- 5,300-ton HMS Talent has a huge dent and will be out of action for weeks
- Defence officials have refused to disclose exact details of the crash
- It will cost an estimated £500,000 to repair, navy sources have claimed
A British nuclear
submarine suffered £500,000 damage in a collision while tracking Russian
vessels, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.
The 5,300-ton HMS
Talent limped back to port with a huge dent and will be out of action for
several months. Royal Navy top brass are investigating the incident.
Last night, defence
officials refused to disclose exact details of the crash – including where or
when it happened – but they were adamant that HMS Talent struck ‘floating ice’
rather than a Russian sub.
But the collision,
which ripped a 6ft hole at the top of the conning tower, comes at a time of
heightened tension between Britain
and Russia in the airspace
over the North Sea and beneath the waves.
Navy sources say
the damage to the nuclear-powered submarine, which will cost as estimated
£500,000 to repair, is consistent with striking an object while trying to
surface.
Surfacing can be a
risky manoeuvre because sonar equipment on a submarine tends to look ahead for
threats rather than above. In addition, radar scanners do not work underwater.
After the crash,
engineers from HMS Talent’s 130-strong crew found that the impact had
devastated the submarine’s outer layer of acoustic tiles. These square-shaped
2in-thick tiles minimise the vessel’s transmission of sound waves and other
signals that could reveal her position. The Royal Navy’s explanation that HMS
Talent struck ice was also used to explain damage to British submarines during
the Cold War which was later found to have been caused by enemy vessels.
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