UK deploys faulty subs!

UK deploys faulty subs!

cryptome.org

Nuclear submarines went to sea with potentially disastrous defect

Severin Carrell and Rob Edwards, The Guardian

Sunday 2 May 2010 16.56 UTC

[Excerpts]

British vessels Turbulent and Tireless allowed to leave port with safety valves sealed off, risking catastrophic explosion, leaked memo reveals

Two British nuclear submarines went to sea with a potentially disastrous safety problem that left both vessels at risk of a catastrophic accident, the Guardian can reveal.

Safety valves designed to release pressure from steam generators in an emergency were completely sealed off w

(visit the link for the full news article)


Related News Links:
www.guardian.co.uk

Not good, makes me wonder if they did it on purpose or if they really just didn't know.

Even then the technical engineers would have known, I know a guy who started his career as a nuclear maintenance member on subs. Years later he moved up and was allowed to pilot the vessel.

The men and woman on those ships know their equipment, and I just find it difficult that any one in the military would by choice operate a vehicle that may be red lined by mechanic crews.

cryptome.org
(visit the link for the full news article)

[edit on 3-5-2010 by ADVISOR]

reply to post by ADVISOR


I'm thinking they sent these Subs knowing of the problems, and just the

mere "presence" of the Subs, would have detered the Argentinians.

Perhaps the problems were bigger than they assumed.

Humans make human mistakes.

Once I was pre-flighting an AH-1 Cobra when the pilot and I found that a hose that was supposed to hook to one valave was hooked to the other valve, and that hose from valve hanging loose. It turned out that a newer maintenance type had been left alone to complete "routine repairs" while the more senior guy was called over to complete an emengency repair on another aircraft that was preparing for a mission. One end of the first hose was so badly mangled, as the guy had tried to make it fit to the wrong valve, that it had to be destroyed and a new line replaced properly.

It was an obvious problem, that no pilot was going to miss, but we asked each other what smaller problems were also present. We switched to another aircraft, while the primary was sent back for a full maintenance inspection. Several less-obvious but important mistakes were also found.

But what if the guy had not made such a huge, glaring mistake? We certainly might have missed the more subtle errors, and taken off anyway.

The more complicated a craft is, the more likely it is that someone's going to screw it up.

This is the story from the local rag (Plymouth Herald)

"WEAK and ambiguous" safety procedures at Devonport Dockyard saw two submarines leave Plymouth's base with potentially catastrophic safety flaws, a leaked memo has revealed.

HMS Tireless and HMS Turbulent left the city's dockyard with steam release safety valves accidentally sealed, and the problem went undetected for more than two years while the boats were in active service.

The fault could have seen explosions, radiation leaking into the boats and fatalities.

It turns out the valves are replaces with blanks for the various dock side tests and refits, they should be replaced with actual valves before the sub is sent to sea.... Doah!

One of the subs went 2 years in this condition - and it sounds like this thing is critical to preventing a disaster... I know these subs are just about the most complex things built by man, but common!

Also it's worth noting that the dockyards have had a number of incidents in the past, they are usually played down until the facts come out drip by drip when the heat is off - I will google for some references, but the last one was a hose (big hose) that is used to drain off radioactive coolant, it leaked in the procedure and 100's of litres ran off into the sea, luckley the cut off valves worked and only the liquid actually in the pipe was lost... We were told.

I know loads of people who live within spitting distance of that place, including some family... You don't get me staying there longer than I have to personally - well that's not true actually, sometimes I get a bit of work down there, but I'm never happy there.