New LA-class Sensor?

[PaulC]

While perusing the @Subspotr Instagram account, I noticed what looks to be a sensor window on the sail of a Flt-3 Los Angeles-class boat pulling into Faslane. Anyone familiar with this? It is a large area on the side of the sail just forward of the trailing edge. It dwarfs the regular window at the very trailing edge that'e been there for years.



You can see it much more clearly in this shot as the boat is passing the camera.

[Ralph --- SSBN 598]

I found a few articles that may relate to your question.
This 2003 article says Goodrich won the bid to build large sail high frequency acoustical arrays.

http://www.defense-aerospace.com/article-view/release/18654/goodrich-acoustic-windows-for-us-navy-subs.html

Here is a site that has collected lots of publicly available information on USA Virginia sub equipment.

https://thaimilitaryandasianregion.wordpress.com/2015/12/23/virginia-class-attack-submarine/

[PaulC]

Wow, Ralph, that second link has some very neat stuff on there regarding Virginia and lots of good images and diagrams. Thanks! My SSN research is 10-15 years behind the times. Nothing like extended war to spur the advance of military technology.

The references to off the shelf technology reminds me of when I was on a DVE aboard USS Helena in 2001. During the tour they told us their computing power was equivalent to a 386 processor. Upgrading was a dream to them at the time.

[Ralph --- SSBN 598]

The newer systems for the periscopes are converting to a standard off the shelf Xbox controller.

https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/19/16333376/us-navy-military-xbox-360-controller

[PaulC]

$20 versus $38K... makes sense to me.