the Noon hour brought the arrival of the French Rubis class submarine. the exact identity is currently secret, but it would have to be one of the 6 boats in the class.
- S601 Rubis
- S602 Saphir
- S603 Casabianca
- S604 Émeraude
- S605 Améthyste
- S606 Perle
Powered by a nuclear reactor, she tied up at Shearwater.
The Tug Glenivis met the sub off Maugher’s beach with a barge, and recovered a towed array. this suggests the array may have gotten stuck in the deployed position and this was an unplanned stop to deal with that.
UPDATE: Marlant tweeted that the sub is FS Améthyste, and is here to re-supply.
The towed array on the Rubis class is not retractable, it cannot get stuck, it’s attached and detached by a barge.
thanks for that. I didn’t know.
it kind of strikes me inconvenient when operating on the surface but what do i know.