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False alarm blamed for Russian submarine deaths

latimes.com — Reporting from Moscow -- A false alarm was responsible for setting off the emission of deadly fire-extinguishing gases on a new Russian nuclear-powered submarine in the Sea of Japan, killing 20 people and injuring 21 late Saturday, Russian navy officials said. All but three of the dead were civilian specialists.

Who dugg this? Made popular Nov 11, 2008

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  • louiebaur, on 11/10/2008, -0/+20What a quote! "I am sure many people were not prepared for what happened," ... You better get sure!
  • mikeoncampus, on 11/11/2008, -1/+20somehow in some way this traces back to sean connery...
  • cle2105, on 11/10/2008, -0/+18I'm a civilian specialist for the U.S. Navy. Before the enlisted men are trained and the system is launched, it must be tested to make sure the mechanical components work. It is likely that the civilians were all engineers who designed the thing, not random guys off the street. Your comment thus makes little sense to me, although it is obvious that the saftey precautions were inadequate at best
  • Akairenn, on 11/11/2008, -2/+20...The ship's safety comes before a few crew members.
  • kraant, on 11/10/2008, -1/+17***** it was...
  • cdadabo, on 11/11/2008, -0/+15Too bad it wasn't a Polish submarine. The screen door would have vented some of the noxious gas.
  • davidg11, on 11/11/2008, -0/+13"I will live in Montana. And I will marry a round American woman and raise rabbits, and she will cook them for me. And I will have a pickup truck... maybe even a "recreational vehicle." And drive from state to state. Do they let you do that?"

    "Well then, in winter I will live in... Arizona. Actually, I think I will need two wives. "

    "I would like to have seen Montana."
  • sockpuppets, on 11/11/2008, -4/+17These comments are fail.
  • doctechnical, on 11/10/2008, -1/+13Ah Halon. Not just for killing mainframers any more.
  • aramova, on 11/11/2008, -0/+9Once you can grow new nuclear submarines by having sex, ships will be less important. People are easy to get right now, subs, not so much.

    So yes, the ship's safety comes before a few crew members.
  • Pimptastic, on 11/11/2008, -0/+7As a Submariner that has worked with civilian specialists I know for a fact they know whats going on.

    Even the best trained would have had trouble when a full compartment fills with freon with no warning.
  • danj484, on 11/11/2008, -0/+7MIR? That crap can was constantly broken, but damned if it didn't hold together. I think a more accurate description is Russian stuff looks like hell, barely works, but is nearly impossible to destroy. Of course, if it did fail, they'd cover it up, so who knows.
  • emt1451, on 11/11/2008, -0/+6to put out the fire... duhhh
  • Junior612, on 11/11/2008, -0/+6Interesting that I'm being dugg down. Probably missing some joke here by doc, but the substance in the sub was actually freon, and not halon.

    "Kurdin said he believed Freon-112 was the gas emitted in two compartments of the submarine when a fire alarm went off. "

    Funny how Smoke on the Water just came up on shuffle.

    More info plus HOT russian news anchor woman: http://redbannernorthernfleet.blogspot.com/2008/11 ...
  • ZenMojo, on 11/11/2008, -0/+6Fox News coverage of this was frighteningly funny and schizophrenic. You have the reporter saying stuff like, "Civilians wouldn't have known how to respond to the alarm" and underneath in the scroll it says, "Poor training cause of deaths." The reporter says, "By the time they heard the alarm anyway, the poisonous gas would have killed them so it didn't matter," and underneath it says, "Responded too slowly to the alarm."

    The entire report was just that retarded.
  • DarkerMaster, on 11/11/2008, -0/+5Ahh...utilitarianism at its finest
  • DeskFlyer, on 11/11/2008, -2/+7Apparently they didn't love the smell of dichlorofluoromethane in the morning.
  • BongoSoptopaleo, on 11/11/2008, -1/+6dont drink and DIVE!
  • ayeroxor, on 11/11/2008, -0/+4Yeah, that's the general idea...
  • ayeroxor, on 11/11/2008, -0/+4bogels, why are you a senseless retard that can't understand a few dead is better than all dead?
  • jjohnstn, on 11/11/2008, -0/+4Dugg for "Hunt for Red October" quotes.
  • slvrbullet87, on 11/10/2008, -9/+13Well isnt that just great... if the sub catches on fire and you try and put it out you ***** DIE


    Great way to protect the sub and crew
  • batmanz, on 11/11/2008, -0/+4Red October shtanding by.
  • diatonic1, on 11/11/2008, -0/+3I wonder if Russian subs have EAB's. God I hated those ***** things. Suck Rubber, and plug in to the low pressure air manifold.
  • gasoline, on 11/11/2008, -0/+3And an hour later:
    "Red October. Red October. Halt and stay where you are. Do not attempt to submerge or you will be fired upon."
  • evvad, on 11/11/2008, -2/+5Think about how many such accidents there were back when the Solviets were operating many more submarines and there was no press to report on accidents.
  • davidg11, on 11/11/2008, -0/+3"We will pass through the American patrols, past their sonar nets, and lay off their largest city, and listen to their rock and roll... while we conduct missile drills."
  • MothBoy, on 11/11/2008, -0/+3What did you think your $145 for a barrel of oil was paying for?
  • eXCubed, on 11/11/2008, -0/+3Yes, by starving the fire of oxygen.
  • inactive, on 11/11/2008, -0/+3what is the point of fire extinguishers that kill you?
  • dstz, on 11/11/2008, -0/+3Civilians were the casualties, not crew members. Read the article, that's in it.
  • zakatov, on 11/11/2008, -0/+3Not sure because it happened at 8:30 PM
  • inactive, on 11/11/2008, -0/+3Did a US sub tow it to port?
  • x060t, on 11/11/2008, -0/+3If you read carefully, you'll see that crew mwmbers are supposed to have gas masks, which allow them to survive the gas. So it's not intended to sacrifice anyone as it sets off. As for the fact that people didn't have them or were not trained to use - well, this is the problem. So it's maybe engineers' fault that alarm has accidentally set off, but it's the organizers' and captain's fault that people actually died. It's like having an untrained person jumping from a plane without an instructor and without knowing how to use a backup shute. Sadly, it's a common situation here when people aren't prepared for anything going wrong. Either way, R.I.P.
  • Junior612, on 11/11/2008, -3/+5Freon.
  • ayeroxor, on 11/11/2008, -0/+2That's morning somewhere...
  • doctechnical, on 11/11/2008, -0/+2I think the point here is there's poot all difference between fire suppression gas "A" that'll kill ya, and fire suppression gas "B" that'll kill ya.
  • XGIUSMC, on 11/11/2008, -0/+2The real tragedy is the human cost. The lives lost on board the vessel, just like the Kursk several years ago. Then there is the suffering of the family members and survivors.

    I for one would like to avoid having Russia entering an ill-advised and poorly planned arms race. Even if there is not actual conflict between us. It is inevitable that there will be more tragedies like this.
  • brotherfranciz, on 11/15/2008, -0/+2Right, so why is the USA relying on Russian rockets now? Maybe because a US space shuttle disintegrated upon re-entry?

    Hypocrites.
  • ayeroxor, on 11/11/2008, -0/+2Yeah, that's inexcusable! You have a whole sub full of people and nobody knows how to respond to a fire alarm? I work in an office with a datacenter full of servers and that datacenter has a Halon gas fire suppression system. There are giant red ABORT buttons. Once the fire alarm goes off, you have 30 seconds to abort the suppressive gas. It sounds to me like, what, they forgot that part?
  • hmunkey, on 11/12/2008, -0/+2What did you expect? Intelligent news reports?
  • ro4ers, on 11/11/2008, -0/+2Shark-class? Akula is the official NATO name for it, the Russian name for this sub is Shchuka-B. The Akula class in russian is actually the Typhoon SSBN, NATO name.
  • TexasKoz, on 11/11/2008, -0/+2Your description is more accurate.
  • XGIUSMC, on 11/11/2008, -0/+2So long as the U.S. continues to build and deploy Boomers, we damn well better make sure thay are both the best and the safest. Our crews will have the best fighting chance, they will all come home alive after each deployment.
  • XGIUSMC, on 11/11/2008, -0/+2It could be that Russia, in the race to achieve World Power status again, is cutting corners on safety just to crank out more armaments.
  • arkaycee, on 11/11/2008, -0/+1Fair and unhinged.
  • Loadedforbear, on 11/11/2008, -0/+1Same thing happened back in the 80's on the USS Jack SSN 605, massive freon leak killed a few guys. Lucky they were in port when it happened. Not a very lucky class of ships.
  • XGIUSMC, on 11/11/2008, -0/+1Realistically, its a wake-up call to examine the safety of our own submarines as well. Lets make sure ours are as safe as possible.
  • Medicamusic, on 11/11/2008, -3/+4Kill everybody in the sub... as long as the tanks fine!
  • tommyredcoat, on 11/11/2008, -2/+3It was the cook! The cook is the saboteur!
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