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[i]"SOFAR stands for Sound Fixing and Ranging; they were small explosive devices attached to the Mercury spacecraft to indicate the splashdown location. They did this by detonating at a specific water depth in what was called "the SOFAR listening channel" which acted like a waveguide allowing the sound to be heard for long distances, possibly several thousand miles if I remember correctly. Each device was both armed and detonated by water pressure and contained 11 ounces of HBX, a military explosive similar to TNT. The device attached to Liberty Bell 7 was located and removed by UXB International and fortunately was a dud. From what I recall, about 10% of these devices did not explode. I find it especially ironic that the one capsule that did sink to a "nonrecoverable depth" had a SOFAR bomb that was a dud. If it had gone off, it would not have destroyed the capsule; however, it certainly would have made a mess of things."[/i]
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