From the ship’s log:
1106—Damage control alarm! Rise to a depth of 50 meters. LOKh delivered to compartment seven.
This entry requires some comments. “LOKh delivered to compartment seven” may also be read as “Deliver LOKh to compartment seven” because the suffix was not clearly written in the ship’s log.
Let’s listen to the explanations by the tragedy’s participants.
Captain 1st Rank B. G. Kolyada (in a report to the Northern Fleet commander):
At 1105 a “damage control alarm” was announced aboard ship. On reaching the GKP [Main command post —D.R.], I found everyone at their places carrying out their duties. BCh-5 commander Captain 2nd Rank Babenko tried to raise compartment seven with the loudspeaker communication system, but there was no answer. On my advice the commander gave the command: “Dispense LOKh into compartment seven.”
Lieutenant A. V. Zaytsev (interrogation tape recording):
At the moment of the alarm I was in my cot. I dressed and ran up to the control room. Damage Control Division Commander Captain 3rd Rank Yudin yielded his place to me at my console. The compartment seven warning light was on—”Temperature above 70 degrees Celsius.” The BCh-5 commander tried to raise compartment seven, but there was no answer. Then the report from compartment six: “Smoke leaking into the compartment.” The command “Dispense LOKh into compartment seven from compartment six” was given. There is a telegram transmitting system on our “Molybden” console. I composed a telegram. A bell was ringing in the compartment from which the LOKh was to have been delivered. A “Revun” siren was wailing in the compartment into which the LOKh was to be delivered. I pressed the telegram transmit button and checked the monitoring parameters.
Captain 3rd Rank Vladimir Ivanovich Yelmanov and captain lieutenants Dvorov, Y. N. Paramonov, and I. V. Kalinin, and lieutenants A. L. Stepanov and A. V. Tretyakov, who were in the control room, also confirmed that after the alarm was announced, a command was transmitted to compartment six to deliver LOKh from it into compartment seven. There are no grounds for disbelieving them. Thus, the entry in the ship’s log for 1106 can be read only as a command: “Deliver LOKh to compartment seven,” which was given to the watchstander for compartment six. And it follows from this that there were no entries in the ship’s log regarding execution of the command to deliver LOKh into compartment seven.
The damage control alarm was announced, but for some reason the place and nature of the accident were not indicated, as is required by Article 89 of the RBZh-PL-82. This can be explained either by careless maintenance of the ship’s log, or could it be that sounding of the damage control alarm disoriented the submarine personnel?
Warrant Officer V. S. Kadantsev (interrogation tape recording):
The alarm was announced. I was resting in my cabin in compartment two. I’m the chief of the mechanics’ crew, and all of the general ship systems are under my management. A training damage control alarm was sounded. I immediately arrived at the TsP [Control room—D. R.]. My seamen immediately arrived in the hold. I reported to the TsP: “The third’s ready for action.” After this the submarine began to surface. They began blowing the tanks of the central group twice. The seamen asked me what happened, but I couldn’t tell them anything. Then came the announcement: “Damage control alarm! Fire in compartment seven!”
The approximate time of the second blowing of the central group of ballast tanks was 1112.
Lieutenant A. V. Tretyakov (interrogation tape recording):
I was standing watch in the third watch section in the control room. A report arrived from Seaman Bukhnikashvili, the watchstander for compartment seven, at 1100: “The compartment has been inspected. No remarks.” At 1112 Senior Lieutenant Markov reported: “Short circuit in so: [R]ShchNo.12.” The temperature sensor was activated: “Over 70 degrees Celsius in compartment seven.” The commander announced: “Damage control alarm!”
Captain 3rd Rank V. I. Yelmanov (explanatory report):
I, Captain 3rd Rank Vladimir Ivanovich Yelmanov, was in my cabin at the moment the damage control alarm was announced—I was resting after my watch. At 1115 I arrived at the control room in response to the damage control alarm, and I began directing the work of the observation and data processing stations in order to ensure safe surfacing of the distressed submarine. At this time the fire was raging in compartment seven. I heard Warrant Officer Kolotilin’s report from compartment six: “The temperature of the bulkhead of compartment seven is 90 degrees Celsius, gas leaks have been stopped, the situation in compartment six is normal.”
1. The alarm was announced at 1106. Warrant Officer Kadantsev says that this was a training alarm, and it was not until later that the damage control alarm was announced.
2. Lieutenant Tretyakov and Captain 3rd Rank Yelmanov believe that the damage control alarm was announced at 1112 and 1115, respectively. Most of the rest of the crew put the announcement of the alarm somewhere between 1103 and 1110.
3. At 1106 a command to deliver LOKh to compartment seven was transmitted to compartment six. It is unknown to whom the command to deliver LOKh was given at 1103.
There are no grounds for not believing Warrant Officer Kadantsev. The conflicting testimony of crew members concerning the time of the alarm’s announcement confirms his story to some degree. In the first meeting of the State Commission in Severomorsk on April 9, 1989, Division Commander Rear Admiral O. T. Shkiryatov gave a report on the accident of the submarine Komsomolets on the basis of the information he received from Captain 1st Rank B.G. Kolyada. He reported that at 1100 a training alarm was announced aboard the submarine, and that the warning signal “Temperature in compartment seven above 70 degrees Celsius” lit up at 1103. In this case he stated that the training alarm was sounded supposedly to awaken the personnel (he was given a blistering scolding for this by his superiors). But Captain 1st Rank Kolyada said nothing about a training alarm in either the report or in the interrogation by the State Commission. Nor did other members of the crew say anything about this. Still, there are indirect confirmations in both the testimony and the actions of the submarine’s personnel that a training alarm may have been announced.
Captain Lieutenant S. A. Dvorov (interrogation tape recording):
Compartment seven commander [Captain Lieutenant Nikoli] Volkov and I ran to compartment six. We ran through compartment four where [Lieutenant A.V.] Makhota and [Warrant Officer M. N.] Valyavin were. When they looked at me in astonishment, I said: “The fire’s real,” and told them to seal off the compartment behind me, because I was running and I didn’t have time to shut the doors.
Every submariner knows that if an emergency occurs during a training alarm, all commands, reports, and messages associated with the accident must be given together with the word “actual,” in order to distinguish actual events and actions from training. Moreover, what would one find astonishing about a person running at breakneck speed to his action station in response to a real damage control alarm? Now, if he had been running like this for a training alarm, then you would certainly drop your jaw in astonishment. Thus, Captain Lieutenant Dvorov’s report indirectly confirms Warrant Officer Kadantsev’s report that a training alarm was announced aboard ship, in response to which Lieutenant Makhota and Warrant Officer Valyavin arrived in compartment four knowing nothing of what happened. This is obviously the only explanation for the fact that they arrived in compartment four “traveling light,” without any kind of individual protective equipment, like to a picnic. One must believe that they would have been carrying both an IP-6 self-contained breathing protective tank and an IDA-59 self-contained breathing apparatus in a real damage control alarm.
Let’s leave the question of a training alarm aside for awhile. At precisely what moment in time in the interval from 1103 to 1115 was the damage control alarm announced? If this happened at 1106 or earlier, then it is incomprehensible that compartment six commander Captain Lieutenant Dvorov and compartment seven commander Captain Lieutenant Volkov were unable to get into compartment six with their men. Dvorov explains this by a fire in compartment six, which was discovered in an attempt to open the bulkhead door. But there was no fire in the compartment, at least before 1114! This is confirmed by entries in the ship’s log concerning Warrant Officer Kolotilin’s report at 1110 and the submarine commander’s decision to establish the line of defense1 at the aft bulkhead of compartment five at 1113. The last report from Warrant Officer Kolotilin was received around 1114, after which communication with the stern was severed, as was recorded in the ship’s log at 1116. Thus, there was more than enough time between 1106 and 1114 to reach compartment six in response to the alarm. How do we evaluate the actions of captain lieutenants Dvorov and Volkov in this case? However, if it was not until 1112 that the damage control alarm was announced, in this case they may in fact not have been able to reach compartment six.
There is no testimony by the participants of the tragedy regarding the command to deliver a fire extinguisher into compartment seven, given at 1103. Considering the testimony of Captain 1st Rank Kolyada and Lieutenant Zaytsev on the fire report of the watchstander for compartment seven, we can assume that the command to deliver freon into compartment seven was given to the watchstander for compartment seven—that is, he was ordered to deliver LOKh onto “his own position” and abandon compartment seven. This can explain the entry in the ship’s log: “Bukhnikashvili tentatively in compartment six,” made at 1325. However, for some reason the watchstander for compartment seven was unable to fulfill this command (most probably because of the fire).
Now it is time to talk about the version that was given, by those who are alive today, at the very beginning of the investigation concerning the circumstances surrounding the accident. The advocates of this version maintain that the rough draft of the watchstander’s journal was falsified, that it was rewritten with the corresponding corrections while the crew survivors were on the cruiser Kirov or in the hospital. Based on their version, they offer the following facts: the presented falsified journal began at 00 hours April 7, 1989 (that is, from the day of the accident), and this falsified journal was checked and strengthened by the seal of the first crew but not the second crew of the submarine. During this process it was firmly established that the expert’s graphology was done inaccurately.
As far as the realism of the version? Only with the support and active collaboration of the leaders of the division and the Navy would it be possible to falsify the rough draft of the ship’s log. Unfortunately, such collaboration could have occurred (remember the guidance “industry is always responsible”). There remains a number of inconsistencies between the surviving members of the crew about the first minutes of the accident. They also speak in favor of this version. Nevertheless, it was impossible to write a completely new scenario about the accident in the falsified journal. One could only change a few time parameters of a few events at the beginning of the accident, excluding or adding separate episodes. With regard to what was said, the supposed rough draft of the ship’s log is considered to be a farce. To this we can add that, in practice, the authority over the false and real ship’s log is the VMF (Navy) who has the responsibility not only to report the results of such versions, but also if a falsified ship’s log exists.
Why was the fire in compartment seven not extinguished by the LOKh system? Before answering this question, let’s listen to the participants.
Captain 1st Rank B. G. Kolyada (interrogation tape recording):
LOKh was dispensed into the compartment at approximately 1105. Compartment six was queried. Six replied: “Dispensing LOKh into compartment seven.” On the console I observed the signal indicating delivery of LOKh to compartment seven. Pressure in compartment seven was normal… . Delivery of LOKh could be heard over the loudspeaker communication system… . After the LOKh was dispensed, a report came in from compartment six: “LOKh dispensed.”
If we remove from the quotation the “story” that Kolyada could hear LOKh being delivered into compartment seven over the loudspeaker communication system, everything in this explanation by the captain 1st rank would be plausible, were it not for one “but.” … As the reader may remember, Lieutenant Zaytsev transmitted the command to use the LOKh system. Let’s listen to the lieutenant.
Lieutenant A. V. Zaytsev (interrogation tape recording):
I pressed the telegram transmission button, and checked the monitoring parameters. I did not see a signal indicating that the LOKh was on its way. The BCh-5 commander, the damage control division commander, and Captain 1st Rank Kolyada, the division deputy commander, said that the light indicating delivery of LOKh to the compartment went on, but I was looking in another direction.
This creates a paradox—the chiefs saw the signal indicating delivery of the LOKh, while for some reason the console operator didn’t. Even so, Lieutenant Zaytsev’s explanation about some “other direction” in which he was supposedly looking may have been given credence, were it not for one circumstance: The warning system is set up in such a way that once the LOKh delivery light goes on, it cannot go off on its own. It has to be deliberately turned off. Moreover, when the light goes on, a sound signal occurs. Thus, if Lieutenant Zaytsev had not seen the light and had not heard the signal, then this would mean that these things did not happen, and that a fire extinguisher had not been delivered to compartment seven.
But what do the other members of the crew say? Captain Lieutenant A. G. Verezgov (interrogation tape recording):
Question: Did you hear the command to dispense LOKh from compartment six into compartment seven when you were in the control room?
Answer: No. The commander was busy with surfacing, and I was monitoring the underwater situation with the sonar operators.
Question: But did you hear the reply regarding delivery of the LOKh?
Answer: No.
Question: Who could have heard it?
Answer: Dvorov.
Warrant Officer Kolotilin’s report that the LOKh system had been activated could have been received by Lieutenant Zaytsev—the operator of the “Molybden” console, and by Captain Lieutenant Dvorov, or by his replacement, Captain Lieutenant Orlov—the operators of the main propulsion unit’s console. However, during their interrogation by the State Commission, none of them said that they received a report that the fire extinguisher had been delivered to the distressed compartment. And yet, although sonar specialists Captain Lieutenant Y. N. Paramonov and Captain Lieutenant I. V. Kalinin were checking on the underwater situation together with Captain Lieutenant Verezgov, in contrast to him they did hear Warrant Officer Kolotilin’s report that the LOKh system had been activated. Lieutenant A. L. Stepanov, the navigator, also heard this report.
This creates another paradox. People directly involved in the delivery of a fire extinguisher to the distressed compartment did not hear Warrant Officer Kolotilin’s report, while people having no relationship to this procedure mention it.
For the sake of fairness we should add that references to an LOKh delivery signal lighting up and to Warrant Officer Kolotilin’s report did suddenly appear in Lieutenant Zaytsev’s explanatory report, submitted two days after the interrogation: The influence of superiors, discussed earlier, had its effect.
Where was Warrant Officer Kolotilin, the watchstander in the energy compartment, when the alarm sounded?
Captain Lieutenant S. A. Dvorov (interrogation tape recording): “At 1100 there was a report from Warrant Officer Kolotilin in the fifth compartment, ‘The compartment has been inspected, nothing observed.’”
Not excluding the assumption that, at the time of the first indication of the emergency, Warrant Officer Kolotilin was in the fifth compartment, this reflects on the response to the command to supply the gas fire extinguisher to the seventh compartment. Significantly later, this assumption was confirmed by Lieutenant A. V. Tretyakov when he reported that the commander of the BCh-5 gave the command to Warrant Officer Kolotilin to supply LOKh to the seventh compartment, but only after he had received the authority to turn on the IDA-59 apparatus, because as reported, it was hard to breathe in the sixth compartment. The time of the report concerning the difficulty of breathing in the sixth compartment was fixed at 1100. The authority to turn on the IDA-59 apparatus was received by the warrant officer after 1114, which agrees with the information given by Captain Lieutenant I. S. Orlov. Before that time Warrant Officer Kolotilin simply could not have supplied LOKh to the seventh compartment.
There is still one unclear question in connection with the LOKh system. In the united act sections, “Operation and Damage Control” and “Shipbuilding,” of the State Commission Working Group the following statement is made: “The LOKh fire extinguishers were replenished (Freon 114B2 GOST 15899-70) during the period of examining the submarine in 1983. Replenishment of the gas fire extinguisher reservoirs (Freon 114B2 is a product of Japan having qualitative indices consistent with GOST 15899-70 and certified under import certificate No. 426) were carried out to standards in December 1988.” At first glance there is nothing unusual in these notes. The fire extinguisher’s reservoirs were replenished to standards and there were no problems. But the fact is that when the LOKh system broke down it failed to transfer the gas fire extinguisher from the reservoir into the emergency compartment. Immediately the question arises: how was the replenishment of the reservoir with freon performed, and in which compartment was this process conducted? What quantity of the fire gas extinguisher was added to the reservoir? How was the hermitization (gas-tight integrity) of the LOKh system ensured after the replenishment of the reservoirs? To all of these questions there are no answers. And no answer to the basic question: To what degree do these efforts reflect on the results of battling the fire in the seventh compartment?
And how did the submarine’s leadership view the matter of delivering LOKh to compartment seven at the time of the accident?
Warrant Officer V. F. Slyusarenko (interrogation tape recording):
I ascended to the control room. The senior watch officer said that people were needed to deliver LOKh from compartment six to compartment seven. Consequently, it was not known whether or not LOKh was being dispensed into compartment seven. I volunteered to go, because I was feeling good and I was wearing an IP-6 self-contained breathing protective mask. Yudin and [A. A.] Grundul were supposed to make their way into compartment six, and I was the safety man at the bulkhead between compartments six and five together with Lieutenant Tretyakov. We were unable to budge the rack-and-pinion2 on the bulkhead leading from compartment five to compartment six. Yudin sent Grundul off to open the clack [check] valve to equalize the pressure. He couldn’t do it. It was hard working in an IP. The entire floor of compartment five was covered with a brown liquid—maybe hydraulic fluid, or maybe VPL3 used to put out the fire. We left compartment five and reported that it was impossible to get into compartment six because the bulkhead couldn’t be opened. Then the executive officer ordered Yudin to dispense LOKh into six out of five.
This patrol of the damage control team into compartment six was entered in the ship’s log at 1356 without indicating its goal.
There is one other circumstance relating to a certain degree to the question of delivery of LOKh into compartment seven.
Captain Lieutenant S. A. Dvorov (explanatory report):
I surrendered my watch to Captain Lieutenant Orlov. On orders from the BCh-5 commander, Captain 2nd Rank [V. I.] Babenko, I was to leave for compartment seven with two IP-6 self-contained protective breathing masks and carry Senior Seaman Bukhnikashvili into the airlock between compartments six and seven, and if he was unconscious, to connect him up to an IDA-59.”4
It follows from this that the submarine’s leadership did not believe that compartment seven was fully involved. Moreover, it believed the fire to be small, and supposed that the watchstander was not only alive but may also have not lost consciousness. The possibility is not excluded that the attack center had information on the nature of the fire. But that’s not the question. How do we explain that two mutually exclusive decisions are made at practically the same time—first, sealing off compartment seven and delivering LOKh into it, and second, unsealing the compartment with the purpose of rescuing the watchstander? According to RBZh-PL-82, Article 99, when the LOKh system is used to put out a fire, the distressed compartment may be opened not earlier than thirty minutes after the fire extinguisher is delivered into it. The explanation for this may be as follows: Either the submarine’s leadership was not unanimous in its opinion and actions in fighting the accident, or what is more probable, the decision to send Captain Lieutenant Dvorov with his men into compartment seven was made later (tentatively at 1112), after it already became known that the fire extinguisher had not been delivered to compartment seven. The latter hypothesis is confirmed by the following entries in the ship’s log: at 1113 on designation of the lines of defense in compartment six, and at 1114 on closure of the LOKh valves in compartment six to avoid any surprises.
Let’s summarize. All of the objective data indicate that freon was not delivered to compartment seven. Again, there are no records of this in the ship’s log.
Experiments confirmed the fire-extinguishing characteristics of the freon used in the LOKh system. Delivery of freon guarantees extinguishment of a fire at any stage of its development within around sixty seconds at normal pressure and normal oxygen concentration in the compartment atmosphere. The fire would have been extinguished even in the presence of a high oxygen concentration in the compartment, because the concentration of freon that would have been delivered to compartment seven exceeded the minimum necessary concentration by almost two times.
The following question naturally arises: Why all of these conjectures about the first minutes of the accident? Wouldn’t it be simpler to ask the participants in the tragedy who were in the attack center in the first minutes of the accident about these events? In an open letter published in Morskoy Sbornik (No. 2, 1990), Captain 1st Rank Kolyada, speaking on behalf of the surviving crew members, even invites us to go to him first to get “information that is in fact truthful.”
Unfortunately, one must say that many of the members of the crew, especially the officers, were not sincere during the investigation by the State Commission and attempted to present the accident in an advantageous light for the crew. This effort continued in the press. Therefore, there was no reason to expect candid answers to unclear questions.
Why did the crew decide to rise to a depth of fifty meters, rather than to the surface itself, which is what the above-cited Article 89 of RBZh-PL-82 states as the primary course of action? This is a very serious question, and it has far-reaching consequences, because the choice of the surfacing procedures depends on the decision reached. Rising to a depth of fifty meters would be possible only with ship’s power; at the same time that surfacing could be accomplished by three different methods: with ship’s power, by blowing the middle group of ballast tanks, and by using powder gas generators—or by any combination of these methods. The assertions of naval representatives that the decision reached—rising to a depth of fifty meters—was dictated by navigation safety are absolutely unfounded because the submarine was not in an area of intensive shipping and, moreover, the situation around the ship was known to a radius of dozens of nautical miles.
Captain Lieutenant Y. N. Paramonov (interrogation tape recording):
I am the commander of the sonar group. I was on watch. There was a group target left of our bearing. It was apparently the tender Khlobystov. The group target was classified as fishing trawlers. The horizon was clear. After this I heard the “Onega” system squeal out its warning signal. Then the damage control alarm was announced.
The distance to the tender Aleksey Khlobystov and the fishing trawlers was over fifty nautical miles.
There could be only one explanation—the submarine command underestimated the full seriousness of the accident, and adopted a halfway decision that had fateful consequences.
What optimum sequence of decisions should the submarine have adopted after receiving notice of the fire in compartment seven?
1. To announce an “actual” damage control alarm, with an indication of the place and nature of the accident (this was done after a delay).
2. To designate the lines of defense and supervise their establishment (this was done with a delay, and not completely).
3. To ensure delivery of fire extinguisher into compartment seven (this was apparently not done for the reasons indicated above).
4. To make the decision to surface the submarine, and to surface by blowing the middle group of main ballast tanks with air from high-pressure air cofferdam (“banks”) No. 4 located in compartment seven, completely using up its air reserve, and then stopping the main propulsion unit and completely sealing off compartment seven (this was not done).
5. To shut off the air and hydraulic pipelines passing into the distressed compartment (not done).
6. To select the main focus of submarine damage control measures, and then make adjustments to it as the accident situation developed (also not done).
7. To monitor fulfillment of measures to seal off the compartments by personnel of these compartments (not done).
It would have taken not more than five minutes to carry out all of these actions, and rescue of the submarine and the crew would have been guaranteed.
“Now, in smoke-filled rooms, having sorted through all of the options for putting out the fire with the assistance of their own and foreign experience, critics of the second crew are eager to throw stones at Vanin’s back: ‘He did this wrong, he didn’t give that order, while he could have done such and such, and then … ,’” says writer and seascape painter N. Cherkashin.5
“Of course, in a calm situation, when time is not sharply lacking, and with the help of the most competent specialists in different fields of science and engineering, and of the most experienced practical experts, decisions and actions aboard a ship in distress that are somehow more effective or prudent could be proposed. Especially when the outcome is known”—these are the words spoken by Vice Admiral V. V. Zaytsev, deputy commander in chief and chief of the Navy’s Main Directorate for Operation and Repair, and repeated after him by Captain 1st Rank B. G. Kolyada.6
But what is forgivable to a certain degree in a writer and painter of seascapes is unforgivable in an admiral.
These recommendations are appropriate for any kind of fire in compartment seven of the submarine Komsomolets and they follow from the requirements of Articles 21, 38, 59, 90, 91, 121 of the RBZh-PL-82, the principal document on submarine damage control. And the concrete actions to be taken by the crew in response to accidents and combat damage are spelled out in the “Manual on Combat Use of Technical Resources (RBITS),” which is written for each submarine design. The “Emergency Bill” is drawn up and plans for conducting ship exercises to work on submarine damage control problems are drawn up on the basis of these documents. The standard problem “Fire in Compartment Seven” should have been practiced within the framework of crew training until the actions of the crew were automatic. But if during an emergency a crew were to begin inventing “decisions that were somehow more effective or prudent,” it would probably be destined to defeat. This had to be known by Vice Admiral Zaytsev and Captain 1st Rank Kolyada.
And when the industrial representatives in the “Operation and Damage Control” section attempted to analyze how Captain 1st Rank Vanin’s crew trained and what the training objectives were in the work on submarine damage control problems, they found that a “Manual on Combat Use of Technical Resources” had not been written for the submarine Komsomolets, even though the basic data for this end were provided by the design office back in 1983. Five years were not enough for the Navy to draw up, “in a calm situation, when time is not sharply lacking, and with the help of the most competent specialists” the main document on damage control, which was supposed to have fleshed out the general requirements of the RBZh-PL-82 as it applied to the submarine Komsomolets.
The “Manual on Combat Use of Technical Resources” is part of the set of combat documents on submarine survivability. Without this document the crew was not supposed to have taken the test in ship damage control, and the submarine itself was not supposed to have been allowed to sea. But as we can see, the law was not written for our naval commanders.
It follows from this that Captain 1st Rank Vanin’s crew did not have the theoretical foundation for competent study of damage control problems, which was a crucial factor in the accident. The crew found itself hostage to the criminal irresponsibility and devil-may-care attitude of the naval leadership toward the needs of submariners.
Also, the plans for ship damage control exercises were not furnished to the State Commission.
None of this was reflected in the materials of the State Commission that investigated the accident aboard the submarine Komsomolets. The reason is simple: Those who were personally responsible for the incident—Naval Institute No. 1 chief, Vice Admiral M. N. Budayev, and Naval Main Directorate for Operation and Repair chief, Vice Admiral V. V. Zaytsev—were the chairmen of the sections of the State Commission Working Group. The investigation of the accident was conducted not by an impartial commission, but by a kangaroo court.