Navy wants bigger coastal range for underwater vehicle training

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KEYPORT, Wash. -- The Navy wants to extend its Washington state ranges so that its subsurface warfare center can adequately test manned and unmanned underwater vehicles.As world threats change, the Navy is more likely to operate submarines near the shore instead of deep at sea, lending more importance to underwater vehicles that can sniff out mines, monitoring devices and vessels."They're out there searching for information that can help keep our sailors out of harm's way," Naval Underwater Warfare Center at Keyport spokeswoman Diane Jennings said of the evolving reconnaissance and surveillance vehicles.The Navy is conducting an environmental review to: extend its Keyport range from 1.5 square nautical miles to 3.2 square nautical miles, and the average number of days the range would be used each year from 55 to 60 days. The service also wants to enlarge the Dabob Bay range from 32.7 square nautical miles to 45.7 with no increase in the 200-day annual use.The Navy also seeks to expand the Quinault range in the Pacific Ocean from 48.3 square nautical miles to 1,840., including a new 7.8-square-nautical-mile surf zone at Pacific Beach. The average annual use offshore would increase from 14 to 16 days, and testing in the surf would occur an average of 30 days per year.Four public hearings on the plans have been scheduled for this week.The ranges are rarely closed to recreational use, and that isn't expected to change, Jennings said."We don't close off areas," she said. "We maintain access. When people look out on the bay they might see a small boat, they'll see Navy craft, see us launching or retrieving something, see divers exiting or getting into the water. We're just a spot on the horizon."The ranges are in the Port Orchard Reach near Keyport, on Hood Canal's Dabob Bay between Toandos Peninsula and Naval Base Kitsap-Bangor, and on the coast of Washington near Kalaloch.The Navy analyzed potential effects of the proposal on a number of areas -- including marine animals, plants, upland wildlife, water quality, and public health and safety.It says it found no significant problems that can't be mitigated -- except for exposing marine mammals to underwater sound. It has asked the U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service to allow for instances when marine mammals might be injured or killed.Spotters would make sure none were around before an exercise could begin and would keep an eye out for them during the exercises, the Navy said."Our range operators are trained by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists on the identification of marine mammals," Jennings said. "As part of our operating procedures, we are on a constant lookout for the presence of any marine mammals."As underwater vehicles evolve, a larger area is needed to test them, Jennings said. The devices, some of which are already deployed and others that are being developed, can be hand-held and launched over the side of a boat, or the size of torpedoes and fired from submarine torpedo tubes. One looks like an underwater plane, another crawls in the shallows and onto beaches."They can run up to 72 hours, so we need more space," she said.The three ranges provide different sea states, such as salinity, which can affect the buoyancy of vehicles when they're retrieved."The goal is to test them in environments that are like the environments they are operating in," Jennings said.(E-mail Ed Friedrich at efriedrich(at)kitsapsun.com.)( xxxx is a reporter for the Kitsap Sun in Bremerton, Wash.)