On March 25, 1984, sensational news spread around the world - a Soviet nuclear submarine surfaced in the center of an aircraft carrier strike group of the US Navy and … … rammed the aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk.
Events unfolded as follows. In early March, an aircraft carrier strike group (AUG) of the US Navy, consisting of an aircraft carrier and seven escort warships, entered the Sea of Japan to conduct planned exercises with an amphibious assault on the coast of South Korea. To observe the Americans, the K-314 nuclear submarine and the Vladivostok submarine went out to sea. The K-314 was commanded by Captain 1st Rank Evseenko, the campaign was supported by the division commander, Captain 1st Rank Belousov.
On the seventh day of the cruise, K-314 established hydroacoustic contact with American ships. At night, the boat surfaced to periscope depth and, not found, "hung" like that for more than an hour. Having determined the elements of the AUG movement, the commander gave the command to dive. The surveillance lasted more than two days, when hydroacoustic contact with the Americans was lost.
On March 21, at about 11:00 pm, an acoustician reported listening noises. It took about 30 minutes to classify the target, then Evseenko decided to surface under the periscope and clarify the situation. Having surfaced to a depth of 10 meters, the commander saw on the right, as he put it, "an airfield of lights." And then a terrible blow shook the boat, after 5-7 seconds - the second. To the order "Look around in the compartments!" from the seventh, the propeller shaft beating was reported. The division commander gave the command to surface to a positional position, but Evseenko quite reasonably objected that he was in command of the boat, and ordered to switch to a reserve propulsion system.
When at dawn the AUG disappeared in the distance (only one patrol boat remained, who followed the boat to the very territorial waters of the USSR), K-314 surfaced, and the commander asked the Vladivostok, which had approached, to inspect the stern. A strange picture appeared before the eyes of the astonished sailors: the propeller with broken blades hung somehow unnaturally, at an angle to the hull. Later, after docking, it turned out that the propeller shaft between the strong and light hull was broken off!
The boat was taken in tow and taken to the Chazhma bay, where it was docked for repairs. By the end of the summer, the repair was completed, and on August 21, the K-314 went to sea trials, and in September went to the Indian Ocean for combat service, however, with a different commander (Evseenko was removed from office).
But the aircraft carrier was less fortunate - with the K-314 propeller and rudders, the bottom was proportioned to it for 40 (!) Meters, and, leaving behind fuel oil stains, it barely crawled to the Japanese port and also became docked for repairs.
But the misadventures of K-314 did not end there either! On August 10, 1985, upon completion of work on recharging the reactors, due to violation of nuclear safety requirements and the technology of undermining the reactor lid, an uncontrolled spontaneous chain reaction of uranium fission of the left side reactor took place. As a result of the thermal explosion, a radioactive plume was formed, which reached the sea on the coast of the Ussuri Bay. The accident killed ten people.
The nuclear submarine K-314 of project 671V "Ruff" (according to NATO classification "Victor 1") belongs to the class of so-called killer submarines. Their creation was due to the emergence of missile submarines and the need to fight against submarines, although the tasks traditional for torpedo submarines were not removed either. In the United States, the first such boat, SSN-597 Talliby, entered service in the fall of 1960, and from 1962 to 1967. the fleet was replenished with 14 more powerful nuclear submarines - the Thresher class. It was obvious that the Soviet Union could not do without such submarines either.
SKB-143 (later SPMBM "Malakhit") received the assignment for the design of the Project 671 nuclear submarine with a normal displacement of 3000 tons and a submersion depth of at least 400 meters. The tactical and technical assignment was approved on November 3, 1959, by March 1960, the draft was ready, and by December - the technical design.
The performance data of the Project 671 submarine:
length - 93 m, width - 10.6 m, draft - 7, 2
displacement - 3500/4870 t
speed - 10/33, 5 knots
immersion depth - 400 m
crew - 76 people, autonomy - 60 days
Structurally, the 671st was a two-hull submarine with a characteristic, "polished" fencing of the conning tower and retractable devices. The robust body was made of high-strength AK-29 steel, 35 mm thick. The light hull, the bow of the superstructure, the vertical and horizontal empennage were made of low-magnetic steel, and the deckhouse guard and the rest of the superstructure were made of AMG-61 aluminum alloy. To reduce noise, the body was pasted over with a special rubber coating.
Armament consisted of six 533-mm torpedo tubes, providing firing from depths of up to 250 meters. Ammunition - 18 torpedoes (rocket-torpedoes) or 32 mines.
Speaking about the K-143 ram, one cannot but mention another, more pleasant case. When in 1964 Khrushchev went to Egypt to present Gamal Abdel Nasser with the Golden Star of the Hero, he was outraged by the insolence of the American pilots who flew over the ship, almost knocking down the masts and absolutely not paying attention to the flag of the head of the government of the USSR. And then the man who had practically ruined the fleet suddenly remembered about him!
Soon our submariners received a secret and very daring task. At noon on July 14, 1964, at the signal of the main headquarters of the Navy in the very center of the US 6th Fleet, 12 (!) Of our submarines simultaneously surfaced, after which our sailors went to the cabin to smoke. The completely stunned Americans were in a panic. They obviously did not expect such impudence. But in vain! Here is such a "Kuz'kina mother" turned out …
