Cooling down: In this video image from Ru-RTR Russian state television channel, firefighters spray water on the Yekaterinburg nuclear submarine in a dock at the Roslyakovo shipyard in the Murmansk region, Russia, on Friday. A fire that erupted while the Yekaterinburg was in drydock for repairs at the town of Roslyakovo near Murmansk has left seven crewmembers injured after they inhaled poisonous fumes from the blaze. (AP Photo/Ru-RTR Russian state channel/ Via APTN) Military prosecutors have launched an
investigation into whether safety regulations were breached. President Dmitry
Medvedev summoned top Cabinet officials to report on the situation and demanded
punishment for anyone found responsible.
The fire broke out Thursday at an Arctic
shipyard outside the northwestern Russian city of Murmansk where the submarine Yekaterinburg
was in dry-dock. The blaze, which shot orange flames high into the air through
the night, was put out Friday afternoon and firefighters continued to spray the
vessel with water to cool it down, Emergency Situations Minister Sergei Shoigu
said.
Russian state television earlier showed the
rubber-coated hull of the submarine still smoldering, with firefighters
gathering around it and some standing on top to douse it with water. Most
modern submarines’ outer hulls are covered with rubber to make them less noisy
and more difficult for an enemy to detect.
Seven members of the submarine crew were
hospitalized after inhaling poisonous carbon monoxide fumes from the fire,
Shoigu said.
An unspecified number of crew remained
inside the submarine during the fire, Defense Ministry spokesman Col. Igor
Konashenkov said in a statement. He insisted there never was any danger of it
spreading inside the sub and said the crew reported that conditions on board
remained normal.
Konashenkov’s statement left it unclear
whether the crew were trapped there or ordered to stay inside.
There has been no radiation leak from the
fire, the Defense Ministry and Foreign Ministry said, and Norway’s
Radiation Protection Authority across the border reported it has not measured
any increased radioactivity.
The governor in Finnmark,
Norway’s northeastern
province that borders Russia,
and the radiation agency complained about the Russian response.
“There have been problems to get clear
information from the Russian side,” Gunnar Kjoennoey told Norwegian broadcaster
NRK. “We have an agreement to exchange information in such cases, but there has
been no information from the Russian side so far.”
Russia’s
military says the blaze started on wooden scaffolding and then engulfed the sub’s
outer hull. The vessel’s nuclear reactor had been shut down and its
nuclear-tipped missiles and other weapons had been unloaded before dry-dock
repairs, it said.
Toxic fumes from the blaze had spread to
the town of Roslyakovo
where the shipyard is located, but officials said there was no need to evacuate
local residents.
The Interfax new agency quoted the former
director of the biggest shipyard in the area as saying the fire was probably
caused by the failure to take proper safety precautions, such as coating the
scaffolding with special sprays to make it fire-resistant.
“It was either lack of professionalism or
an attempt to save money that has turned into huge losses,” Nikolai Kalistratov
said.
The Yekaterinburg is a Delta-IV-class
nuclear-powered submarine that normally carries 16 nuclear-tipped
intercontinental ballistic missiles. The 166-meter vessel has a displacement of
18,200 tons when submerged.
The chief of the General Staff of the
Russian armed forces, Gen. Nikolai Makarov, led a team of senior military
officials to Roslyakovo to oversee the emergency response.
The damage from the fire could be so
massive that the submarine would need to be scrapped, the Interfax news agency
reported Friday. But Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, who is in charge of
the nation’s military industries, said that the submarine will rejoin the navy
after repairs.
The Russian navy suffered its worst
accident in August 2000, when the Kursk
nuclear submarine exploded and sank during naval maneuvers, killing all 118
crew members aboard.
A 2008 accident at the Nerpa
nuclear-powered submarine killed 20 Russian seamen and injured 21 others when
its fire-extinguishing system activated in error and spewed suffocating Freon
gas. (nvn)
