[HN Gopher] Haunting Photos Show the Aftermath of the Kursk Subm...
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Haunting Photos Show the Aftermath of the Kursk Submarine Disaster
in 2000
Author : mooreds
Score : 162 points
Date : 2026-04-02 16:18 UTC (5 days ago)
(HTM) web link (rarehistoricalphotos.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (rarehistoricalphotos.com)
| Klaster_1 wrote:
| [removed]
| ahhhhnoooo wrote:
| I found several photos haunting.
| brookst wrote:
| I found the story and photos entirely haunting. Those sailers
| had no chance.
| tokai wrote:
| The survivors possibly had a change if Russia had accepted
| the offer for help from the Norwegian rescue divers right
| away.
| gbuk2013 wrote:
| From the article
|
| > Analysts concluded that 23 sailors survived the initial
| blasts and took refuge in the small ninth compartment at
| the rear of the submarine.
|
| > Evidence suggests they remained alive for more than six
| hours. When oxygen grew scarce, they attempted to replace a
| potassium superoxide chemical oxygen cartridge, but it fell
| into the oily seawater pooling on the floor and exploded on
| contact.
|
| > The resulting fire killed several crew members and
| triggered a flash fire that consumed what remained of the
| oxygen, asphyxiating the last survivors.
|
| That does not suggest a possibility of a foreign rescue
| vessel making it there in time.
| WithinReason wrote:
| Also:
|
| "No search was launched for more than six hours."
|
| "It ultimately took over 16 hours to locate the stricken
| vessel, which lay on the seabed at a depth of 108 meters
| (354 feet)."
| infecto wrote:
| Found it pretty haunting myself. You could pick a different
| descriptive word but haunting fits.
| giraffe_lady wrote:
| Being able to look at a full actual likeness of a person who is
| dead is incomprehensibly novel to human experience. It has
| never stopped giving me chills.
| pavel_lishin wrote:
| Reading a note written by a sailor, in the dark, by feel,
| estimating his changes to be 10%, certainly felt haunting to
| me.
| Mikhail_Edoshin wrote:
| Chomsky wrote that Western media publishes only what is
| "useful" for certain ends, usually political. So you think the
| article is useful, don't you?
| nradov wrote:
| Why would anyone care what a "useful idiot" like Chomsky
| thinks?
| vrosas wrote:
| One of the most interest facts about this disaster is that if the
| submarine was standing on its tail straight up, its nose would be
| sticking 150ft OUT of the water it sunk in.
| thedanbob wrote:
| And yet even in that shallow of water the pressure would have
| been around 10 atm. It's amazing how dangerous something as
| mundane as water can be.
| lencastre wrote:
| nothing but respect for water
| atomicnumber3 wrote:
| Definitely a strong contender for favorite 3-atom molecule
| HoldOnAMinute wrote:
| Sangamon's Principle
| pavel_lishin wrote:
| Which sounds good, but isn't Nitrous Oxide actually
| pretty fucking bad for you if you use it continuously?
| watwut wrote:
| This is the first time I see someone refer to 100m deep as
| shallow.
| stronglikedan wrote:
| it's all relative!
| QuantumNomad_ wrote:
| It only takes a little over a minute to walk 100m. And if I
| stand at point A and look at point B, 100m away, it doesn't
| feel far away either.
|
| That's why I think even though I am only able to swim what
| 4 meters or something down, maybe less, 100m under the
| water sounds really little for a submarine. Also probably
| because I have no experience with submarines so I was
| imagining that for the most part they would be many hundred
| meters under the sea level.
| petepete wrote:
| It was 155m long and the ocean was 108m deep, in case anyone
| else was wondering.
| niwtsol wrote:
| I didn't realize how big the submarine actually was
|
| - Ohio class - US' largest: 18,750 tonnes displaced
| submerged, 170m long, 13m beam
|
| - Typohoon-class - USSR's biggest: 48,000 tonnes displaced,
| 175m long, 23m beam
|
| - Oscar II-class (Kursk) - 19,400 tonnes submerged, 154m
| long, 18.2m beam
| SoftTalker wrote:
| I think I read something similar about the _Edmund Fitzgerald_
| i.e. it sank in water that was less deep than the length of the
| ship.
| kelnos wrote:
| Similarly, a human can drown in only a few inches of water, not
| even enough to fully submerge you while lying face first in it,
| let alone while standing.
|
| Water is not to be trifled with.
| FridayoLeary wrote:
| The story depresses me a little. One of the greatest engineering
| marvels in history, destroyed by stereotypical Russian
| negligence, incompetence and corruption and more then 100 lives
| lost in the process. The Soviets for all their many sins were at
| least capable of building incredible things, the protections on
| the nuclear reactor held up, for example, preventing a massive
| environmental catastrophe.
| giraffe_lady wrote:
| It's stereotypical now but I remember at the time this was
| taken as a kind of confirmation that russia had been coasting
| on and also neglecting a lot of the soviet-era infrastructure.
| It's hard to reflect back now but in 2000 the soviet collapse
| was recent memory and the role and effectiveness of its
| successor was an open question, internationally.
|
| I do remember that in the 90s the "russia understanders" were
| split into two camps: now that russia is free of the shackles
| of communism it will step into its destiny as supreme global
| superpower vs the soviet system was actually quite effective at
| large scale mundane infrastructure & logistics in a way the
| russian federation isn't.
|
| By 2000 the weight of evidence was already fairly strong for
| the second view but this disaster, and especially their
| response to it, really settled the matter. This is how I
| remember feeling about it all anyway.
| Gagarin1917 wrote:
| Russia had roughly half the population as compared to the
| Soviet Union. There's just no way they could have ever
| competed on the global stage the same way.
| mitthrowaway2 wrote:
| If one took the view that communism was holding back
| roughly half of their their potential, then it would have
| been a reasonable prediction.
| Gagarin1917 wrote:
| No, it wouldn't have. Only with cetera peribus would that
| make any sense. And losing half your population is not
| "all other things being equal."
|
| It's a major difference that has a huge impact on output
| and relative standing globally.
| nradov wrote:
| I don't understand your comment. Over the long term,
| communism (or any sort of economic central planning) will
| obviously cripple any country's economy. The absolute
| number of people is meaningless if they're only
| pretending to work.
|
| Look at the war between Russia and Ukraine today. Every
| day Russia sends hundreds of men to their deaths in human
| wave attacks with nothing to show for it. They have a
| large population but but they're not doing anything
| useful. If they had double the population it wouldn't
| change anything.
| Gagarin1917 wrote:
| > Over the long term, communism (or any sort of economic
| central planning) will obviously cripple any country's
| economy. The absolute number of people is meaningless if
| they're only pretending to work.
|
| I'm as anti-communist as can be, but saying population is
| meaningless when it comes to national output is
| ridiculous. There are many capitalist nations around the
| world, but the United States is the most populous, and
| therefore has the most output... because population plays
| a major role in national output. The socioeconomics of a
| nation certainly play a role too, but not enough to
| overcome population being cut in half.
|
| Ceteris peribus, a capitalist country will beat a
| communist one long term in output and influence. But
| that's not the only thing that can influence output and
| influence.
|
| > Look at the war between Russia and Ukraine today. Every
| day Russia sends hundreds of men to their deaths in human
| wave attacks with nothing to show for it. They have a
| large population but but they're not doing anything
| useful.
|
| The entire nation is not devoted to Ukraine, they still
| need to maintain defenses against NATO and China
| simultaneously. The Ukraine war is just what they can
| spare on top of those other goals.
| bluGill wrote:
| Sweden's population is tiny, but by working with "the west"
| they gain from everything everyone else does. Russia has
| isolated themselves (both directly and in doing things that
| made others want to isolate them), and thus cannot benefit
| from what others do near as much.
| hencq wrote:
| I also remember how frustrating and depressing it was that
| they wouldn't allow foreign teams to help with the rescue
| effort. At the time it was clear that the Russians lacked the
| capabilities to do it. I also think in hindsight it was a
| sign how little interest Russia had in being part of the
| West.
| vkou wrote:
| You should look into the history of the 90s again.
|
| Russia opened up to the West in a big way in the first half
| of the decade, and worked with NATO and the UN in the first
| half of the Bosnian war.
|
| The result was... A complete collapse of the domestic
| economy, and a second half of the Bosnian war where NATO no
| longer felt like it needed to get Russia on board to do
| whatever it wanted in the region.
|
| The degradation of this relationship was _not_ the fault of
| a single party. Clinton and Yeltsin (an utter turd of a
| man) worked hard to have a productive relationship, but
| then Bush gets elected and takes a more... Unipolar view of
| the world. As does Putin.
| eszed wrote:
| Early in the Bush administration, at least, there was
| continuing approchement. Bush was mocked for saying
| something like "I looked into his [Putin's] eyes, and I
| trust him". I don't remember enough about the early GWOT
| days to pinpoint the particulars of the falling out, but
| I do remember thinking that there were areas of
| cooperation not being pursued. Like, could Russia have
| been brought along into Afghanistan? I thought that at
| the time, though I'm not sure how it looks 25 years
| later. Like you, however, I doubt that Russia's eventual
| (and justified, mind you!) current stance and status was
| written into stone.
| vkou wrote:
| > Like, could Russia have been brought along into
| Afghanistan?
|
| It pretty much was. Afghanistan was a UN-sanctioned war,
| and Russia did not object to it from its position on the
| UNSC - and provided support for the invasion.
|
| Iraq ( _Three_ permanent UNSC members voted against it),
| on the other hand, was a clear indication that the rules-
| based world is a sham and a scam... And that the only
| rule that matters is 'Fuck you, make me.'
|
| You know how Trump is criticized for pursuing idiotic
| short-term gains that torpedo long-term trust and
| legitimacy? That was also the real, lasting legacy of
| Bush II's first term. Anyone playing by the rules is a
| fool.
| nradov wrote:
| I looked into the history of the 90s again. The collapse
| of the domestic Russian economy was 100% their own fault.
| If they had simply accepted their place as a second-rate
| power under US hegemony (something like France) then
| everything would have been fine and they would be far
| more secure and prosperous today.
| vkou wrote:
| > The collapse of the domestic Russian economy was 100%
| their own fault.
|
| It was.
|
| But that doesn't matter - the _result_ was incredible
| misery and ruin for the country, and it drove
| reactionary, anti-western sentiment, kind of like how
| reactionary sentiment over $3 eggs drove Americans to
| flip the table and rally behind Trump II.
| stickfigure wrote:
| The soviet-era protections on a certain infamous RBMK reactor
| didn't hold up quite so well.
| jeffrallen wrote:
| Soundtrack for this post: https://youtu.be/3qF95ANVHSg
|
| Kursk, by The Vad Vuc
| jvuygbbkuurx wrote:
| That is an absolute unit. The photos at the end with people
| inside the wreck put it in perspective.
| ge96 wrote:
| Damn that's crazy seeing Putin back in 2000
| andyjohnson0 wrote:
| He had the same dead look as he does today.
| dlev_pika wrote:
| "He wouldn't lie to me." - American President
| fusslo wrote:
| The description of the survivors last hours is horrifying.
| dlev_pika wrote:
| Compound that with knowing that your military doesn't give a
| damn about it and whether you have any chance of being alive -
| brutal
| drivebyhooting wrote:
| High Test Peroxide is incredibly dangerous. Even a slight
| contaminant can catalyze a runaway decomposition. This is the
| main reason HTP has been abandoned as a storable propellant.
| LgWoodenBadger wrote:
| I'm surprised 5-7 torpedo warheads detonating didn't do more
| damage to it. About 2750kg-4000kg of high explosive.
| serf wrote:
| nuclear submarines are first and foremost built as a protective
| sarcophagus for the powerplant, and that's on top of submarines
| being designed to compartmentalize damage, anyway.
|
| i.e. if it could totally destroy itself with a full payload
| that'd be a very bad design choice, not that there wasn't
| plenty of bad choices wrt the kursk.
| bluGill wrote:
| They are designed for war. They have to assume that it will be
| hit at some point - you still want it to return as many of the
| highly trained people on board back home as possible. If you
| can repair it so much the better. They can't always meet this
| goal (the enemy goal is to make that impossible), but it is a
| design goal of any reasonable navy.
| headsman771 wrote:
| > Dutch company Mammoet was awarded a contract in May 2001 and,
| within three months, designed, fabricated, and deployed over
| 3,000 tonnes of custom equipment aboard a specially modified
| barge.
|
| Impressive, particularly by today's standards.
| sparky_z wrote:
| Before clicking on this link, I hopped over to the Wikipedia page
| and read the intro section to get some quick context. Turns out
| that was unnecessary because this "article" is literally just the
| Wikipedia intro, almost sentence for sentence, with some minor
| rephrasing here and there. It's pretty blatant. Wikipedia is
| mentioned in the photo credits, but there's no attribution for
| the text, which I think is a violation of the Creative Commons
| license and counts as plagiarism?
|
| Pictures were interesting, though.
| conartist6 wrote:
| Also in the movie about these events, rescuers have finally
| located the wreck and the crew are still alive and banging on
| the hull with a wrench, but the movie-Russians at that point
| make needless further delays which cost the crew their chance
| at survival.
|
| There is no evidence anywhere that anyone was alive in the
| vessel by the time it was reached by rescuers. Nobody heard a
| wrench banging. Hollywood made that up to paint a picture of
| the Russians.
| distances wrote:
| > Hollywood made that up to paint a picture of the Russians.
|
| I don't think the true version of the events is necessarily
| any kinder to Russians than this dramatization.
| bookofjoe wrote:
| That movie is powerful and well worth watching.
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