Project Jennifer

Well I didn't see any threads on this, so I'll throw it in:

Project Jennifer

On 11 April, 1968, US underwater listening devices picked up the sinking of a Soviet submarine carrying nuclear missiles, torpedoes, codes and coding machines, 300 miles from Hawaii. The capture of these items would be very valuable to US intelligence.

Unfortunately, it went down in 17,000 feet of water.

Undaunted, the CIA came up with a plan: Project Jennifer, the recovery of a whole subload of Soviet secrets. The equipment for the recovery of the sub would be too big to keep secret, so they went the opposite route: publicity. They enlisted the aid of Howard Hughes, known for extravagent projects. His company was creating a ship made for recovering minerals from the ocean floor. This ship, the Hughe Glomar Explorer, was extremely complex. For one it had an internal bay large enough to hold a Golf-II Soviet ballistic missile submarine. It was equipped with a crane that could reach down and grab the sub in its entirity. It was also made to stay 'static' in a turbulent, windy ocean. The Glomar Explorer could remain stationary within a 10' area.

This was all done with the public believing that the Glomar Explorer was going to be picking manganese off the ocean floor.

Finally, in June 1974, the Explorer settled over the submarine's resting place and began extraction. Though much of the project is still secret, it's known that there was an accident recovering the sub. Some, or most of the submarine may have broken off during the long ride up into the ship's bay. Some say the entire operation was a bust. Others claim that the recovered portion was an intel gold mine; Coding machines, books, nuclear torpedoes and missiles were all recovered, and less significant portions of the sub fell off.

The portions of the submarine that were recovered still had remains of the crew inside. The US Navy performed a Soviet-style burial at sea for the crewmembers. A videotape of this was made, and presented to Gorbachev while he visited Reagan in 1984.

Shortly after the sub was recovered, the cover story for the Glomar was revealed and printed in newspapers.

The project cost the US about 200 million dollars. Whether it worked or not we won't really know until classified information about the project is released. Regardless, it was an interesting project.

The Glomar Explorer is now used as an undersea oil prospecting ship. Or is it?

Thanks for sharing this info, I had never heard of this but did some searching and found this link to info on the subject of Project Jennifer.....
Project Jennifer
Hughes Glomar Explorer

The Hughes Glomar Explorer [HGE] was built in 1973 by Sun Shipbuilding and Drydock Co. for an intricate CIA undertaking. The mission of Glomar Explorer was to raise a Soviet nulear submarine that had sunk in the Pacific, resting on the ocean floor nearly 17,000 ft. (5,200 m) down. The Soviet Golf-II Class ballistic missile submarine sank on April 11, 1968, approximately 750 miles northwest of Hawaii. Naval intelligence at Pearl Harbor had tracked the submarine and learned of its fate through underwater listening devices. After months of futile searching by Soviet vessels, it became apparent that only the US knew the location of the sunken submarine.

Interesting, and I repeat your question, Is it a prospecting ship?

I watched a show about this before it was pretty interesting. The Russians were watching us the whole time we did this. I remember they were very worried about one Russian boat that was watching the operation that contained a Helicopter with a team of Spetnaz onboard.

HMB1, or Hughes Mining Barge 1, was a submersible barge with a large claw underneath it. The claw was intended to grab the wreck, and then a hoist in the Glomar Explorer would raise both barge and submarine up into a moonpool inside the ship. It reminds me off that game were you grab stuffed animals with the claw.

It was amazing how the ship could do all that inside of the ship itself. They had a cool animation of it picking up the sub and how part of it snapped off when they were lifting it up to the boat. No one really knowes how much they got but it was enough for them not to make a second attempt to pick up the rest of the sub.


Despite the apparant success of the mission, the public had no idea what was going on. But four burglars broke into Hughes office and stole thousands of dollars in money, as well as files about Project Jennifer, scattering some of them as they made their escape. Thinking the files contained business information, the thieves demanded a million dollars for their return. The FBI and Los Angeles police were brought in to recover the documents.

Most were recovered, but the tight secrecy placed on the theft was not good enough. The details were leaked to the media, and in February 1975 the Los Angeles Times broke the story of Project Jennifer to the world.

[edit on 5-8-2004 by ShadowXIX]

A LA Times reported actullay scouped the whole project but agreed to keep it quite for a while. There is one book that is still in publication on Project Jennifer and it is a good read. They also did a burial at sea with full honors and taped it. This tape wa given to Boris Yeltsin years later. Rumors persist that the mission was a sucsess and that they encouraged the failure rumors to keep the lid on thier discoveries.

What was the name of the book? I would like to pick it up!!!

Originally posted by Are u for real???
What was the name of the book? I would like to pick it up!!!

The Jennifer Project by Clyde W. Burleson. Also Blind Mans Bluff also has a good chapter on it.

I have always been facinated by the project. WHen I hwas in High School, we used to go 4 Wheeling in the salt marshes in Redwood City. There was this strange barge that was ported there that had armed guards. Turns out this was the same barge that they held Clemintine (name given to the claw) in and the barge would submerge to allow the claw to be covertly loaded onto the GLomar. Turns out they were using it to hide the SeaShadow the lockheed stealth ship.

Originally posted by FredT
A LA Times reported actullay scouped the whole project but agreed to keep it quite for a while. There is one book that is still in publication on Project Jennifer and it is a good read. They also did a burial at sea with full honors and taped it. This tape wa given to Boris Yeltsin years later. Rumors persist that the mission was a sucsess and that they encouraged the failure rumors to keep the lid on thier discoveries.

I saw a show on Discover which actually showed a portion of the Soviet sailors reamins being buried at sea. There are supposed to be detailed pictures of the sub on the sea floor with a complete Soviet skeleton in uniform.

Originally posted by mad scientist

Originally posted by FredT
A LA Times reported actullay scouped the whole project but agreed to keep it quite for a while. There is one book that is still in publication on Project Jennifer and it is a good read. They also did a burial at sea with full honors and taped it. This tape wa given to Boris Yeltsin years later. Rumors persist that the mission was a sucsess and that they encouraged the failure rumors to keep the lid on thier discoveries.

I saw a show on Discover which actually showed a portion of the Soviet sailors reamins being buried at sea. There are supposed to be detailed pictures of the sub on the sea floor with a complete Soviet skeleton in uniform.

Well, isn't that pleasent.

Very interesting, does anyone have links to any video or animation of this recovery operation?