Azorian: The Raising of the K-129

On February 25, 1968, Soviet submarine K-129, a diesel boat carrying three 755-nautical-mile-range ballistic missiles each armed with a 1-megaton thermonuclear warhead, sailed from its base on the Kamchatka Peninsula bound for its patrol station on a 60-day mission. The 324-foot, 3,610-ton submarine never made it. On March 11, the K-129 sank in the northern Pacific Ocean in 16,400 feet of water, about 1,600 nautical miles northwest of Hawai'i. All 98 men aboard perished. For months, Soviet Navy search teams looked for the wreckage, but never even came close to finding it. The U.S., on the other hand, had sophisticated undersea acoustical monitoring equipment that the Soviets lacked, and knew exactly where the K-129 went down. The CIA soon hatched an audacious plan that would give America an incalculable intelligence coup--a plan to raise the K-129 from the ocean floor. The PBS DVD "Azorian: The Raising of the K-129" tells the full, almost unbelievable story of the boldest American clandestine operation of the Cold War (at least of those the public knows about). In the summer of 1974, the operation secretly attempted to salvage the forward 136 feet of the K-129 (which had broken off from the stern section). The U.S. stood to gain enormously valuable insights into Soviet naval equipment, capabilities and operational procedures. CIA intelligence analysts drooled at the thought of the information they expected the K-129 to yield--cryptographic hardware, code manuals, communications systems, torpedoes and one or more missiles with their thermonuclear warheads. The operation would be scandalously expensive, technically challenging, unprecedentedly complex, extremely risky, probably illegal and not at all certain to succeed. But if it did... "Azorian: The Raising of the K-129" covers the operation in great detail, and a fascinating story it is. Project Azorian cost about as much as an Apollo mission to the moon, and involved equipment and hardware that to this day remain marvels of innovative marine engineering. With cost practically no object, the CIA, through a series of "front" companies including Lockheed, Hughes and Honeywell, built the huge salvage ship "Hughes Glomar Explorer," a remote-controlled "claw" to pick up the K-129 and an enormous barge to conceal parts of the operation from observation. Using interviews with surviving participants, including the ex-Soviet Navy officer who dispatched the K-129, archival photos and motion picture footage and, especially, stunning computer graphics, "Azorian" reveals the whole story in exceptional detail. CGI animations of the design and operation of the hardware are extremely well-done, and make all parts of the operation very clear to the viewer. This DVD is a must-have for anyone interested in Cold War history, ocean engineering, Howard Hughes, intelligence operations or many other subjects. Even if you have the latest book on the subject, " Project Azorian: The CIA and the Raising of K-129 ," by Norman Polmar and Michael White, you should still buy this DVD. This stunning visual record of the project complements the book perfectly. Still photos and text descriptions simply can't equal the impact of seeing the project unfold in motion picture form. I recommend "Azorian: The Raising of the K-129" most highly.

I recently read Josh Dean's 2017 book The Taking of K129 which was a thrilling and detailed account of one of the most daring and challenging undertakings by the United States, to raise a sunken Russian submarine. I searching for some photos or videos for visual aids to help me understand the ship and the lift attempt better when I came across this film. The archival footage and animations alone are worth the watch but it is also a great high-level overview of an amazing story. Make time to watch this movie and if you have more, read Josh's book.

This film is INCREDIBLY interesting, but it is so monotonic with respect to every aspect, that I use it whenever I can't get to sleep. And guess what? It knocks me right out every time! Still, it's a heck of a story. . . if you can keep your eyes open!

This DVD is excellent! The authors had a lot more, and higher quality, material than I've read in other books or seen in other videos. A lot of erroneous information was also corrected. The one that really caught my attention was that the Jennifer Project was the wrong name---It was called Project Azorian! The media pulled up the name, "Jennifer", which referred to a small part of Azorian & just ran with it. There were a number of photos I had never seen before. I was impressed in the way they explained and showed the lifting of the K-129 and the dropping of a number of parts & and sections. I also liked the views of how all the arms worked. The Moon Pool, the "Barge" the grabbers were all presented very clearly. Imagine 4,000 people involved without any secrets about the true mission of Azorian getting out until the K-129 parts were safely delivered to the USA. Think of the special machinery they had to invent and and fabricate for this task! Think of the valuable info we captured from what we were were able to salvage off the K-129! I'd like to see an actual movie of this adventure. I can't think of a sea story that could beat it. This whole adventure is something this country should be proud of! Yet when word of this got out, many people throughout the world and many in this country condemned what we had done. The Glomar Explorer became synonymous with dirty deeds. If you're interested in high adventure videos of true events, I think you'll love this DVD.

Brilliant engineering at work. Worth watching for anyone.

Still today I'd have to say Project Azorian, and it's technology, is close to the technological feat of putting man on the moon. Yet few people know, or care, about this amazing accomplishment. It comes down to press. Azorian could have no press much like the useful life of the SR-71 Blackbird. Now it's kind of out, I say kind of because this is so secretive that just knowing it existed is fairly amazing since this is blackworks of quite high order. And that is where this documentary lives. It reveals the surface of the operation for the first time. Believe it there is ultra-technical stuff few can comprehend and we do like to keep our greatest science close to the vest. For a certain crowd, however, there is enough here to make this a very compelling watch. By the same token I'd have to say that for the average viewer not so much. So if you are a person who can name every plane and type ship we engaged in past wars this is a must see. If you can't be bothered with stuff that isn't glitz and glamour it's a pass.

While I was not unfamiliar with this super clandestine project to raise K-129 with Howard Hughes front cover story, I obviously had not seen anything like this DVD documentary detailing the behind the scenes activities, people, trials and trivilations, wreckage site and -- certainly -- not anything substantantive about the Hughes Glomar Explorer or it's lift mechanism. This movie covered all of that and more....in surprisingly thorough detail and "depth". The videos of the wreck site and partial sub pressure hull on the ocean floor and in 'the cradle' were remarkable and had me moving closer to the screen. Yes, they were somewhat hard to make out due to B&W/low resolution, small FOV and dark lighting. But it was more than enough to make out fascinating details of the hull and the 'crash site'. This DVD has a bit of everything to satisfy a variety of people and interests. CIA intrigue, cold war theme, submarine hazards, a bit about the K-129, 'the project' planning and cover story, the many engineering problems and solutions that were solved on a scale never atempted before, the actual operation, etc. Best part to me, was learning about the engineering challenges and how the engineers solved each of them with new/novel devices and VERY special equipment.. The scale of what they did was immense and unimaginable. That is the real story. American ingeniuty and "Americans that can' get it done attitude. I'm not worthy.... In the end, however, they were less than successful...but still successful. Was it the brittle tensile strength of the steel 'prongs'? Or was it not having the data they needed for the ocean floor density...or the compromised sub hull? We'll never know for sure. Especially since they weren't able to go back to get the rest of K-129. See it and you'll see why I'm obviously so impressed with this Project...and this DVD.

Documentary-wise, this program is superb. Petty arcane in the details of engineering the ship and the capture vehicle. The failure of the maraging steel arms and davits due to the uncertainty in the strength of the seabed is a huge disappointment, but one of the engineers explains it perfectly as a trade-off between strength and weight. (That guy was really excellent in this.) The shame is that the bulk of K-129 broke loose and fell back into the depths. At the end of the mission - the self-serving anti-American press betrays the USA and sells out for the news story. That is why I hate the press. No good, spineless socialists. The USA could have recovered the rest of the unfortunate sailors and the damaged missiles which remain possibly polluting the ocean with plutonium, disposing of this material properly and, more importantly, given the sailors a proper burial with honor and respect.

A remarkable true story. Impressive engineering.

Raise a Submarine, its hard? raise it in secret right under the Soviets view? How on earth? Its a impressive look at the CIA secret project that was done in near full public view. Fantastic interviews, some greet images and reconstructions of this insane project, well worth it

brilliant

I love this real life story dealing with the attempt to raise a Russian nuclear sub that they think nay have attempted to launch an attack against the US during the cold war.. They did a fantastic job on this. It's re watchable.

that film was very interesting.. i enjoyed it very much.