ask.
- lupusreal 3y agoThe "Nuclear Triad" is more of a historic artifact; the result of several years of organizational rivalries that eventually ossified in this form, rather than something which was deliberately engineered to be this way from the start. The necessity of strategic nuclear bombers is particularly suspect, but for a time they were the only option to get the job done and for that reason SAC was very politically powerful. Furthermore, the deterence factor from land-based ICBMs is relatively weak (although this can be improved by making the missiles mobile, overbuilding silos, then playing a shell game with them.) If what you need is a credible "we'll ruin you from beyond the grave" threat, then the UK's four SSBNs get that job done well enough (presuming the chance of the missiles working is high enough to not take the risk.)
- _kbh_ 3y ago[dead]
- phyalow 3y agohttps://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/26/us-planning-to-station-nuclear-weapons-in-uk-amid-threat-from-russia-report https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/26/us-planning-... Maybe related? From a month ago.
- oldpersonintx 3y agoRegrettable from a PR perspective but realistically, there are going to be some dud rockets. I assume in a real nuclear war, some number of US ICBMs fail in boost and come down the US, likewise for Russia. These have been sitting in silos for decades.
- defrost 3y agoIn the real Cold War some number of US bomb delivery systems did fail and live bombs did fall down on mainland US soil (and a few off shore). See: broken arrows. At least one came so close to exploding it's a case study on the question of why it didn't ...
- arethuza 3y agoPresumably the 1961 Goldsboro incident: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1961_Goldsboro_B-52_crash https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1961_Goldsboro_B-52_crash
- phyalow 3y ago190 UK tests, only 2 failures, and those failures are on the 2 most recent launches. Something is obviously wrong.
- captaincaveman 3y agoyes it's time for more funding, nothing gets funding better than a burning platform ...
- shaftoe444 3y agoBut for the UK this is our only nuclear weapon, if it fails there are no planes or land based missiles to back it up. Different for the US.
- morsch 3y ago> "The issue that occurred during the test was specific to the event and would not have occurred during a live armed fire," the source said. Right! That's what I keep telling our QA engineers, too.
- A1vis 3y ago- So it comes back to Trident? - When it comes. - If it works. - If it wor... - What do you mean? - Normally, when new weapons are delivered, the warheads don't fit the ends of the rockets. That's what happened to Polaris. You know the sort of thing, wiring faults, microchip failure. We couldn't fire Polaris for some years. Cruise is probably the same. Trident might be too.
- matthewfelgate 3y agoA timeless TV show.
- alecco 3y agohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKQlQlQ6_pk&t=70s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKQlQlQ6_pk&t=70s
- tudorw 3y ago"Some of the technology is so new, we had no idea how much it would cost' 1988 'Mockumentary' - This is David Lander, contains some 'adult' content, well, adult for Britain in 1988... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_ucx1MTEO4&list=PL1B297DE784CFA3F5 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_ucx1MTEO4&list=PL1B297DE78... For context September that year; 'It marked the second time in the last three launchings that one of the $23.7 million missiles had to be destroyed by the safety officer. The Navy reported about 20 minutes after the 1:45 P.M. launching that the Trident 2 had developed a problem in the second stage and that the range safety officer had sent a signal to blow up the missile to prevent it from veering into populated areas.'
- belter 3y ago"The Red Hot Nuclear Button" - https://youtu.be/P7YR6WICIAI https://youtu.be/P7YR6WICIAI
- ilaksh 3y agoWhen you make a change to a complex software/hardware system, you should expect something to go wrong the first time you test it. Clearly they changed something for this test in particular and it broke the system. It is likely something fairly minor that just doesn't work when part of it is removed. Also, if it just went through a retrofit and has actually never fired a missile, then it's not unlikely for something to have been not quite placed back where it was supposed to be. This is the difference between doing a release with a QA process that takes some time and testing versus doing development and just launching the new version into production. They changed the code or hardware for this particular test. That not working does not prove that the system has fundamental flaws or that other systems that have been tested and not modified will have the same issue. Most people do not understand the inherent brittleness in engineered systems. Even those that are designed to be fault tolerant. That can cause confusion about outcomes and the necessity of testing every release.
- robertlagrant 3y agoIt does depend on the approach, though. If you're SpaceX and switched on to this stuff, and testing is part of development that's one thing. If you've done your real testing already and this is more like a demonstration sort of test, that's different.
- ilaksh 3y agoMy theory is that they should have done a development test before the demo, but because it's so expensive , the higher ups just told the engineers to skip it. They probably just said "Well, it was _only_ a retrofit, and you just changed a couple of minor things for the test. Are you sure we need to spend $17 million on another throwaway test?" And the engineer said he's not 100% sure it's necessary, but it would be advisable. So the higher up, not understanding how brittle and complex systems are or how development works, decided that meant it wasn't necessary. I think the main issue might be that there is no way to do a good test without spending millions of dollars. Which I think might be because of structural issues in the defense industry.
- 3y ago
- 57FkMytWjyFu 3y agoSeems somewhat related to the miserable paint and preservation on the hull. (former US Boomer sailor here)
- pja 3y agoA little digging suggests that photo was taken at the end of a six month deployment. Which probably explains the state of the hull - it’s absolutely covered in barnacles & other marine growth. The crew must have been shattered. Six months is a long time to spend at sea. Links: https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/navy-ships/a45279628/royal-navy-nuclear-sub-completes-record-6-month-patrol/ https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/navy-ships/a452796... https://www.navylookout.com/royal-navy-nuclear-deterrent-submarines-conducting-increasingly-long-patrols/ https://www.navylookout.com/royal-navy-nuclear-deterrent-sub...
- pjc50 3y agoThere's some real staffing and morale problems around Trident, which nobody wants to look too closely at because that would be actual governance. The real purpose of Trident is to threaten left-wing MPs with.
- booi 3y agoI guess the left-wing MPs have nothing to worry about
- eunos 3y agoSomebody stole the fuel to boil tea /s ?
- TheOtherHobbes 3y agoSay Trump wins in 2025 - he pulls the US out of NATO, Putin threatens the EU with nukes, and only the UK and France can offer any kind of resistance. If the UK is out that leaves France, and if Le Pen wins France will be in the Putinist camp. My guess is Putin would nuke some US cities too just to make a point, and his fans in the US will be very surprised when that happens.
- gambiting 3y agoI mean, that's a "fun" little fantasy scenario to think through, but it doesn't change the fact that it's absolutely insane. Russia and US are not nuking each other no matter what. I can see Russia nuking a target in Ukraine in a "what are you going to do about it" kind of way, but again, Nato countries would not be attacked, US support present or not.
- baybal2 3y ago[dead]
- TMWNN 3y ago[dead]
- hermitcrab 3y agoI'm usually a fan of government transparency. But I'm not sure it helps with deterrence to be public with this. Maybe it wasn't possible to cover it up?
- bondarchuk 3y agoThink of the second order effects of what you're proposing.
- hermitcrab 3y agoI've thought about it. I still can't see a good reason to broadcast that our deterrent isn't as effective as we have been making out.
- jvmboi 3y ago> The Ministry of Defence said the "nuclear deterrent remains safe, secure and effective". The test that we did to show that it would work, didn't work but that doesn't mean that it wouldn't work. Of course!
- jvanderbot 3y ago> "The issue that occurred during the test was specific to the event and would not have occurred during a live armed fire," the source said. OK, so, this might be the kind of thing you'd say, but that is also entirely plausible.
- jvmboi 3y agowell it's very easy for them to say that, right? Because they'll never have to prove this in detail to anyone that could hold them accountable because SECRETS and COMPLICATED TECHNOLOGY.
- pjc50 3y agoFamously, the USN had the reverse problem with torpedoes in WW2: they worked in testing but were extremely unreliable in live situations, and it took a while before HQ believed that the problem was real. With Trident, either there will be no live usage, or there will be no UK left to do anything about the failure of the second strike weapons.
- jvanderbot 3y ago> Famously, the USN had the reverse problem with torpedoes in WW2: they worked in testing but were extremely unreliable in live situations, and it took a while before HQ believed that the problem was real. IIRC, this was a problem for Germany as well. It was the magnetic detonators on both sides .. ? > With Trident, either there will be no live usage, or there will be no UK left to do anything about the failure of the second strike weapons. .. in the event of trident failures, you mean. The third possibility is that they do work, and there still is no UK, but at least there is less of everyone. So fun to think about /s
- 3y ago
- temac 3y agoOff topic: usually british websites are pretty good but apparently the bbc website has become absolute garbage. I had to confirm 5 or 6 times that no thank you I don't want cookies, at which point the fine site is still constantly nagging me in a third of the display to accept them or go configure them in yet another page, which fixes nothing. People accepting to implement such bullshit should be ashamed.