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The Soviet Union Launched project 658
- In response to the US developement of nuclear submarines -The Soviet Union began building 8 nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines -The first of which was the K-19 submarine
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K-19 Submarine construction began
-K-19 keel was laid down and construction began
-During construction numerous workers died for various reasons: a fire, inhalation of posionous fumes from glue and an electrician was crushed by a missile-tube cover -
K-19 was launched
-Due to the rush to get the submarine in to the ocean, there were many design flaws
-During manufactuering there was a crack in the coolant pipe that went unnoticed/unreported
-There was no backup coolant system -
Initial Issues
-Confusion between crew members led to improper use of the reactor
-Causing a reactor-control rod to be bent
-This lead to the reactor having to be disassembled for repair, further delaying the deployment of the K-19 into the Soviet fleet -
K-19 began sea trials
-After a full power-run, crew members saw the rubber coating of the hull had detached and the entire ship needed to be recoated
-During a test dive to the ships maximum depth of 980 ft, flooding was found in the reactor compartment
-Later that year, coolant was lost due to a failure with the main circuit pump.
Repairs were made and the ship was deemed operational in the following months -
K-19 completed
-After repairs were made, and sea tests were finished, the K-19 submarine was deemed completed
-There were 139 crew members aboard when the submarine was officially commissioned -
Fixing the coolant leak
-The first captain had crew members of the engineering section go down to fix the burst pipe by cutting off an air vent and welding a water supply pipe to the coolant system
-The crew members that were working to fix this system were exposed to radioactive steam coming from the reactor
-Due to the radiation, their appearances started to change shortly after -
Coolant Pipe burst (0415)
-During the K-19's first mission, a coolant pipe burst, with no backup coolant system and unble to contact Moscow due to other equipment malfuntions
-The first captain, Nikolai Zateyev, thought the overheating of the reactor could lead to an explosion and be seen as an attack to neighboring countries
-He decided the crew needed to find a way to create a new cooling system on their own. -
Crew mebers began to die from radiation sickness
-out of the crew members who helped with the repair, 3 died 6 days later
-a few more died within 3 weeks, and within two years, 22 crew members had passed due to the radiation exposure
-some survived with treatment that included boine marrow transplants and blood transfusions -
Aftermath
-The K-19 was eventually towed back to Russia
-The next 2 years, crews worked to repair and replace the damaged reactors
-The original radioactive compartment was eventually sealed and dumped into the sea
-The K-19 was officially decomissioned in 1972