GWX2 mines and hydrophone

[TS13]

Hallo, this one is my first post. After playing stock SHIII for a while, I have just started my first career with GWX2. So here come the questions.

1) mines
I read that GWX includes minefields. I am a bit worried. How do we defend against them? Is there some kind of warning when we are getting close to them or do we just die when we run out of luck? Some kind of precaution etc?

2) Hydrophone, or "me < Bernard"
In stock SHIII, one of the things I enjoyed doing was taking over the hydrophone and spotting ships that Bernard couldn't spot. Unfortunately, GWX2 has reversed this situation. Bernard spots a ship, speaks out bearing etc, I then take over the hydrophone and I still can't hear it! Not until it gets really-really close.
What changed here? How come in GWX2 I lost my ability of spotting ships through the hydrophone? Anyone else experienced this?

OK, these are my questions, a big thank you to all who participated in the making of GWX2.