Routine inspection, maintenance, and work to correct existing faults were carried out prior to the forthcoming cruise of the submarine Komsomolets in accordance with regulations. Considering the complexity and intensity of the work, and according to the technical design documents, it should have been carried out by a special technical crew with the help of highly qualified specialists from the Navy’s ship repair plants. The trial run of the submarine Komsomolets demonstrated the need for assembling such a crew, but one was not provided.
In order that the full schedule of routine inspection and maintenance be carried out within the established time aboard a Komsomolets-class submarine, no less than 200 to 250 highly qualified specialists should be used. The Navy’s repair bases do not have such a large number of specialists, and they do not participate in routine maintenance and inspection. The entire burden of this work is laid upon the submarine crews.
“A ship’s officer is responsible for the good working condition of his matériel, and must do everything to restore it in the event of breakdown,” declared Navy Commander-in-Chief V. N. Chernavin, apparently feeling that there are no problems in repairs, routine maintenance, and inspection in the fleet that cannot be addressed by ship’s officers.1
In reality, submarine crews are physically unable to carry out the full volume of routine inspection and maintenance with acceptable quality within the forty days allowed. Consequently, they are forced to compromise with their conscience and carry out routine inspection and maintenance principally only on equipment that failed or was placed on report during the last cruise. The submarine fleet has even evolved a system of “failure-to-failure” equipment operation. Unsatisfactory maintenance of matériel, and late and poor quality inspection and maintenance, resulting from the absence of specially trained, highly qualified technical crews and from imperfections in the Navy’s repair service, are recorded aboard all submarines of the Navy, especially after expiration of the warranty period.
Further, as a result of the limited availability of pierside electric power and power generators of acceptable quality at naval bases, submarines moored at those bases must generate their own power and thereby expend the life of ship equipment (to avoid malfunction of electronic equipment).
These factors, coupled with the lack of a system for documenting and certifying completion of routine inspection and maintenance in the Navy, render it practically impossible to conduct the required maintenance and verify the completeness and quality of such work.
Every issue identified above applied to the submarine Komsomolets as well. Moreover, the difficulties of routine inspection and maintenance aboard this submarine were aggravated by the absence of a set of documents concerning refits between cruises. An order of the Main Naval Command placed the responsibility of drafting these documents on a specialized naval department, but the order was not carried out.
None of these issues were reflected in the published findings of the State Commission. This omission could be expected because Vice Admiral V. V. Zaytsev, who, as the chief of the Navy’s Main Directorate for Operation and Repair, was responsible for the unsatisfactory equipment of submarine bases and the quality of repairs and routine maintenance and inspection, was appointed chairman of the “Operation and Damage Control” section of the State Commission’s working group.
Being aware that the situation concerning routine inspection, maintenance, and repairs by Navy personnel was so unfavorable, the workers of the shipbuilding industry suggested in their letter to CPSU Central Committee Secretary O. D. Baklanov, cited above, that the industry should service submarines over the course of the entire submarine cycle. This proposal was shamelessly distorted in the August 8, 1989, edition of Krasnaya Zvezda, in which the need for industry service was suggested as being related to the low quality of submarine construction.
But let’s return to the submarine Komsomolets. As is confirmed in the joint act of two sections of the State Commission Working Group—the “Operation and Damage Control” and “Shipbuilding” sections—the Komsomolets set out to sea for patrol duty in serviceable condition. A question not clarified by the working group regards the extent to which this assertion, in serviceable conditions, corresponded to reality. The work order for refitting of the submarine Komsomolets between cruises, which was signed off by Division Commander Rear Admiral O. T. Shkiryatov and approved by Flotilla Deputy Commander Rear Admiral L. B. Nikitin, foresaw the need to repair the closed circuit television system equipment (one of the television cameras of this system was in compartment seven of the submarine) and the oxygen gas analyzer for compartment seven (items 7 and 71 of the work order). No documents attesting to completion of these repairs were presented. According to a statement by naval representatives, the repairs were carried out in floating ship repair drydock number seven, but they were unable to say who carried them out, and who accepted the equipment after repairs. However, the joint act of the two working group sections, mentioned above, states: “The sensor of the MN-5134 automatic oxygen gas analyzer of compartment seven failed on the tenth day of the cruise,” and “the television system failed during the navigation period prior to the submarine’s accident.”
The question arises as to whether these multiple failures are a chance occurrence or a definite pattern. There are certainly grounds for suggesting that the submarine set out on its cruise with a faulty gas analyzer and a faulty television system. In any case, no measures were undertaken to clarify the circumstances associated with repair of this equipment. Neither section chairman Vice Admiral V. V. Zaytsev, nor members of the section representing the Navy’s Main Directorate for Operation and Repair were interested in clarifying these issues, because then all of the shortcomings in the organization of ship repair, for which these same people were personally responsible, would be revealed.
And this was apparently not the only equipment that was faulty prior to the cruise. During the work of the State Commission in the city of Severomorsk, at my request, Captain 1st Rank M. V. Petrovskiy, chief mechanical engineer of the Northern Fleet, telephoned the hospital to ask Lieutenant A. V. Zaytsev by specifically what means (batch [portsionnyy] or emergency) the end groups of ballast tanks were blown. Lieutenant Zaytsev replied that emergency blowing was carried out, because the batch blowing system was “not in operation.” It follows from this reply that the submarine went to sea with a faulty system for the batch-blowing of ballast tanks.
An examination of the submarine Komsomolets with deep-sea submersibles in August–September 1991 revealed that it lacked an aft outboard television camera. Review of videotape showing the location at which this camera is secured permits a categorical conclusion—the television camera had been removed from the submarine at the base prior to its cruise. Such are the facts. Eventually, in 1993, it became clear that the oxygen gas analyzer in compartment seven had been faulty in 1988, and practically all that year the submarine operated with a faulty oxygen gas analyzer. Thus, one may maintain that the submarine Komsomolets went into combat service with an inaccurate oxygen gas analyzer in compartment seven and without its complement of television cameras.
RBZh-PL-82, Article 173: Departure for sea is prohibited … in the presence of faults in the hull, technical equipment, or rescue devices.
It is difficult to say how much a working television system could have helped the submarine’s attack center to correctly estimate the situation in compartment seven and adopt the necessary damage control decisions, but one thing is clear—there is no doubt that its breakdown played a negative role. The role the oxygen gas analyzer played in creating the accident situation in compartment seven will be discussed later.
Prior to this cruise, the submarine Komsomolets had already operated for more than five years. During that time the reactor worked more than fourteen thousand hours. The other equipment of the main energy installation had operated the corresponding number of hours. Continually running the equipment practically exhausted the automation system’s resources (consumable materials) completely. Also, all automated gas oxygen analyzers, having the resources for twelve thousand hours, were in need of repair or needed to be replaced.
From all this data it follows that the assertion of the report by the State Commission Working Group that the submarine Komsomolets entered into combat service in a serviceable condition, as published in the sections “Operating and Damage Control” and “Shipbuilding,” does not correspond to the facts.
Prior to the patrol, the Komsomolets took aboard stores of provisions, bed linens, underwear, warm clothing, and other gear and supplies for sixty-nine persons intended for full self-sufficiency. Part of these provisions and supplies (including bread) were stored in compartment seven, even though storage in that compartment is not foreseen by the design documents. Such compartments are intended to be kept clear to avoid unnecessary hazard. Despite this, the State Commission Working Group failed to establish either the assortment or the quantity of provisions and gear in compartment seven. The joint act of the two sections simply states: “The following may be noted among conditions contributing to fire in compartment seven: … presence of 500 kg of bread, for which alcohol is used as a preservative, during the cruise in compartment seven.” We should add to this that in the initial stage of the commission’s work the figure was 1,000 kilograms of bread. But by calculation of the use-note, there should have been not less than 2,000 kilograms of bread in compartment seven at the moment of the accident.
It was revealed during investigation of the accident’s circumstances that in accordance with a decision of the corresponding higher “father-commanders,” chocolate in the emergency rations was replaced with sugar. It was unpleasant to listen to the childish prattle of admirals attempting to justify this outrage by claiming a chocolate shortage. It is true that Russia is living through hard times. But there is no shortage of this kind, and there cannot be one when the discussion turns to submariners, and all the more so to emergency rations for them. But the shortage of conscience and responsibility revealed itself fully. It is shameful to write about this, but it must be done—otherwise next time the “geniuses” in the Navy will put sugar coupons in the emergency ration instead of chocolate, and will then justify this by the long lines at the stores.
Such was the “readiness” of the submarine Komsomolets for the difficult cruise as reflected by the facts made available to the State Commission Working Group. However, since that time, additional information has come to light. As background, on February 21 and 22, 1989, Navy specialists conducted a readiness test of the crew for combat service. According to the results of the test, the crew received an unsatisfactory appraisal. Neither the leaders of the division nor the leaders of the Navy did anything to address the conclusions of this test.
Before the combat cruise, the submarine Komsomolets performed a test cruise. On this cruise the submarine seemed to be on the verge of a disaster. As the head of the chemical department, Captain Lieutenant V. A. Gregulev states that as a result of his “dawdling” the composition of oxygen in the atmosphere in compartment seven rose to 30 percent. Only by pure coincidence did a fire not spring up in that compartment. And even after this extraordinary event, the Navy and the commander of the division did not arrive at the obvious conclusions and make the necessary decisions. The crew was not kept from combat service.
By not recognizing the situations, the impression was created that some type of evil fate fell upon the crew of Captain 1st Rank Y. A. Vanin leading to a disaster.Maybe it was not the result of “evil fate” but the result of real people and of matériel circumstances. The authors of the “matériel” version maintain that the combat cruise of the crew was planned in the Moscow circles of the Navy, in coordination with their preference to transfer Vanin to the central apparatus of the Navy. Independent of whether this version is real or not, one thing is clear—the green light to the disaster of the submarine Komsomolets lit up the leadership of the 6th Division and the 1st Submarine Flotilla of the Northern Fleet.
In 1994 the “Unification Report Bellona Version 1” was published. In the article Thomas Nelson and Niles Bemer put forth the following statement from Captain Lieutenant I. S. Orlov from a conversation that was held February 22, 1992. “At 1103 in the seventh compartment at the stern of the nuclear submarine a fire broke out in the electrical panel, which caused a series of short circuits throughout the entire ship. The emergency defense system for the most part did not work and on board there were a few centers where fire formed. At 1700 the nuclear submarine sank. Forty-two members of the crew were killed. Before the cruise in the beginning of 1989, the nuclear submarine Komsomolets went through an emergency defense system’s test, which showed it was not in a satisfactory condition. For this reason, it was planned to delay the cruise of the Komsomolets; however, it all the same went out to sea.”
The statement of Captain Lieutenant Orlov provides important insight to the readiness of Komsomolets. Of course, the fire did not break out in the electrical panel. Rather, the electrical panels seemed to be in the area of the fire. It is also not true that the hot spots of the fire in the third, fourth, and fifth compartments were formed due to “a large part of the emergency defense system not working.” All of this will be discussed further. As to the unsatisfactory state of the emergency defense system of the Komsomolets before the cruise, no one from the crew, including Orlov himself, said anything to the State Commission. Instead, many of them maintained that the submarine was well prepared for the cruise. The State Commission was not provided any type of data about the unsatisfactory condition of the automation system and the emergency defense system.