With ARA San Juan (S-42) now more than 10 days overdue, with no verified communications or items found from the vessel in that period, it is looking bleak for the prospect that the German-made Type TR-1700 SSK will be found intact and the 44 souls aboard her smiling and happy.
Especially with news from the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization and others that, on 15 November, they picked up an underwater non-nuclear explosion from within the area that she is thought to be lost.
If San Juan is indeed gone, it would be the largest loss of life for the Argentine Navy since the Falklands Islands conflict in 1982 and the worst peacetime submarine loss since the Russian Navy’s Kursk (K-141), a Project 949/Oscar II-class cruise missile sub, sank with all hands in 2000, reminding all that venture to sea that there is no guarantee they will come back home.
Still, Argentine President Mauricio Macri said the search will go on.
“I’m here to guarantee you that we will carry on with the search, especially now that we have the support of all the international community,” said Macri in a speech Friday.
More than a dozen countries have assets in the region– including the U.S.– concentrating on an area the size of Spain.
171121-N-TY130-005 ATLANTIC OCEAN (Nov. 21, 2017) A remotely operated underwater vehicle operated by the U.S. Navy’s Undersea Rescue Command (URC) is staged aboard the Norwegian vessel Skandi Patagonia to support the ongoing search for the Argentine navy submarine A.R.A. San Juan (S 42) in the Atlantic Ocean. URC Sailors are highly trained and routinely exercise employing the advanced technology in submarine rescue scenarios. (U.S. Navy photo/Released)