Soviet submarine graveyard

[cash_tx]

Saw this on Facebook, and thought it was interesting.

 

[Red Leg]

Saw this on Facebook, and thought it was interesting.

View attachment 574230

Don't get too excited. They still have 11 operational ballistic missile submarines with a 12th soon to be commissioned. Four are the new Borei class boomer carrying 16 SLBMs each loaded with six 150 KT independently targeted warheads (that is 384 targets, each being struck by a warhead ten times more powerful than what hit Hiroshima from just those four subs). The other seven boats or Delta III/IV class missile launchers. They also carry 16 missiles each though these are only armed with three warheads each. That is another 296 targets.

They also maintain 19 nuclear powered hunter killer boats and an additional 21 diesel electric attack boats.

The Russian submarine fleet is a very serious threat. For instance, China has exactly four boats operational capable of attacking the US.

 

[Randy F]

Don't get too excited. They still have 11 operational ballistic missile submarines with a 12th soon to be operational. Four are the new Borei class boomer carrying 16 SLBMs each loaded with six 150 KT independently targeted warheads (that is 384 targets, each being struck by a warhead ten times more powerful than what hit Hiroshima from just those four subs). The other seven boats or Delta III/IV class missile launchers. They also carry 16 missiles each though these are only armed with three warheads each. That is another 296 targets.

They also maintain 19 nuclear powered hunter killer boats and an additional 21 diesel electric attack boats.

The Russian submarine fleet is a very serious threat. For instance, China has exactly four boats operational capable of attacking the US.

I just went from a smile to back to carrying supplies to the bunker in .5 seconds.

 

[jpr9954]

Saw this on Facebook, and thought it was interesting.

View attachment 574230

I see this and wonder did they just leave the nuclear reactors in these subs. I also wonder if the Chinese haven't already been to Vladivostok to recycle all that metal.

 

[Skshyk]

8 Hours ago....

 

[Mark A Ouellette]

I see this and wonder did they just leave the nuclear reactors in these subs. I also wonder if the Chinese haven't already been to Vladivostok to recycle all that metal.

Maybe the Chinese metal scrappers visited those old Soviet and Russian subs with Geiger Counters in hand?

 

[mark-hunter]

Saw this on Facebook, and thought it was interesting.

Scrapped sub, you have to put somewhere.

On this picture it looks like foxtrot class sub, at the time allegedly largest conventional sub in the world.
But this is so obsolete, you could as well place it in Jurassic park.

Attached photo below is another scrapped sub - that looks like the one from your photos.
It is (was) placed in Long Beach, California, I visited it, when I was there.

This particular one in Long beach, was sold to Indian navy then decommissioned, then sold to the US, and exhibited as tourist attraction.

Foxtrot-class submarine - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Its old cold war relic. Diesel electric.
Recently I heard Long Beach sub is (or to be) removed and scrapped totally
Later edit. Foxtrot class had system of warm beds. One part of crew works, another part of crew rests.
Later they change shifts and go to bed of the ones who took duty. Beds kept warm. Beds where placed through the length of the sub, often placed above some machinery. One joint room for officers, and one single bed cabin for captain, one single bed cabin for political officer, other ratings beds around the sub, on machineries etc whereever was possible - at least this is how it was marked on display. This is what I have seen during visit in Long Beach. But I think this sub came directly from ww2 technologies, and this was life on conventional sub at the time.

,

 

[jpr9954]

Scrapped sub, you have to put somewhere.

On this picture it looks like foxtrot class sub, at the time allegedly largest conventional sub in the world.
But this is so obsolete, you could as well place it in Jurassic park.

Attached photo below is another scrapped sub - that looks like the one from your photos.
It is (was) placed in Long Beach, California, I visited it, when I was there.

This particular one in Long beach, was sold to Indian navy then decommissioned, then sold to the US, and exhibited as tourist attraction.

Foxtrot-class submarine - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Its old cold war relic. Diesel electric.
Recently I heard Long Beach sub is (or to be) removed and scrapped totally
Later edit. Foxtrot class had system of warm beds. One part of crew works, another part of crew rests.
Later they change shifts and go to bed of the ones who took duty. Beds kept warm. Beds where placed through the length of the sub, often placed above some machinery. One joint room for officers, and one single bed cabin for captain, one single bed cabin for political officer, other ratings beds around the sub, on machineries etc whereever was possible - at least this is how it was marked on display. This is what I have seen during visit in Long Beach. But I think this sub came directly from ww2 technologies, and this was life on conventional sub at the time.

The National Museum of the Pacific War in Fredericksburg, TX has the conning tower from a WW2 sub. Not sure which one but Nimitz had been a submariner at one time.

 

[mark-hunter]

I forgot to say in my earlier post.
When I visited this sub in Long Beach, I was impressed by living conditions of classic sub of immediate post ww2 era.
There were one toilet at the bow, one toilet at the stern. I dont remember exactly - but there were maybe one or two bathrooms
Total crew is 78. Total number of beds is around one half or two thirds of total crew.

So, just working on such a sub is living hell. Working in mines, or prison with forced labor has better conditions, literally.
Not to mention life on board during war patrols, and with constant stress of being attacked.

 

[Macduff]

I forgot to say in my earlier post.
When I visited this sub in Long Beach, I was impressed by living conditions of classic sub of immediate post ww2 era.
There were one toilet at the bow, one toilet at the stern. I dont remember exactly - but there were maybe one or two bathrooms
Total crew is 78. Total number of beds is around one half or two thirds of total crew.

So, just working on such a sub is living hell. Working in mines, or prison with forced labor has better conditions, literally.
Not to mention life on board during war patrols, and with constant stress of being attacked.

Submariners back then, and now, had big brass balls.

I can't imagine going out on an oversized tin can.

The survival rate on subs during WWII wasn't particularly good, IIRC. Seems like a terrible way to go in my mind.

 

[mark-hunter]

I was reading somewhere that German submariners had the biggest percentage of losses of all their armed forces. Like 75% men and boats. (something like that)

But dont disregard ships hit by torpedo by them. Not much chances of survival either in that case.

In convoys, nobody stopped to collect survivors, so they dont get hit next.

Winter north Atlantic, or arctic convoys, and your ship sinks?
Winter heavy seas that smashes wooden lifeboats against the listed burning hull.
Jumping overboard with life jacket in Atlantic freezing waters at night?

So, in all reality I dont know for which side Atlatnic battle was worse. Total and merciless brutality on the receiving ends on both sides.

I had a neighbor who was a chief engineer on escort destroyer on Atlantic convoys.
He was telling me war stories - one night when escorting convoy, cargo ships were sinking being torpedoed one after another. All night.

They were expecting to be next.
His hair turned grey in that one night. Thats what he told me. They were not hit.
As a young boy, I remember him white as Santa Klaus.

 

[Pondoro]

Imagine what watching a tanker carrying 105 octane aviation fuel being torpedoed does to your mind..a bright flash going up some 1,5km..tanker atomized....and your own ship is doing 8-10 knots...

 

[jpr9954]

Imagine what watching a tanker carrying 105 octane aviation fuel being torpedoed does to your mind..a bright flash going up some 1,5km..tanker atomized....and your own ship is doing 8-10 knots...

Is it any wonder that Robert Ruark drank to excess after having served as a Navy gunnery officer commanding a Armed Naval Guard unit attached to one of those ships. From what I read, he did the Murmansk route.

From Terry Wieland about researching Tales from the Hill:

Ruark was an officer in the U.S. Navy, and his first assignment in 1942 was to command a unit of the Armed Guard (a.k.a., “fish food”). These were handfuls of naval personnel posted on merchant ships on the arctic run to man the anti-aircraft guns.

The Murmansk Convoys were, in the dark days of 1942-43, the very worst assignment any man or ship could be given. Life expectancy was slim, conditions were abominable; the North Atlantic teemed with wolf packs of German U-boats; if you reached the North Cape, you faced Luftwaffe attacks and the threat of the huge battleship Tirpitz, lurking at Alta Fjord.

he convoys ran during the winter because the summer conditions of calmer seas and 24-hour daylight favored the attackers; the arctic winters — gales, mountainous seas, blizzards, and sub-zero temperatures certainly hampered the subs and bombers, but added more hazards to an already long list.

https://www.grayssportingjournal.com/abandon-ship/