HMS Astute Grounded

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by Bubblehead Nuke

Looking at the photos of it, I'd say you could have walked on the stern planes. I'll bet they were JUST under the water. The stress on the hull is HUGE in situations like this. She will be in a drydock VERY soon I'll bet.

As for them running the diesel? I would say that was a prudent thing to do. With water that shallow I would have been worried about cavitation of the MSW pumps and silt injesting into the condensers. No cooling is a bad thing.

One other thing most people do not realize. There is NO SHIELDING on the side of the boats. There is SOME shielding on the top of the reactor compartment so you can walk topside at very low power levels, but NONE on the sides. As far as they were out of the water, they would have a radiological consideration to think of. There are also other operational aspects to consider. I know on a 688, we would have been shut down if that high and dry.

Its is gonna be a BAD day for somone.

Question... if the Reactor is SCRAMED aren't the rods dropped in to the reactor vessel in a solution of water and a moderator to stop the nuclear reaction? Doesn't that stop most of the harmful radiation?

[Oberon]

The CO is going to get Scrammed I'm pretty sure of that much. Of course, there's bound to be a catalog of errors about, starting with getting so close to shore, sounding equipment either not being checked or not working. There's a hundred different failures that could have accumulated to create this incident...but at the end of the day, HMS Astute is an SSN, SSNs aren't exactly good at shallow water ops, even in friendly territory. I've heard that a personnel transfer exercise had taken place just before she caught her rudder, so that explains why she was close to shore, probably practicing SBS deployment and recovery, but there's close and then there's too close, and the two are measured by success or failure...and in this case it was a very embarrassing failure.

In regards to radiologics, since she was a distance from the shore (close but not right in) I should imagine that anyone at the shore would have only received a very low dosage, particularly since only a third or so of the side was exposed. The tugs nearby might have got a bigger dosage but since they didn't really move in close until the tide was up, they might be alright, furthermore it's possible they scrammed the reactor and are running on diesels now. They certainly had the diesels on when stuck.

The latest reports indicate that she's able to make her own way back to Faslane, (again, probably on diesels) I'm not sure if Faslane has a drydock, I think it does but it's undercover (for the Vanguards) but I wouldn't be surprised if she spends at least the rest of the year in there undergoing strict hull testing.

Not exactly the shining start for our new attack sub, let's hope that Ambush does a bit better when she's finished next year.

[Catfish]

Hello,

" ... Aside from attack capabilities, it is able to sit in waters off the coast undetected, delivering the UK's special forces where needed or even listening to mobile phone conversations. ..."

Sorry, but this somehow made me laugh.

I think she is running on Diesel judging from the exhaust fumes, most probably to keep up electricity for board systems and cooling pumps for the - most probably shut-down - reactor. Even a scrammed reactor will take some time to cool down.

From bubblehead nuke:
" ... There is NO SHIELDING on the side of the boats. There is SOME shielding on the top of the reactor compartment so you can walk topside at very low power levels, but NONE on the sides. As far as they were out of the water, they would have a radiological consideration to think of. There are also other operational aspects to consider. I know on a 688, we would have been shut down if that high and dry. ..."

This is why a always have to laugh at those official statements like
"there was no radioactivity leaking out".
What the hell do they mean ? That no radiating material itself leaked out ? This would be a major disaster.
But the reactor is radiating all the time, only that there is a lot of seawater around it which buffers most of it, although not very nice towards mother nature even when all works as it should.

The cooling water of the reactor's inner cooling system is certainly radioactive, as well as all the tubes, heat exchangers, steel and metal around becomes radioactive, when exposed to nuclear radiation for a time. I really do not even want to know what is going on in Murmansk and Severodvinsk with all those laid off and rusting boats. Ah wait, they cut out whole segments of some subs and sunk them near the coast of Novaja Semlja - immediately before leasing out the region to norvegian fishing trawlers. Nuclear propulsion has never been a "clean" technology, by the real meaning of the word.

Greetings,
Catfish

[XabbaRus]

Ok comments like that really annoy me.

Talking about splitting hairs. Radiation falls off with range quite quickly. As long as the pipes didn't break and the coolant didn't leak then there has been no incident.

However the wingnuts at CND don't realise that, they just assume that as soon as a nuke boat has a bump or something that that is proof nuclear powered vessels are more dangerous and at risk as if the fact they are nuclear makes them more likely to have an accident. I'd say that the bumps and scrapes that commercial shipping have had over the past decades have caused more pollution than nuke boats.

What the russians did yes is nuts, but then that is their business.

[Catfish]

Hello,

Originally Posted by XabbaRus

Ok comments like that really annoy me.

Talking about splitting hairs. Radiation falls off with range quite quickly. As long as the pipes didn't break and the coolant didn't leak then there has been no incident.

Well i thought here at subsim i could be a little polemic

I know that radiation falls away quickly, and this was no "incident". However what do they do after the boat's or other's life cycle(s) ? Clean the steel plates with soap ? The reactor housing, or the fuel rods, make small pellets and seal them in glass masses to bury ? If they do that at all, and just don't sink the waste in a fishery area.
I just said that nuclear propulsion is not a "clean" technology if taking energy balance, including building and disposing, into account.

A breaking-up super tanker or disposing marine fuel residues into the sea has a more direct effect, i agree.

Greetings,
Catfish

[Jimbuna]

Did anyone notice the amount of crap that has already attached itself to the hull just below the surfaced waterline?

[Oberon]

Originally Posted by jimbuna

Did anyone notice the amount of crap that has already attached itself to the hull just below the surfaced waterline?

Aye, it doesn't take long...I wonder how it affects sonar performance and signature...