The death of the crew of the secret AU-31: who lost Russia

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It was a Soviet secret nuclear submarine formally assigned to the Northern Fleet, to the 29th separate brigade of submarines (based on Olenya Bay, admin. Gadzhievo okrug), but at the same time reporting to the Main Directorate of Deep-Water Research, which reports not to the Northern Fleet command, but directly Minister of Defense. Simply put, this is naval intelligence. Not surprisingly, very little is known about the people serving on the AC-31. This text is intended to shed a little light on them and their military feat.





Died at execution


According to our sworn “friends” from NATO, the combat readiness of the Russian Navy has reached the highest point since the beginning of the 1990s, and submarines are its most modern part. And here they are not mistaken, the submarine fleet is the only part of the Navy that Russia decided to maintain at a level close to the Soviet one. As of today, the Russian Navy includes 13 nuclear submarines (nuclear submarines) armed with ballistic missiles, 27 nuclear submarines with missile and torpedo weapons, 19 diesel-electric submarines (diesel-electric submarines) armed with Caliber, 8 special-purpose submarines and 1 DEPL for special purposes. On July 1 of this year, an accident occurred on one of them and, only thanks to the courage of the crew, we did not lose it. As luck would have it, this happened again in the Barents Sea on the eve of the next anniversary of the death of Kursk. In principle, there are not so many accidents of this kind in the world. Since 1945, at least 10 submarines have sunk: 3 - the USA, 5 - the USSR, 2 - the Russian Federation. Since that time, more than 180 emergency situations have been recorded, most of which are with American and Soviet submarines. July 1, another emergency occurred, which could result in the loss of the ship, but the crew defended it at the cost of their lives.

It was a top secret nuclear submarine AS-31 of project 10831, formally assigned to the Northern Fleet, to the 29th separate submarine brigade (based on Oleny Bay, administrative district of Gadzhievo, Murmansk Region), but subordinated to the Main Deep-Water Research Directorate ( GUGI, military unit No. 45707, Peterhof), which reports not to the command of the Northern Fleet, but directly to the Minister of Defense. Simply put, this is naval intelligence. Not surprisingly, very little is known about the people serving on the AC-31. This text is intended to shed a little light on them and their military feat.

A boat


Contrary to information distributed on the Internet, the injured device carries the AC-31 index, not the AC-12 index, as was previously announced, but what is the difference - even experts can’t explain. The carrier for them is the same special-purpose submarine BS-136 “Orenburg” of project 09786 (according to other sources, it is no longer it, but special-purpose submarines BS-64 “Moscow Region” of project 09787, and BS-136 “Orenburg” is subject to decommissioning). In addition, this unit in September 2012 took part in the Arctic 2012 research expedition, during which it collected soil and rock samples at a depth of 2500-3000 meters for 20 days. Then, for the first time, the whole world learned about its existence. It was he who obtained samples from the northern and southern parts of the Mendeleev Ridge, having studied which specialists came to the conclusion that the rocks are identical to the base of the Novosibirsk Islands. This was a documentary confirmation of the claims of the Russian Federation to expand its exclusive economic zones in the Arctic and evidence that 1,2 million square meters. km of underwater territories is a natural continuation of its continental shelf. And since participation in this expedition is attributed to both devices, it can be concluded from here that this is one and the same device. Another obvious conclusion that must be drawn to avoid rumors is that the carrier boat was not involved in this accident, since the accident occurred in the exclusive territorial waters of the Russian Federation at the exit from the Kola Bay, where the AS-31 (AS-12) arrived under its own power. Everything else is covered with darkness under the heading “Top Secret”, due to the fact that the affected device is completely secret and completely unique. Similar analogues neither in our country nor in the world. The topic of deep-sea stations in general is one of the most classified in Russia, as is the activity of the Main Department of Deep-Water Research of the Ministry of Defense as a whole.

From open sources it is only known that there are only two types of deep-sea vehicles in the world - this is the bathyscaphe and the bathysphere. But an apparatus of the type AC-12 (AC-31) is neither one nor the other, and this is its uniqueness. AS-12 (AS-31) is a deep-sea nuclear submarine (according to the official Russian naval classification - a nuclear deep-sea station of the 1st rank of project 10831 “Wicket”), capable of diving to depths of up to 6000 meters, which has become a further development of nuclear deep-sea stations of projects 1910 Sperm Whale and 1851 Halibut. There is so far in a single copy. All the other analogues that appear on the balance sheet of the GUGI are not suitable for it. It does not carry weapons, because at those depths where it goes, there’s simply no one to fight with. Yes, and not for this it is intended; at a depth where it can lie, it is invisible to enemy submarines, but it can covertly conduct surveillance from a depth. Structurally, she is nevertheless closer to the bathysphere. The apparatus consists of several titanium compartments - spheres, in one of which an isolated nuclear power plant is located. The compartments are interconnected by transitions. Balls allow the station to withstand pressure, which is critical for a conventional boat designed as an elongated cylinder. Due to this, the robust housing is able to withstand water pressure at very great depths. A sequence of seven balls, closed by the streamlined hull usual for a boat, gave rise to the nickname "Losharik."

In the online mode, the Losharik moves and maneuvers, being rigidly attached to the bottom of the ship — the mother ship — with a submarine of much larger displacement and fully armed. This allows the AC-12 (AC-31) to remain in the “sound shadow” of a large vessel and operate unnoticed. It turns out that a potential adversary at his sonar stations only hears a large boat. And the work of "Losharik" is practically inaudible. In addition, mother ship armament is also a defense for the station. It is believed that the AS-12 station is equipped with its own subordinate ship - a mini-submarine "Rus", which has a subjugated depth of 6180 meters behind it. In 2015, a similar apparatus of the same military unit 45707, consisting of a crew of hydronauts - test takers of the Boev, Kuzmichev and Vice Admiral Kurganov caperans, dived to this depth in the waters of the Central Atlantic and conducted research there for a total of 10 hours, for which In 2016, by a closed Decree of the President of the Russian Federation, all three were awarded the title of Heroes of the Russian Federation. And in just 43 years of the existence of military unit 45707, twenty-seven of its officers, not participating in the hostilities, received the titles of Heroes of the Soviet Union and Russia. The concentration of Heroes is higher only in the cosmonaut corps. Now you understand what NATO representatives are so afraid of, calling them the advanced detachment of Russian underwater saboteurs. Although the technical characteristics of the AC-12 (AC-31) are classified, Pentagon experts say that it is a "diversion apparatus" for installing devices to destroy various underwater infrastructure, primarily communication cables. According to them, in the event of a global conflict, the AS-12 can seriously undermine the Internet, destroying the main communication cables between the mainlands. Well, of course, they know better. We only know that the AS-12 (AS-31) is perhaps the most invulnerable and silent submarine of the Russian fleet. At a certain speed and depth, it can be practically invulnerable to the hydroacoustic systems of a potential adversary, which allows it to solve the most complex tasks in the entire ocean.

Nuclear deep-water station AS-12 was designed at the Central Design Bureau “Malakhit”. The chief designer is Hero of Russia Yu. M. Konovalov. There is no data on the exact date of the bookmark, but it is known that in August 2003 it was removed from the slipway of workshop No. 42 of Sevmash (Severodvinsk), and the Navy Commander-in-Chief Vladimir Kuroedov was present at the ceremony. The characteristics and capabilities of the station are shrouded in mystery, but it is reliably known that it is equipped with equipment for work at great depths and possesses properties that can be claimed not only by the Ministry of Defense, but also in the interests of science, oceanography and even mining.

Surface displacement: 1600 tons
Underwater displacement: 2100 tons
Underwater speed: up to 30 knots
Depth of immersion (working): 1000 meters
Autonomy of swimming: according to various sources, from 3 to 30-60 days
Length: 69 meters
Width: 7 meters
Draft: 5,1 meter
Power plant: nuclear reactor E-17 with PPU and a turbo-gear unit with a rated shaft power of 15 thousand hp
Armament: None
Crew: 25 people (all officers).

According to a rough estimate of The Bell, the cost of the complex, together with the nuclear submarine carrier, can reach up to $ 1,5 billion. The USSR already had experience in building titanium nuclear submarines. April 7, 1989, another titanium secret - experimental nuclear submarine K-278 "Komsomolets", formerly known in the Navy as a "goldfish", because of its monstrous cost and has still set the current world record for a ship’s immersion in 1027 m, sank due to a fire. Then 42 out of 69 sailors died. Now it lies at the bottom of the Norwegian Sea, not far from Medvezhy Island, together with a drowned reactor and a pair of nuclear warheads. No one else built titanium ships in the world. AC-12 (AC-31) - the first successful attempt of the Russian Federation in this direction. Its small size is due exclusively to the high cost of the materials used and the tasks that it is designed to solve. Therefore, it is clear why the crew did not doubt for a second when he decided to save her at the cost of his life.

Fire


According to the report of the Commander-in-Chief of the Navy, Nikolai Evmenov, who headed the commission for the investigation of the accident, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, the cause of the accident was a fire in the battery compartment of the boat. The crew fulfilled their duty to the end, fighting for the survivability of the ship, at the cost of their lives saved the apparatus and the remaining crew members from death, lifted up the hatches and localized the fire in the working compartments. The last thing they managed to do for the survivors was to put the device into emergency ascent mode.

The cause of the fire at the deep-water station "Losharik" could be a short circuit in one of the distribution panels, which led to the ignition of the braid of cables or transformer oil and smoke compartments. Most hydronauts at this time rested and did not have time to use the IDA (individual breathing apparatus). As a result, only a shift of five people who entered the last XNUMX hours of duty survived - they managed to localize the spread of fire and raise the station.


It is clear that no one will tell us the true picture. All of the above and below is only a version, but a source close to the squad of hydronauts. In an interview with the publication Kommersant on condition of anonymity, he said that the emergency at AC-31 occurred last Monday at about 21 hours. The station at that time performed combat missions in the Northern Fleet training ground, located in the area of ​​exit from the Kola Bay to the Barents Sea. At the same time, the sailors served according to the usual routine for the hike: at 19:20 Moscow time, the third shift of the hydronauts was supposed to have dinner, and at 00:31 at the central post AC-4 the shift was to change: the officers, who were on duty for 31 hours, went to rest, and their the place is occupied by the last shift in days, which is supposed to manage the station until midnight. Thus, the majority of the AS-31 personnel on Monday evening was to be in the so-called “residential” compartment of the station, separated from the service compartments and the central post by special bulkheads. At this moment, a short circuit was presumably in one of the many AC-20 electrical switchboards, which led to a fire and smoke in the compartments. The watch on duty may have been a little late with sealing the compartment, and vacationing shifts with inclusion in portable breathing apparatus. According to the charter, each submariner is obliged to constantly keep this device, which allows him to stay in a smokeless room for about XNUMX minutes, with him. During this time, the hydronaut, according to the manufacturer, even in the most difficult situation, will be able to find one of the fittings of the stationary respiratory system that supplies fresh air from the balloon supplies and connect to it. However, for some reason, the sailors did not use either system.

Meanwhile, smoke from a burning cable sheath, according to the source, is able to put a person out of action literally in seconds.

For loss of consciousness in a closed room, just a few breaths are enough

- he is convinced.

Thus, only a few minutes after the start of the smoke, for the survivability of the boat, obviously, only the duty shift at the central post continued to fight. These four officers organized the AS-31 lift, which in the current situation was difficult to do.

As we already know from the report of the Minister of Defense, they removed the civilian specialist from the burning compartments (this was done by Captain 2nd rank Solovyov, after which he returned to his comrades fighting for the survivability of the ship), and the civilian joined the resting shift in the residential AC-31 compartment. These six survived, and are now with varying degrees of severity of carbon monoxide poisoning in the military hospital of Severomorsk (two in intensive care). Captain Solovyov and his comrades did not have just a few minutes to escape, but they did what they could and died like heroes. The depth of the Barents Sea in the area of ​​the landfill is very small - within 200 m. However, the ascent procedure with all operations takes about ten minutes. These minutes, obviously, turned out to be fatal for 14 hydronauts who received severe poisoning by combustion products.

But so far this is just a version of what happened, the exact causes of the accident can only be spoken about after carrying out the necessary investigative actions on board the affected boat, interviewing the survivors of the trip, and performing the necessary examinations in such cases. Fires, in principle, happen on submarines, and the crew, it seems, should be well prepared to survive and fight the fire, but ten suffocated hydronauts for some reason could not use the IDA that they had to carry with them all the time, or connect to a clean pipe source air, as required by the instructions for a fire on board. The investigation should answer this question.

Now, according to Gazeta.ru, a deep-sea nuclear power station was towed to the base at Yagelnaya Bay (Gadzhievo). At the same time, according to official information, the deep-sea vehicle is located in the Severomorsk naval base.

Crew


С technical sorted out by the side, now let's talk about people. It is already clear that the heroically dead crew belonged to a completely closed group of people called hydronauts in their narrow environment. They also differ from submariners, just as cosmonauts differ from test pilots, only their circle is much narrower and the selection is stricter than in the cosmonaut squad (let’s not offend representatives of this legendary profession here).

The dead officers belonged to the elite of the navy. Deep sea special forces. Absolutely piecewise, there are fewer of them on Earth than astronauts, and they solve tasks comparable, not only in space, but under water. And if in space you have to deal with weightlessness, then with frantic pressure, live in a pressure chamber for months and breathe oxygen - helium mixture, from which the nostrils stick together. Such specialists have been trained for years, if not decades. After graduating from the naval school, they undergo a special selection, and then special training. Hydronauts are conquerors of the seas. Plunge into blind cold depths where it is dark and cold. They are prepared for a long stay at hundreds of meters under water in special pressure chambers, and there is less space than on the ISS. There are very special people from steel, and the competition there is higher than in the cosmonaut corps. Below I will give a list of the dead with all the regalia, and you will understand everything yourself. Indeed, on July 1, we lost the best, the color and pride of the Navy (hereditary submariners, representatives of naval dynasties, Heroes of the Russian Federation in the second generation died):

1. DOLONSKY Denis Vladimirovich - Hero of Russia, captain of the 1st rank, 46 years old. Born in Leningrad. There he graduated from the Higher Naval School of scuba diving them. Lenin Komsomol. Married. The father of two sons. Commander of the nuclear deep-sea station AS-31 (AS-12). He served on it from the moment of launching. Married. He was awarded: the Gold Star medal of the Hero of the Russian Federation, the Order of Courage, the Order of Military Merit, the Order of Maritime Merit, and the Medal of Merit to the Fatherland, 2nd Degree. He received the title of Hero of Russia in September 2016 for his services in the study of the Arctic and Antarctic by a closed Decree of the President of the Russian Federation.

2. FILIN Nikolay Ivanovich - Hero of Russia, captain of the 1st rank, 57 years old. Born in the village of Krasilovo, Novgorod Region. He graduated from the Faculty of Nuclear Power Plants of the Higher Naval Engineering School. Dzerzhinsky. His family remained in Lomonosov: wife, two children. He was awarded the Golden Star medal of the Hero of the Russian Federation, three orders of Courage, the Order of Military Merit, and the Medal of Honor. The title of Hero of Russia was presented by Decree of the President of the Russian Federation in June 2018 for completing a particularly important task and showing courage and high professionalism. The “Golden Star” of the Hero of the Russian Federation was handed to him in the Kremlin on June 27, 2018 by Russian President Vladimir Putin personally.

3. ABANKIN Vladimir Leonidovich - captain of the 1st rank, 49 years old. Born in the Crimea. He graduated from the Sevastopol Higher Naval Engineering School. He lived in Pushkin, raised with his wife - a teacher of two daughters. He was awarded the Order of Courage, the medal "For Merit to the Fatherland of the 1st Degree", the medal "For Merit to the Fatherland of the 2nd Degree", the Ushakov Medal.

4. VOSKRESENSKIY Andrey Vladimirovich - captain of the 1st rank, 47 years old. Born in Sevastopol. He graduated from the Department of Nuclear Power Plants of Submarines of the Sevastopol Higher Naval Engineering School. Wife and daughter live in St. Petersburg. They are also from the naval family, his father-in-law, Rear Admiral Vladimir Bederdinov, in 1979, as part of the SSBN crew, made the transition around the Earth in an underwater position through the Drake Strait to Kamchatka, then commanded an atomic submarine strategist, then a division of strategic missile submarines of strategic purpose Pacific Fleet. Andrei did not disgrace the honor of the family, he was a holder of three orders of Courage, the order “For Military Merit”, and the medal “For Merit to the Fatherland of the 2nd Degree”.

5. DANILCHENKO Sergey Petrovich - captain of the 1st rank, 36 years old. Born in the city of Klimov, Bryansk region. He graduated from the Pacific Higher Naval School. Makarov, passed the Higher Special Officer Classes of the Navy. In Petersburg he lived with his wife and daughter. Awarded: Order of Courage, medal "For Merit to the Fatherland, 2nd Degree".

6. IVANOV Konstantin Anatolyevich - captain of the 1st rank. This is the most unknown of the dead heroes, with the most common surname in Russia, they could not find out anything about him (neither age, nor place of birth, nor family composition, nor even the school he graduated from). Awarded: Order of Courage, Order of Military Merit, Medal of Merit to the Fatherland of the 1st Degree, Medal of Merit to the Fatherland of the 2nd Degree, Ushakov Medal.

7. OPARIN Denis Aleksandrovich - captain of the 1st rank, 40 years. A native of the village of Olenya Guba, Murmansk region. The son of the Hero of Russia, captain 1st rank Alexander Ivanovich Oparin, the commander of the same military unit 45707 in Peterhof, to which the crew was assigned. In 2000, Oparin, the senior on board the Temryuk missile launcher, participated in a rescue expedition at the site of the death of the K-141 Kursk nuclear submarine in the Barents Sea. Denis followed in his father's footsteps, was awarded the Order of Courage, the medal "For Merit to the Fatherland of the 2nd Degree", and Ushakov's Medal.

8. SOMOV Konstantin Yuryevich - captain of the 1st rank, 48 years old. Born in the Georgian SSR in the family of a naval officer. In 1992 he graduated from the Caspian Higher Naval Red Banner College. Kirov (in the year of graduation due to the collapse of the USSR, it was renamed the Azerbaijan Higher Naval School). In Pushkin there was a wife and a daughter. A holder of three orders of Courage, the medal "For Merit to the Fatherland of the 1st degree", the medal "For Merit to the Fatherland of the 2nd degree".

9. AVDONIN Alexander Valerievich - captain of the 2nd rank, 44 years old. Born in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. He graduated from the Pacific Higher Naval School. Makarova. In St. Petersburg there was a family, two children. Awarded: Order of Courage, Order of Military Merit, Ushakov Medal.

10. SOLOVIEV Dmitry Alexandrovich - captain of the 2nd rank, 37 years old. Born in the city of Pochep, Bryansk region. He graduated from the Military (Naval Polytechnic) Institute of the Military Training and Scientific Center of the Navy in Pushkin. The family lives in St. Petersburg. Have a son. The wife is expecting a second child. He was awarded the medal "For Merit to the Fatherland of the 2nd Degree", the medal "For Courage", the Ushakov Medal.

11. VASILIEV Alexander Sergeevich - lieutenant colonel of the medical service, 43 years old. Born in Leningrad. In 1999 he graduated from the 4th faculty of the Military Medical Academy. Kirov in St. Petersburg. According to the distribution, he was sent to serve in the Caspian flotilla, from there he got to the GUGI. A wife and three children live in Petersburg. Awarded: Medal "For Merit to the Fatherland of the 2nd Degree", Suvorov Medal.

12. KUZMIN Victor Sergeevich - captain of the 3rd rank, 33 years old. Born in the city of Gadzhievo, Murmansk region. He graduated from the Marine Corps of Peter the Great in St. Petersburg. The son of the Hero of Russia, Vice Admiral Kuzmin Sergey Viktorovich. Kuzmin, the senior Hero of the Russian Federation, received for an unprecedented trip to the North Pole as part of a nuclear submarine group. From July 15 to August 12, 1994, the B-414 nuclear submarine, under the command of the caperan S. V. Kuzmin, together with the K-18 submarine, under the command of Captain 1st Rank Yu. I. Yurchenko, made a group Arctic expedition dedicated to the 300th anniversary of the Russian fleet, surfacing at the geographical point of the North Pole. Rear Admiral A. A. Berzin led the campaign. The deceased sailor in St. Petersburg left a wife and two sons. Victor was equal in everything with his father, was awarded the Ushakov medal.

13. SUKHINICHEV Vladimir Gennadevich - captain of the 3rd rank, 34 years. Born in the city of Vilyuchinsk in Kamchatka. He graduated from the St. Petersburg Naval Engineering Institute. He was married, did not have time to get children. He served in the 16th Red Banner Navy Submarine Squadron of the Pacific Fleet, then in the 29th Separate Submarine Brigade of the Main Directorate for Deepwater Research of the Ministry of Defense. He was awarded the medal "For Courage".

14. DUBKOV Mikhail Igorevich - lieutenant commander, 29 years old, the youngest among the dead. He was born, like Sukhinichev, in Vilyuchinsk, Kamchatka Territory. He graduated from the Naval Institute of Radio Electronics. Popova. Also from a family of hereditary submariners. And grandfather was a submariner, and father a submariner - Rear Admiral Igor Dubkov, commanded the 7th submarine division of the Northern Fleet, now deputy. commander of the submarine division of the Pacific Fleet. I learned about the death of my son on a campaign. Mikhail was named after his grandfather. He did not change family traditions - he also became a submariner, even more a hydronaut, since sports training allowed, he was a master of sports. He lived in Murmansk, a small family: his wife and a two-year-old beauty - a daughter. On his page on the social network there was a photo of his meeting with Dmitry Medvedev in May 2014. And the only friend in the social network is the Prime Minister. The page on the network remains, but the guy is no longer there. Fate He was awarded departmental medals of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation.

The fact that they are all unique specialists, each of which has not one difficult research expedition in the Arctic with immersion to the utmost depths, and that they are all heroic heroes, is clear and true, I wanted to draw attention to something else. Have you noticed that half of them have naval dynasties, and two guys have fathers - submariners, Heroes of Russia. And now in one family there are two Heroes - a father and a son (posthumous). What is there for three out of 14 - three orders of Courage and six more - one each. And all this on one submarine, in a team of 14 people! And the Order of Courage, I tell you, stands out on the list of state awards. To him, as well as to the medal "For Courage" a special relationship. These are the only awards in the List of State Awards that the Statute is allowed to duplicate, i.e. handing more than one. Do you know how many cavaliers of three or more orders of Courage we have in Russia at the moment? There are 31 of them, and five more have 4 orders. And of these 31, three were on the AS-31. How do you like this circumstance? And according to the Regulation on the order of rewarding - persons awarded three orders of Courage, when committing yet another feat or other courageous and selfless act, can be presented with the title of Hero of the Russian Federation.

Now you understand why, by the Decree of the President of the Russian Federation dated July 5, 2019, the title of Heroes of the Russian Federation was awarded to captains of the 1st rank Andrei Voskresensky and Konstantin Somov? They already had three orders of Courage, and the next automatically gave the title of Hero. But the caperan Nikolai Filin already had the title of Hero of the Russian Federation, so he was awarded the Order of Courage (posthumous) and he joined the ranks of the owners of 4 orders of Courage, becoming the sixth from this list, which is also very honorable. Because since 2010, after the reform of President Medvedev, the ranks of twice Heroes of the Russian Federation have been abolished. In general, the stars have been abolished, replaced with crosses, there is only one star left - the “Golden Star” of the Hero of the Russian Federation, and it can only be awarded once in a lifetime. Twice and thrice Heroes have sunk into oblivion. Left in the past. Maybe it’s right, the Hero cannot be a hero twice or thrice, the Hero - he is already a hero.

By the way, two more got Heroes of the Russian Federation from the list of the dead - captain 1st rank Denis Oparin and captain 2nd rank Dmitry Solovyov. And if everything is clear with Solovyov - he brought out a civilian and closed the hatch, then Denis Oparin could not get a Hero with a machine gun, he only had one order of Courage. It means that it was they, together with Solovyov, who performed all the actions to save the ship, and at the cost of their lives did not allow him to go to the bottom, saving the ship and the surviving crew members. I do not exclude that among this shift, which continued to struggle with fire for the survivability of the ship, there were Somov and Voskresensky, and when opening the compartments it became clear who managed to use the IDA and who did not. But this version does not fit with the information that they were originally going to award all crew members with orders of Courage (posthumous) and one to present to the Hero. And who was this one, Shoigu immediately voiced the report to the president, saying that the captain of the 2nd rank Solovyov took the civilian out of the fire and smoke zone, and personally closed the passage hatch from the inside, thereby localizing the fire in the working compartments. Those. in fact, at the cost of his life he saved the ship. But for me personally, all the dead Heroes, regardless of the awards.

By the way, I also noted for myself the three winners of the medal “For Courage”, also a very special award in the list of state awards, especially an honor among people who served the Fatherland. She was awarded the caperan Filin, captain of the 2nd rank Soloviev and captain of the 3rd rank Sukhinichev. This is a sign of special courage. And in the case of Solovyov, who became the Hero of the Russian Federation (posthumously), this does not surprise me at all. And another very rare award was present at our dead heroes - submariners. Six of them had Ushakov's medals. It has been known since the war, since 1944, when it was established along with the Nakhimov Medal to award the rank and file, senior and midshipman of the Navy and naval units of the border troops for personal courage and bravery. Then many sailors and foremen received it. But after 1994, the Nakhimov’s medal was abolished, and the officers’ staff was handed over the Ushakov’s medal, very selectively. For 15 years, a few people have received it. Very rare reward. And six of them were on this boat, caperanges Abankin, Oparin and Ivanov, captains of the 2nd rank Avdonin and Solovyov, as well as captain of the 3rd rank Kuzmin - holders of these medals, by the way, the first four of them are also knights of the orders of Courage. All this suggests that the color of the Russian Navy was collected in the crew of this smallest nuclear submarine.

And one more moment I noticed. At a meeting between Putin and Defense Minister Shoigu on July 2, he announced the figure that of the 14 dead - seven captains of the 1st rank, two Heroes of Russia, and all the dead were highly professional class specialists. And this is a big loss for the fleet, and for the whole army as a whole. Apparently, Putin was incorrectly informed, but captains of the 1st rank on the AS-31 were not seven, but eight. Just two weeks before the tragedy of June 14, captain of the 2nd rank Sergey Danilchenko received the rank of captain of the 1st rank. Do you know a lot of caperangs at 36?

Such a number of senior officers on a ship measuring 69 by 7 meters and with a crew of only 20 people should not be surprised. Yes, in terms of the number of caperanges, he overtook a heavy aircraft-carrying cruiser, such as the Admiral of the Fleet of the Soviet Union Kuznetsov TAVKR with a crew of 1980 people, where there were only 520 officers. But do not forget that one and the other are ships of the 1st rank, and not the size of the ship determines its rank, but the tasks that it solves. What tasks the AC-31 solved was evident from the fact that the commission to investigate the causes of his accident was not even headed by the commander of the Northern Fleet, Alexander Moiseev, but personally by the Commander-in-Chief of the Navy, Nikolai Evmenov. The ship was classified and it solved problems of national importance. Its very existence became known only after the accident. And if it were not for the death of the crew, then we would never have known anything about him. And the crew there was, you already see, heroic, so many naval dynasties can hardly be found on any ship of the Russian Navy, and it solved very special tasks. And according to the density of the Heroes of Russia per square meter of the ship’s area, this ship can compete with the orbital space station.

Yes, in fact, AS-12 (AS-31) was a nuclear space station, only submarine, and the hydronauts are the same astronauts, only deep-sea ones. You are not surprised that all the colonels and lieutenant colonels of the VKS fly into space as commanders of ships and onboard engineers - the spacecraft is a complicated thing, not everyone can be trusted. Here the situation is the same, the crew was staffed according to the staffing table, which means that SUCH equipment and tasks of SUCH complexity could only be entrusted to senior officers. Only the squad of hydronauts is smaller than the squad of cosmonauts, and as a result of this tragedy, we have lost the entire elite, the color of the deep-sea fleet of the Russian Federation. The guys fulfilled their duty to the end, in conditions of open burning, in extremely small volumes of the research apparatus, they were able to cope with the fire, return the controllability to the apparatus and ensure ascent. They are all heroes for us! What else can I say? Keep quiet ...
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  1. -9
    8 July 2019 13: 44
    It flashed in the press that the dead had prevented a catastrophe on a planetary scale, which implies that they were preparing this catastrophe, but it exploded and utilized saboteurs! The fact that so many kapras and kapdva were collected in one place suggests that they planned to stir up the muck noble, but God is not a frayer, he sees rabbits and sends them to hell, as promised!
    1. +7
      8 July 2019 14: 33
      Why didn’t he send you there? Are you our Washington diplomat ?! Give him a disaster, you see! Do you know what a nuclear reactor is, or are you not taught this in the Washington region? Do you know how he can bang? It’s just not enough for you! What kind of hare does your God see? God has a dollar for you, what can he finally see except inflation?
    2. +5
      10 July 2019 12: 03
      Your friends from Fashington muddy the nastiness, and do not stain the dead sailors with your dirty tongue!
      1. The comment was deleted.
  2. +3
    8 July 2019 18: 38
    The navy crew died
    Saving a boat from the depths.
    14. Extra team.
    Heroes are all. All as one.

    They went to holy eternity
    Not everyone is taken there.
    Only those whose souls are rare
    As long as we remember - they all live ...
  3. +2
    9 July 2019 14: 29
    If the boat is not visible at such a depth, then the boat itself is blind and deaf at depth? If our crew could perform some actions and navigate in space, then we have such devices that allow us to work at such depths. Bravo!
  4. +3
    9 July 2019 21: 40
    Saikas like you are driving this blizzard in the press, ...
    Actually saiki now is this press ...
  5. -2
    31 July 2020 08: 30
    It is believed that the AS-12 station is equipped with its own subordinate vessel - the mini-submarine "Rus"

    fool This is "technical" BRED and ACHINEA of an absolutely incompetent and technically illiterate "aFtora" lol - and such ALL this illiterate OPUS.

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