Nuclear submarines. Five Facts About the World's First Nuclear Submarine Building Nuclear Submarines

For more than half a century, the best design minds of all maritime powers have been solving a puzzling problem: how to find an engine for submarines that would work both above and below water, and besides, it did not require air, like a diesel engine or a steam engine. And such an engine, the same for the underwater-surface elements, was found. They became a nuclear reactor.

No one knew how the nuclear genie, enclosed in a steel "bottle" of a strong body, squeezed by the pressure of depth, would behave, but if successful, the benefit of such a solution was too great. And the Americans took the risk. In 1955, fifty-five years after the first American submarine sank, the world's first nuclear-powered ship was launched. It was named after the submarine, invented by Jules Verne - "Nautilus".

The beginning of the Soviet nuclear fleet was laid in 1952, when intelligence reported to Stalin that the Americans had begun building a nuclear submarine. And six years later, the Soviet nuclear submarine "K-3" parted with its sides first the White Sea, then the Barents Sea, and then the Atlantic Ocean. Its commander was Captain 1st Rank Leonid Osipenko, and its creator was General Designer Vladimir Nikolaevich Peregudov. In addition to the tactical number, "K-3" also had its own name, not as romantic as the Americans, but in the spirit of the time - "Leninsky Komsomol". “In fact, the Peregudov Design Bureau,” says Rear Admiral Nikolai Mormul, historian of the Soviet submarine fleet, “created a fundamentally new ship: from appearance to product range.

Peregudov managed to create the shape of the nuclear-powered ship, optimal for movement under water, removing everything that interfered with its full streamlining."

True, the K-3 was armed only with torpedoes, and time required the same long-range, long-range, but also fundamentally different missile cruisers. That is why in 1960 - 1980 the main bet was made on submarine missile carriers. And they weren't wrong. First of all, because it was the atomic marines - nomadic underwater rocket launchers - that turned out to be the least vulnerable carriers of nuclear weapons. Whereas underground missile silos were sooner or later spotted from space with an accuracy of up to a meter and immediately became the targets of the first strike. Realizing this, first the American and then the Soviet Navy began to place missile silos in strong submarine hulls.

The six-missile nuclear submarine "K-19", launched in 1961, was the first Soviet atomic missile submarine. At its cradle, or rather stocks, there were great academicians: Alexandrov, Kovalev, Spassky, Korolev. The boat impressed both with unusually high underwater speed, and the duration of stay under water, and comfortable conditions for the crew.

"In NATO, - notes Nikolai Mormul, - there was interstate integration: the United States built only an ocean fleet, Great Britain, Belgium, the Netherlands - anti-submarine ships, the rest specialized in ships for closed theaters of military operations. At this stage of shipbuilding, we were in the lead in many tactical and technical We have commissioned comprehensively automated high-speed and deep-sea combat nuclear submarines, the largest amphibious hovercraft, we were the first to introduce large high-speed anti-submarine ships on controlled hydrofoils, gas turbine power, cruise supersonic missiles, missile and landing ekranoplanes. However, it should be noted that in the budget of the USSR Ministry of Defense, the share of the Navy did not exceed 15%, in the United States of America and Great Britain it was two to three times more.

Nevertheless, according to the official historiographer of the fleet M. Monakov, by the mid-80s, the combat strength of the Soviet Navy "consisted of 192 nuclear submarines (including 60 strategic missile submarines), 183 diesel submarines, 5 aircraft-carrying cruisers ( including 3 heavy type "Kyiv"), 38 cruisers and large anti-submarine ships of the 1st rank, 68 large anti-submarine ships and destroyers, 32 patrol ships of the 2nd rank, more than 1000 ships of the near sea zone and combat boats, over 1600 combat and transport aircraft. The use of these forces was carried out to ensure the strategic nuclear deterrence and national-state interests of the country in the oceans."

Russia has never had such a huge and powerful fleet.

In the years of peace - this time has a more accurate name: the "cold war" in the oceans - more submariners and submarines died in Russia than in the Russian-Japanese, World War I, civil, Soviet-Finnish wars combined. It was a real war with rams, explosions, fires, with sunken ships and mass graves of dead crews. In its course, we lost 5 nuclear and 6 diesel submarines. The US Navy opposing us is 2 nuclear submarines.

The active phase of the confrontation between the superpowers began in August 1958, when Soviet submarines entered the Mediterranean for the first time. Four "esks" - submarines of medium displacement type "C" (project 613) - moored by agreement with the Albanian government in the Gulf of Vlora. A year later, there were already 12 of them. Submarine cruisers and fighters circled in the depths of the oceans, tracking each other. But despite the fact that no great power had such a submarine fleet as the Soviet Union, it was an unequal war. We did not have a single nuclear aircraft carrier and not a single geographically convenient base.

On the Neva and the Northern Dvina, in Portsmouth and Groton, on the Volga and Amur, in Charleston and Annapolis, new submarines were born, replenishing the NATO Joint Grand Fleet and the USSR Great Submarine Armada. Everything was determined by the excitement of the pursuit of the new mistress of the seas - America, who proclaimed: "Who owns the trident of Neptune, he owns the world." The car of the third world was launched at idle ...

The early 70s was one of the peaks in the oceanic Cold War. The US aggression in Vietnam was in full swing. Submarines of the Pacific Fleet conducted combat tracking of American aircraft carriers cruising in the South China Sea. In the Indian Ocean, there was another explosive region - Bangladesh, where Soviet minesweepers neutralized Pakistani mines exposed during the Indo-Pakistani military conflict. It was hot in the Mediterranean too. In October, another Arab-Israeli war broke out. The Suez Canal was mined. The ships of the 5th operational squadron escorted Soviet, Bulgarian, East German dry cargo ships and liners in accordance with all wartime rules, covering them from terrorist attacks, missiles, torpedoes and mines. Each time has its own military logic. And in the logic of confrontation with world maritime powers, an aggressive nuclear missile fleet was a historical inevitability for the USSR. For many years, we have played nuclear baseball with America, which has taken away the title of mistress of the seas from Britain.

America opened a sad score in this match: on April 10, 1963, the Thresher nuclear submarine sank for an unknown reason at a depth of 2,800 meters in the Atlantic Ocean. Five years later, the tragedy recurred 450 miles southwest of the Azores: the US Navy's nuclear submarine Scorpion, along with 99 sailors, remained forever at a three-kilometer depth. In 1968, for unknown reasons, the French submarine Minerve, the Israeli submarine Dakar, and also our diesel missile boat K-129 sank in the Mediterranean Sea. There were also nuclear torpedoes on board. Despite the depth of 4 thousand meters, the Americans managed to raise the first two compartments of this broken submarine. But instead of secret documents, they got problems with the burial of the remains of Soviet sailors and nuclear torpedoes that lay in the bow tubes.

We equalized with the Americans the account of the lost atomic ships in early October 1986. Then, 1,000 kilometers northeast of Bermuda, fuel exploded in the missile compartment of the K-219 submarine. There was a fire. 20-year-old sailor Sergei Preminin managed to shut down both reactors, but he himself died. The superboat remained in the depths of the Atlantic.

On April 8, 1970, in the Bay of Biscay, after a fire at great depths, the first Soviet nuclear submarine K-8 sank, taking 52 lives and two nuclear reactors with it.

On April 7, 1989, the nuclear submarine K-278, better known as Komsomolets, sank in the Norwegian Sea. When the bow of the ship was submerged, an explosion occurred, which practically destroyed the hull of the boat and damaged the combat torpedoes with an atomic charge. 42 people died in this tragedy. "K-278" was a unique submarine. It was from her that it was supposed to begin the construction of a deep-sea fleet of the 21st century. The titanium hull allowed her to dive and operate at a depth of a kilometer - that is, three times deeper than all the other submarines in the world ...

The camp of submariners was divided into two camps: some blamed the crew and the high command for the misfortune, others saw the root of evil in the low quality of marine equipment and the monopoly of the Minsudprom. This split caused a furious controversy in the press, and the country finally learned that this was our third sunken nuclear submarine. Newspapers began vying to name the names of the ships and numbers of submarines that died in "peacetime" - the battleship "Novorossiysk", the large anti-submarine ship "Courageous", the submarines "S-80" and "K-129", "S-178" and "B-37" ... And, finally, the last victim - the nuclear-powered ship "Kursk".

... We did not win the Cold War, but we forced the world to reckon with the presence of our submarines and our cruisers in the Atlantic, Mediterranean, Pacific and Indian Oceans.

In the 60s, nuclear submarines firmly established themselves in the battle formations of the American, Soviet, British and French fleets. Having given the submarines a new type of engine, the designers equipped the submarines with new weapons - missiles. Now nuclear missile submarines (the Americans called them "boomers" or "citykillers", we - strategic submarines) began to threaten not only world shipping, but the whole world as a whole.

The figurative concept of "arms race" took on a literal meaning when it came to such precise parameters as, for example, submerged speed. The underwater speed record (unsurpassed by anyone so far) was set by our submarine K-162 in 1969. as the speed increased, everyone felt that the boat was moving with acceleration. After all, you usually notice movement under water only by the readings of the lag. But here, as in an electric train, everyone was driven back. We heard the noise of water flowing around the boat. It grew along with the speed of the ship, and when we passed over 35 knots (65 km / h), the roar of the aircraft was already in our ears. According to our estimates, the noise level reached up to 100 decibels. Finally, we reached a record - forty-two knots speed! Not a single inhabited "underwater projectile" did not cut the sea thickness so rapidly."

The new record was set by the Soviet submarine "Komsomolets" five years before the sinking. On August 5, 1984, she made an unprecedented dive in the history of world military navigation to 1,000 meters.

In March last year, the 30th anniversary of the flotilla of nuclear submarines was celebrated in the northern fleet village of Gadzhiyevo. It was here, in the remote Lapland bays, that the most complex technology in the history of civilization was mastered: nuclear-powered underwater rocket launchers. It was here, in Gadzhiyevo, that the first cosmonaut of the planet came to the pioneers of hydrocosmos. Here, aboard the K-149, Yuri Gagarin honestly admitted: "Your ships are more complicated than space ships!" And the god of rocket technology, Sergei Korolev, who was offered to create a rocket for underwater launch, uttered another significant phrase: "A rocket under water is absurd. But that's why I will undertake to do it."

And he did ... If only Korolev had known that one day, starting from under the water, boat rockets would not only cover intercontinental distances, but also launch artificial satellites of the Earth into space. For the first time, this was carried out by the crew of the Gadzhiev submarine cruiser "K-407" under the command of Captain 1st Rank Alexander Moiseev. On July 7, 1998, a new page was opened in the history of space exploration: an artificial Earth satellite was launched from the depths of the Barents Sea into near-Earth orbit by a standard ship rocket ...

And a new type of engine - a single, oxygen-free and rarely (once every few years) replenished with fuel - allowed humanity to penetrate into the last hitherto inaccessible region of the planet - under the ice dome of the Arctic. In the last years of the 20th century, there was talk that nuclear submarines were an excellent transarctic vehicle. The shortest route from the Western Hemisphere to the Eastern Hemisphere lies under the ice of the northern ocean. But if atomic marines are re-equipped into submarine tankers, bulk carriers and even cruise liners, then a new era will open in world shipping. In the meantime, the nuclear submarine Gepard has become the very first ship of the Russian fleet in the 21st century. In January 2001, the St. Andrew's flag, covered with centuries of glory, was hoisted on it.

HISTORY OF THE FIRST SOVIET NUCLEAR SUBSCRIPTION

V.N. peregudov

In 1948, the future academician and three times hero of labor Anatoly Petrovich Alexandrov organized a group with the task of developing nuclear power for submarines. Beria closed the work so as not to be distracted from the main task - the bomb.

In 1952, Kurchatov instructed Alexandrov, as his deputy, to develop a nuclear reactor for ships. 15 variants were developed.

Vladimir Nikolaevich Peregudov, engineer-captain 1st rank, was appointed chief designer of the first Soviet nuclear submarines.

For a long time, the issue of reliability of steam generators (Heinrich Hasanov Design Bureau) was on the agenda. They were designed with some overheating and gave an advantage in efficiency over the American ones, and therefore a gain in power. But the survivability of the first steam generators was extremely small. The steam generators were already leaking after 800 hours of operation. Scientists were required to switch to the American scheme, but they defended their principles, including from the then commander of the Northern Fleet, Admiral Chabanenko.

Military, D.F. Ustinov and all the doubters were convinced by making the necessary improvements (replacing the metal). Steam generators began to work tens of thousands of hours.

The development of reactors went in two directions: pressurized water and liquid metal. An experimental boat with a liquid metal carrier was built, showed good performance, but low reliability. A submarine of the Leninsky Komsomol (K-8) type was the first among the dead Soviet nuclear-powered submarines. On April 12, 1970, she sank in the Bay of Biscay as a result of a cable network fire. During the disaster, 52 people were lost.

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58 years ago, on January 21, 1954, the nuclear submarine Nautilus was launched. It was the first submarine with a nuclear reactor, allowing months to be in autonomous navigation without rising to the surface. A new page was being opened in the history of the Cold War...

The idea to use a nuclear reactor as a power plant for submarines originated in the Third Reich. Professor Heisenberg's oxygen-free "uranium machines" (as nuclear reactors were then called) were intended primarily for the "underwater wolves" of the Kriegsmarine. However, the German physicists failed to bring the work to its logical conclusion and the initiative passed to the United States, which for some time was the only country in the world that had nuclear reactors and bombs.

In the early years of the Cold War between the USSR and the USA, long-range bombers were conceived by American strategists as carriers of the atomic bomb. The United States had extensive experience in the combat use of this type of weapon, American strategic aviation had a reputation as the most powerful in the world, and finally, the territory of the United States was considered largely invulnerable to enemy retaliation.

However, the use of aircraft required their basing in close proximity to the borders of the USSR. As a result of the diplomatic efforts undertaken, already in July 1948, the Labor government agreed to deploy 60 B-29 bombers with atomic bombs on board in Great Britain. After the signing of the North Atlantic Pact in April 1949, all of Western Europe became involved in the US nuclear strategy, and by the end of the 1960s the number of American bases abroad reached 3,400!

However, over time, the US military and politicians have come to understand that the presence of strategic aviation in foreign territories is associated with the risk of a change in the political situation in a particular country, therefore the fleet was increasingly seen as the carrier of atomic weapons in a future war. Finally, this trend was strengthened after the convincing tests of atomic bombs near Bikini Atoll.

In 1948, American designers completed the development of a nuclear power plant project and began designing and building an experimental reactor. Thus, there were all the prerequisites for creating a fleet of nuclear submarines, which not only had to carry nuclear weapons, but also have a nuclear reactor as a power plant.

The construction of the first such boat, named after the fantastic submarine, invented by Jules Verne, "Nautilus" and having the designation SSN-571, began on June 14, 1952 in the presence of US President Harry Truman at the shipyard in Groton.

On January 21, 1954, in the presence of US President Eisenhower, the Nautilus was launched, and eight months later, on September 30, 1954, it was adopted by the US Navy. On January 17, 1955, the Nautilus went on sea trials in the open ocean, and its first commander, Eugene Wilkinson, broadcast in plain text: "We are going under an atomic engine."

Apart from the completely new Mark-2 power plant, the boat had a conventional design. With a displacement of Nautilus of about 4,000 tons, a two-shaft nuclear power plant with a total capacity of 9,860 kilowatts provided a speed of more than 20 knots. The submerged cruising range was 25,000 miles at a flow rate of 450 grams of U235 per month.. Thus, the duration of the voyage depended only on the correct operation of the air regeneration facilities, food supplies and the endurance of the personnel.

At the same time, however, the specific gravity of the nuclear plant turned out to be very large, because of this, it was not possible to install part of the weapons and equipment provided for by the project on Nautilus. The main reason for the weighting was biological protection, which includes lead, steel and other materials (about 740 tons). As a result, all the weapons of the Nautilus were 6 bow torpedo tubes with 24 torpedoes.

As with any new business, it was not without its problems. Even during the construction of the Nautilus, and specifically during the testing of the power plant, there was a rupture of the pipeline of the second circuit, through which saturated steam with a temperature of about 220 ° C and under a pressure of 18 atmospheres came from the steam generator to the turbine. Fortunately, this was not the main, but an auxiliary steam pipeline.

The cause of the accident, as established during the investigation, was a manufacturing defect: instead of pipes made of high-quality carbon steel grade A-106, pipes made of less durable material A-53 were included in the steam pipeline. The accident caused American designers to question the feasibility of using welded pipes in pressurized submarine systems. The elimination of the consequences of the accident and the replacement of already assembled welded pipes with seamless ones delayed the completion of the construction of the Nautilus for several months.

After the boat entered service, rumors began to circulate in the media that the personnel of the Nautilus had received serious doses of radiation due to flaws in the design of bioprotection. It was reported that the naval command had to hastily make a partial replacement of the crew, and dock the submarine to make the necessary changes to the protection design. How true this information is is not known so far.

On May 4, 1958, a fire broke out in the turbine compartment of the Nautilus, en route from Panama to San Francisco. The ignition of the port side turbine's oil-soaked insulation was found to have started a few days before the fire, but its signs were ignored.

The slight smell of smoke was mistaken for the smell of fresh paint. The fire was discovered only when the presence of personnel in the compartment became impossible due to smoke. There was so much smoke in the compartment that the submariners in smoke masks could not find its source.

Without finding out the reasons for the appearance of smoke, the ship's commander gave the order to stop the turbine, ascend to the periscope depth and try to ventilate the compartment through the snorkel. However, these measures did not help, and the boat was forced to float to the surface. Enhanced ventilation of the compartment through an open hatch with the help of an auxiliary diesel generator finally brought results. The amount of smoke in the compartment decreased, and the crew managed to find the place of ignition.

Two sailors in smoke masks (there were only four such masks on the boat) with the help of knives and pliers began to rip off the smoldering insulation from the turbine casing. A column of flame about a meter high burst out from under the torn piece of insulation. Foam fire extinguishers were used. The flame was put out and work to remove the insulation continued. People had to be changed every 10-15 minutes, as acrid smoke penetrated even masks. Only four hours later, all the insulation from the turbine was removed and the fire was extinguished.

After the boat arrived in San Francisco, its commander carried out a number of measures aimed at improving the fire safety of the ship. In particular, the old insulation was removed from the second turbine. All personnel of the submarine were provided with self-contained breathing apparatus.

In May 1958, during the preparation of the Nautilus for a trip to the North Pole, the main condenser of the steam turbine plant leaked on the boat. Outboard water seeping into the condensate-feed system could cause salinization of the secondary circuit and lead to the failure of the entire power system of the ship.

Repeated attempts to find the place of the leak were unsuccessful, and the submarine commander made an original decision. After the arrival of the Nautilus in Seattle, sailors in civilian clothes - the preparations for the campaign were kept in strict confidence - bought up all the proprietary liquid in automobile stores to fill in car radiators in order to stop the leak.

Half of this liquid (about 80 liters) was poured into the condenser, after which the problem of condenser salinization did not arise either in Seattle or later during the trip. Probably, the leak was in the space between the double tube plates of the condenser and stopped after filling this space with a self-hardening mixture.

On November 10, 1966, during a NATO naval exercise in the North Atlantic, the Nautilus, which was attacking in a periscope position on the American aircraft carrier Essex (displacement of 33,000 tons), collided with it. As a result of the collision, the aircraft carrier received an underwater hole, and the fencing of retractable devices was destroyed on the boat. Accompanied by the destroyer, the Nautilus reached under its own power at a speed of about 10 knots to the naval base in New London, USA, covering a distance of about 360 miles.

On July 22, 1958, the Nautilus, under the command of William Andersen, left Pearl Harbor with the goal of reaching the North Pole. It all started with the fact that at the end of 1956, the Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Burke, received a letter from Senator Jackson. The senator was interested in the possibility of nuclear submarines operating under the Arctic pack ice.

This letter was the first sign that forced the command of the American Navy to seriously think about organizing a campaign to the North Pole. True, some of the American admirals considered the idea reckless and were categorically against it. Despite this, the commander of the submarine forces of the Atlantic Fleet considered the polar campaign a done deal.

Anderson began to prepare for the upcoming campaign with triple zeal. Special equipment was installed on the Nautilus, which made it possible to determine the state of the ice, and a new compass MK-19, which, unlike conventional magnetic compasses, operated at high latitudes. Before the very trip, Anderson got hold of the latest maps and sailing directions with the depths of the Arctic and even made an air flight, the route of which coincided with the planned route of the Nautilus.

On August 19, 1957, the Nautilus headed for the area between Greenland and Svalbard. The first test exit of the submarine under the pack ice was unsuccessful. When the echometer recorded zero ice thickness, the boat tried to surface. Instead of the expected polynya, the Nautilus encountered a drifting ice floe. From a collision with her, the boat severely damaged the only periscope, and the commander of the Nautilus decided to return back to the edge of the packs.

The mangled periscope was repaired in field conditions. Anderson was rather skeptical about how stainless steel welders work - even in ideal factory conditions, such welding required a lot of experience. Nevertheless, the crack formed in the periscope was repaired, and the device began to operate again.

The second attempt to reach the Pole did not bring results either.. A couple of hours after the Nautilus crossed the 86th parallel, both gyrocompasses failed. Anderson decided not to tempt fate and gave the order to turn - in high latitudes, even a meager deviation from the correct course could be fatal and lead the ship to a foreign shore.

At the end of October 1957, Anderson made a short presentation at the White House, which he devoted to a recent campaign under the Arctic ice. The report was listened to with indifference, and William was disappointed. The stronger became the desire of the commander of the Nautilus to go to the pole again.

Thinking about this voyage, Anderson prepared a letter to the White House, in which he convincingly argued that the passage through the pole would become a reality as early as next year. From the presidential administration they made it clear that the commander of the Nautilus could count on support. The Pentagon was also interested in the idea. Shortly thereafter, Admiral Burke reported on the upcoming campaign to the president himself, who reacted to Anderson's plans with great enthusiasm.

The operation was to be carried out in an atmosphere of strict secrecy - the command was afraid of a new failure. Only a small group of people in the government knew about the details of the campaign. To hide the true reason for the installation of additional navigation equipment on the Nautilus, it was announced that the ship was participating in joint training maneuvers along with the Skate and Halfbeak boats.

On June 9, 1958, the Nautilus set off on its second polar voyage.. When Seattle was far behind, Anderson ordered that the number of the submarine on the cabin fence be painted over to preserve incognito. On the fourth day of the journey, the Nautilus approached the Aleutian Islands.

Knowing that they would have to go further in shallow water, the ship's commander ordered the ascent. "Nautilus" maneuvered in this area for a long time - looking for a convenient gap in the chain of islands in order to get to the north. Finally, navigator Jenkins discovered a fairly deep passage between the islands. Having overcome the first obstacle, the submarine entered the Bering Sea.

Now the Nautilus had to slip through the narrow and ice-covered Bering Strait. The path to the west of St. Lawrence Island was completely closed by pack ice. The draft of some icebergs exceeded ten meters. They could easily crush the Nautilus, pinning the submarine to the bottom. Despite the fact that a significant part of the path was completed, Anderson gave the order to follow the reverse course.

The commander of the Nautilus did not despair - perhaps the eastern passage through the strait would be more friendly to rare guests. The boat left the Siberian ice and headed south from the island of St. Lawrence, intending to pass into deep water past Alaska. The next few days of the campaign passed without incident, and on the morning of June 17 the submarine reached the Chukchi Sea.

And then Anderson's bright expectations collapsed. The first alarm signal was the appearance of a nineteen-meter-thick ice floe, which went straight to the submarine. Collisions with her were avoided, but the recorders of the instruments warned that there was an even more serious obstacle in the way of the boat.

Pressing close to the very bottom, the Nautilus slipped under a huge ice floe at a distance of only one and a half meters from it. It was only by a miracle that he escaped death. When the recorder pen finally went up, indicating that the boat had missed the ice floe, Anderson realized that the operation had failed completely ...

The captain sent his ship to Pearl Harbor. There was still hope that at the end of the summer the ice boundary would move to deeper regions, and it would be possible to make another attempt to get close to the pole. But who will give her permission after so many failures?

The reaction of the highest US military department was immediate - Anderson was summoned to Washington for an explanation. The commander of the "Nautilus" behaved well, showing perseverance. His report to senior Pentagon officers expressed his firm conviction that the next, July, campaign would undoubtedly be crowned with success. And they gave him another chance.

Anderson immediately began to act. To monitor the ice situation, he sent his navigator Jenks to Alaska. A legend was made up for Jenks, according to which he was a Pentagon officer with special powers. Arriving in Alaska, Jenks lifted into the air almost the entire patrol aircraft, which daily conducted observations in the area of \u200b\u200bthe future route of the Nautilus. In mid-July, Anderson, still at Pearl Harbor, received the long-awaited news from his navigator: the ice conditions had become favorable for the transpolar transition, the main thing was not to miss the moment.

On July 22, a nuclear submarine with overwritten numbers left Pearl Harbor.. The Nautilus was moving at top speed. On the night of July 27, Anderson took the ship to the Bering Sea. Two days later, having made a 2900-mile journey from Pearl Harbor, the Nautilus was already cutting through the waters of the Chukchi Sea.

On August 1, the submarine sank under the pack Arctic ice, which in some places goes into the water to a depth of twenty meters. It was not easy to navigate the Nautilus under them. Almost all the time Anderson himself was on watch. The crew of the ship was excited about the upcoming event, which they wanted to celebrate properly. Some, for example, proposed to describe twenty-five small circles around the pole. Then the Nautilus could enter the Guinness Book of Records as the ship that was the first in the history of navigation to complete 25 round-the-world voyages in one campaign.

Anderson rightly believed that such maneuvers were out of the question - the probability of going astray was too high. The commander of the Nautilus was worried about completely different problems. In order to cross the pole as accurately as possible, Anderson did not take his eyes off the pointers of the electric navigation instruments. On August 3, at twenty-three hours and fifteen minutes, the goal of the campaign - the North Geographic Pole of the Earth - was reached.

Not staying in the Pole longer than required by the collection of statistical information on the state of ice and outboard water, Anderson sent a submarine to the Greenland Sea. The Nautilus was to arrive in the Reykjavik area, where a secret meeting was to take place. The helicopter, which was waiting for the submarine at the rendezvous point, removed only one person from the submarine - Commander Anderson.

Fifteen minutes later, the helicopter landed in Keflavik next to a transport aircraft ready to depart. When the wheels of the plane touched the runway of the airfield in Washington, Anderson was already waiting for a car sent from the White House - the president of the Nautilus wanted to see the president. After the report on the operation, Anderson was again returned to the boat, which in the meantime managed to reach Portland. Six days later, the Nautilus and its commander entered New York with honors. A military parade was held in their honor...

On March 3, 1980, the Nautilus, after 25 years of service, was removed from the Navy and declared a National Historic Landmark. Plans were made to convert the submarine into a museum for public display. Upon completion of the decontamination and a large amount of preparatory work, on July 6, 1985, the Nautilus was towed to Groton (Connecticut). Here at the US Submarine Museum, the world's first nuclear submarine is open to the public.

The first nuclear submarines of the Soviet Union and the USA

Shortly after the Christmas holidays of 1959, Admiral Ralph posted the following announcement at the entrance to his office: “I am Commander of the US Atlantic Fleet promise a case of Jack Daniels whiskey to the first submarine commander who provided evidence that an enemy submarine was exhausted by pursuit and was forced to surface ". It wasn't a joke. The admiral, as if on a hippodrome, bet on the miracle of American military thought - a nuclear submarine. The modern submarine produced its own oxygen and was able to stay under water for the entire trip. Soviet submariners could only dream of such a ship. During a long voyage, their crews suffocated, submarines were forced to surface, becoming easy prey for the enemy.

The winner was the crew of the USS Grenadier submarine tail number SS-525, which chased the Soviet submarine for about 9 hours, and forced it to surface off the coast of Iceland. The commander of the US submarine, Lieutenant Commander Davis, received the promised case of whiskey from the hands of the admiral. They had no idea that very soon the Soviet Union would present them with a gift.

In 1945, the United States openly demonstrated to the world the destructive power of its new weapons, and now it must have a reliable means of delivering them. By air, as it was with Japan, it is fraught with great risk, which means that the only reasonable way to deliver a nuclear cargo should be a submarine, but one that can covertly never surface, deliver a decisive blow for this, a nuclear submarine was ideal. The creation of such a submarine was the most difficult task at that time, even for the United States. Less than a year later, at the shipyard in New London, Connecticut, the first nuclear-powered ship "USS Nautilus" tail number "SSN-571" was laid down. The project was implemented in an atmosphere of such utmost secrecy that intelligence information about it came to Stalin's desk only two years later. The Soviet Union again found itself in the role of catching up. In 1949, the first Soviet atomic bomb was tested, and in September 1952, Stalin signed a decree on the creation of nuclear submarines in the USSR.

Domestic designers, as happened more than once, were forced to go their own way, so there were difficult circumstances for the Soviet Union as a whole and for Soviet military science in particular. In the USSR, the work of defense significance has always been headed by people unknown to the general public, who were not written about in the newspapers. The creation of the submarine project was entrusted to the designer V.N. Peregudov. The technical design of the first nuclear submarine was approved.

Technical characteristics of the nuclear submarine of project 627 "K-3", code "Kit":

Length - 107.4 m;

Width - 7.9 m; Draft - 5.6 m; Displacement - 3050 tons; Power plant - nuclear, power 35,000 hp; Surface speed - 15 knots; Underwater speed - 30 knots; Immersion depth - 300 m; Autonomy of navigation - 60 days; Crew - 104 people; Armament: Torpedo tubes 533 mm: bow - 8, stern - 2.

The idea for the combat use of the submarine was as follows: a boat armed with a giant torpedo is towed from the base point to the dive point, from where it continues to swim under water to a given area. Upon receiving the order, the nuclear submarine fires a torpedo, attacking the enemy's naval bases. During the entire autonomous voyage, the nuclear-powered ship is not planned to surface; means of protection and countermeasures are not provided. After completing the task, she becomes practically defenseless. An interesting fact is that the first nuclear submarine was designed and built without the participation of the military. The only torpedo with a thermonuclear charge of the submarine had a caliber of 1550 mm and a length of 23 m. It immediately became clear to the submariners what would happen to the submarine when this super-torpedo was launched. At the time of launch, the entire water mass will be fired along with the torpedo, after which an even larger mass of water will fall inside the hull and will inevitably create an emergency trim. To level it, the crew will have to blow through the main ballast systems and an air bubble will be released to the surface, allowing you to immediately detect a nuclear submarine, which means its immediate destruction. In addition, specialists from the main headquarters of the Navy found that not only in the United States, but throughout the world, there are only two military bases that can be destroyed by such a torpedo. In addition, they had no strategic value.

The giant torpedo project was buried. Life-size models of equipment were destroyed. Changing the design of the nuclear submarine took a whole year. Workshop No. 3 became a closed production. His workers were not allowed to tell even their relatives where they worked.

In the early 50s, hundreds of kilometers from Moscow, the GULAG forces built the first nuclear power plant, the purpose of which was not to produce electrical energy for the national economy - it was a prototype of a nuclear installation for a nuclear submarine. The same prisoners built a training center with two stands in a pine forest. Within six months, all the fleets of the Soviet Union recruited the crew of the future nuclear submarine, sailors and officers. Not only health and military training were taken into account, but also a pristine biography. The recruiters had no right to pronounce the word atom. But somehow a rumor spread in a whisper where and what they were invited to. Getting to Obninsk became a dream. Everyone was dressed in civilian clothes, military subordination was canceled - everyone addressed each other only by their first names and patronymics. The rest is strict military order. The personnel was painted as on a ship. The cadet could answer anything to questions from strangers, except that he was a submariner. The word reactor was always forbidden to pronounce. Even at lectures, teachers called him a crystallizer or apparatus. The cadets practiced a lot of actions to leak the release of radioactive gas and aerosols. The most significant problems were fixed by the prisoners, but the cadets also got it. Nobody really knew what radiation was. In addition to alpha, beta and gamma radiation, there were harmful gases in the air, even household dust was activated, no one thought about it. The traditional 150 grams of alcohol were considered the main medicine. The sailors were convinced that they were filming the radiation picked up during the day. Everyone wanted to go sailing and was afraid of being written off even before the submarine was launched.

The first nuclear-powered ship was built by the whole country, although most of the participants in this unprecedented business were unaware of their involvement in a unique project. In Moscow, they developed a new steel that allowed the boat to dive to a depth unthinkable for that time - 300 m; the reactors were made in Gorky, the steam turbine plants were produced by the Leningrad Kirov Plant; the K-3 architecture was worked out at TsAGI. In Obninsk, the crew trained on a special stand. A total of 350 enterprises and organizations "brick by brick" built a miracle ship. Captain 1st rank Leonid Osipenko became its first commander. If not for the secrecy regime, his name would have thundered throughout the Soviet Union. After all, Osipenko tested the first "hydrospace ship" that could go into the ocean for three whole months with only one ascent - at the end of the campaign.

And at the Severodvinsk Machine-Building Plant, the finished nuclear submarine K-3, laid down on September 24, 1954, was already waiting for its first crew. The interiors looked like works of art. Each room was painted in its own color, the colors of bright shades are pleasing to the eye. One of the bulkheads is made in the form of a huge mirror, and the other is a picture of a summer meadow with birch trees. The furniture was made on special order from precious woods and, in addition to its direct purpose, could turn into an object of assistance in emergency situations. So a large table in the wardroom, in case of need, was transformed into an operating room.

The design of the Soviet submarine was very different from the American submarine. On the submarine "USS Nautilus" the usual principles of diesel submarines were repeated, only a nuclear installation was added, and the Soviet submarine "K-3" had a completely different architecture.

On July 1, 1958, it was time to launch. Canvas was stretched over the conning tower to hide the forms. As you know, sailors are superstitious people, and if a bottle of champagne does not break on the side of the ship, this will be remembered at critical moments during the voyage. There was a panic among the members of the selection committee. The entire cigar-shaped body of the new ship was covered with a layer of rubber. The only hard place on which the bottle can break is a small fence of horizontal rudders. Nobody wanted to take risks and take responsibility. Then someone remembered that women break champagne well. A young employee of the Design Bureau "Malachite" confidently swung, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Thus was born the firstborn of the Soviet nuclear submarine fleet.

In the evening, when the nuclear submarine entered the open sea, a strong wind arose, which in gusts demolished all carefully installed camouflage from the skin, and the submarine appeared before the eyes of the people who found themselves on the shore in its original form.

On July 3, 1958, the boat, which received the tactical number K-3, entered sea trials, which took place in the White Sea. On July 4, 1958, at 10:30, for the first time in the history of the Russian fleet, atomic energy was used to propel the ship.

The tests ended on December 1, 1958. During them, the capacity of the power plant was limited to 60% of the nominal. At the same time, a speed of 23.3 knots was achieved, which exceeded the calculated value by 3 knots. For the successful development of new technology, for the first time after the end of the Great Patriotic War, the commander of K-3 L.G. Osipenko was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. At present, his name has been given to the training center for the training of nuclear submarine crews in Obninsk.

In January 1959, K-3 was transferred to the Navy for trial operation, which ended in 1962, after which the nuclear submarine became a "full-fledged" warship of the Northern Fleet.

During sea trials, the nuclear submarine was often visited by Academician Aleksandrov Anatoly Petrovich, who considered the creation of the "K-3" the main brainchild of his life (the boat was so dear to him that he bequeathed that his coffin be covered with the first Naval flag "K-3") , Navy Commander Admiral of the Fleet S.G. Gorshkov. On December 17, 1965, the guest of the submariners was the first cosmonaut of the Earth, Hero of the Soviet Union, Colonel Yu.A. Gagarin. The first nuclear-powered submarine almost immediately began to develop the Arctic region. In 1959, K-3 under the command of Captain 1st Rank L.G. Osipenko passed 260 miles under the Arctic ice. On July 17, 1962, this nuclear submarine completed the transition to the North Pole, but to surface.

An interesting fact is that when the Americans opened the archives of the Cold War era, it was discovered that a very short time after the launch of the first K-3 nuclear submarine, Captain 1st Rank of the US Navy Berins spent his submarine at the mouth of the channel leading to the port of Murmansk. He approached the Soviet port so close that he was able to observe sea trials of a Soviet, but diesel-powered ballistic missile submarine. At that time, the Americans did not learn about the Soviet nuclear submarine.

The nuclear submarine "K-3" turned out to be excellent in all respects. In comparison with the American submarine, she looked more impressive. After passing all the required tests, the K-3 nuclear submarine of project 627 was given the name "Leninsky Komsomol" and on July 4, 1958, it became part of the USSR Navy. Already in the summer of 1962, the crew of Leninsky Komsomol repeated the feat of the Americans, who in 1958 on the first US nuclear submarine USS Nautilus made a trip to the North Pole, and then repeatedly repeated it on other nuclear submarines.

In June 1967, the submarine tested the ascent in ice and ice breaking from 10 to 80 cm. There were minor damage to the cabin hull and antennas. Subsequently, from July 11 to July 21, 1962, the boat completed a special Task - an Arctic trip with the crossing of the North Pole at 00 hours 59 minutes 10 seconds Moscow time on July 17, 1962. During the historical campaign, the submarine surfaced three times in polynyas and ruins.

During its glorious combat path, the submarine "Leninsky Komsomol" performed 7 combat services, took part in the exercises of the Warsaw Pact countries "North", participated in the exercises "Okean-85", "Atlantika-85", "North-85", six once declared by order of the KSF "Excellent Submarine". 228 crew members were awarded government orders and medals, and four of them received the honorary title Hero of the Soviet Union. Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev personally presented submariners with awards for the Arctic campaign. The captain of the nuclear submarine Lev Zhiltsov became a Hero of the Soviet Union. The entire crew, without exception, received orders. Their names became known throughout the country.

After a feat in the ice, the Leninsky Komsomol nuclear submarine became the modern Aurora and was the subject of numerous delegations visiting. Propaganda window dressing has almost completely replaced military service. The captain of the submarine was sent to study at the General Staff Academy, experienced officers were dismantled by headquarters and ministries, and instead of servicing complex military equipment, sailors took part in various congresses and conferences. It soon paid off in full.

According to Soviet intelligence, it became known that an American submarine was secretly patrolling the neutral waters of the Mediterranean. The leadership of the USSR Navy hastily began to discuss who to send there and it turned out that there were no free warships nearby. They remembered the K-3 nuclear submarine. The submarine was hastily staffed with a combined crew. A new commander has been appointed. On the third day of the trip on the submarine, the stern horizontal rudders were de-energized, and the air regeneration system failed. The temperature in the compartments rose to 40 degrees. A fire started in one of the combat units, and the fire quickly spread through the compartments. Despite stubborn rescue efforts, 39 submariners died. According to the results of the investigation conducted by the command of the Navy, the actions of the crew were recognized as correct. And the crew was presented for state awards.

But soon a commission from Moscow arrived on the Leninsky Komsomol submarine, and one of the staff officers found a lighter in the torpedo compartment. It was suggested that one of the sailors climbed in there to smoke, which caused the catastrophe of the nuclear submarine. Award lists were torn to shreds, instead of them penalties were announced.

That tragedy of "Lenin Komsomol" did not become the property of our common memory either in 1967 or in the "epoch of glasnost", they do not really know about it today. A modest unnamed monument was erected to the sailors who burned to death on K-3, far from crowded places: "To the submariners who died in the ocean on 08.09.67." And a small anchor at the foot of the slab. The boat itself lives out its life at the pier of the shipyard in Polyarny.

Superpower rivalry in submarine fleets was intense. The struggle was in terms of power, dimensions and reliability. Multi-purpose nuclear submarines have appeared carrying powerful nuclear missiles, for which there are no flight range limits. Summing up the confrontation, we can say that in some ways the US naval forces were superior to the Soviet navy, but in some ways they were inferior.

So, Soviet nuclear submarines were faster and with more buoyancy. Records of immersion and underwater speed still remain with the USSR. About 2000 enterprises of the former Soviet Union were involved in the production of nuclear submarines with ballistic missiles on board. During the years of the Cold War, the USSR and the USA threw 10 trillion dollars into the furnace of the arms race. No country could endure such extravagance.

The Cold War has sunk into oblivion, but the concept of defense capability has not disappeared. For 50 years after the first-born "Leninsky Komsomol" 338 nuclear submarines were built, 310 of which are still in service. The operation of the nuclear submarine "Leninsky Komsomol" continued until 1991, while the submarine served on a par with other nuclear-powered ships. After the decommissioning of the K-3, the submarine is planned to be converted into a museum ship, the corresponding project has already been developed at the Malachite Design Bureau, but for unknown reasons, the ship remains inactive, gradually becoming unusable.

The last time I saw K-3 on the go was in Polyarny, in Kislaya Bay in 1986. The reactor in it was already muffled.
Now she is at the Nerpa plant. It is now being made into a floating museum.
Here she is in Snezhnogorsk (Blizzard). Photo 2014, the last days of July.

It wasn't a joke. The admiral, as if on a hippodrome, bet on the miracle of American military thought - a nuclear submarine.

The modern submarine produced its own oxygen and was able to stay under water for the entire trip. Soviet submariners could only dream of such a ship. During a long voyage, their crews suffocated, submarines were forced to surface, becoming easy prey for the enemy.

Technical characteristics of the nuclear submarine of project 627 "K-3", code "Kit":

Length - 107.4 m;
Width - 7.9 m;
Draft - 5.6 m;
Displacement - 3050 tons;
Power plant - nuclear, power 35,000 hp;
Surface speed - 15 knots;
Underwater speed - 30 knots;
Immersion depth - 300 m;
Autonomy of navigation - 60 days;
Crew - 104 people;
Armament:
Torpedo tubes 533 mm: bow - 8, stern - 2.

The only torpedo with a thermonuclear charge of the submarine had a caliber of 1550 mm and a length of 23 m. It immediately became clear to the submariners what would happen to the submarine when this super-torpedo was launched. At the time of launch, the entire water mass will be fired along with the torpedo, after which an even larger mass of water will fall inside the hull and will inevitably create an emergency trim. To level it, the crew will have to blow through the main ballast systems and an air bubble will be released to the surface, allowing you to immediately detect a nuclear submarine, which means its immediate destruction. In addition, specialists from the main headquarters of the Navy found that not only in the United States, but throughout the world, there are only two military bases that can be destroyed by such a torpedo. In addition, they had no strategic value.

The personnel was painted as on a ship. The cadet could answer anything to questions from strangers, except that he was a submariner. The word reactor was always forbidden to pronounce. Even at lectures, teachers called him a crystallizer or apparatus. The cadets practiced a lot of actions to leak the release of radioactive gas and aerosols. The most significant problems were fixed by the prisoners, but the cadets also got it. Nobody really knew what radiation was. In addition to alpha, beta and gamma radiation, there were harmful gases in the air, even household dust was activated, no one thought about it. The traditional 150 grams of alcohol were considered the main medicine. The sailors were convinced that they were filming the radiation picked up during the day. Everyone wanted to go sailing and was afraid of being written off even before the submarine was launched.

The inconsistency of departments has always interfered with any project in the USSR. So the crew of the first nuclear submarine and the entire submarine fleet as a whole are hit twice. The Minister of Defense of the USSR, Marshal Zhukov, who, with all due respect to his land services in the Navy, understood little, issued an order halving the salaries of over-conscripts. Practically trained specialists began to file reports for dismissal. Of the six recruited crew of the first nuclear submarine, only one remained who loves his job more than welfare. With the next blow, Marshal Zhukov canceled the second crew of the nuclear submarine. With the advent of the submarine fleet, order was established - two crews. After a months-long campaign, the first went on vacation, and the second took up combat duty. The tasks of submarine commanders have become much more complicated. They had to come up with something to find time for the crew to rest without canceling combat duty.
The first nuclear-powered ship was built by the whole country, although most of the participants in this unprecedented business were unaware of their involvement in a unique project. In Moscow, they developed a new steel that allowed the boat to dive to a depth unthinkable for that time - 300 m; the reactors were made in Gorky, the steam turbine plants were produced by the Leningrad Kirov Plant; the K-3 architecture was worked out at TsAGI. In Obninsk, the crew trained on a special stand. A total of 350 enterprises and organizations "brick by brick" built a miracle ship. Captain 1st rank Leonid Osipenko became its first commander. If not for the secrecy regime, his name would have thundered throughout the Soviet Union. After all, Osipenko tested the first "hydrospace ship" that could go into the ocean for three whole months with only one ascent - at the end of the campaign.

In January 1959, K-3 was transferred to the Navy for trial operation, which ended in 1962, after which the nuclear submarine became a "full-fledged" warship of the Northern Fleet.

The first nuclear-powered submarine almost immediately began to develop the Arctic region. In 1959, K-3 under the command of Captain 1st Rank L.G. Osipenko passed 260 miles under the Arctic ice. On July 17, 1962, this nuclear submarine completed the transition to the North Pole, but to surface.

After the decommissioning of the K-3, the submarine is planned to be converted into a museum ship, the corresponding project has already been developed at the Malachite Design Bureau, but for unknown reasons, the ship remains inactive, gradually becoming unusable.