The British Royal Navy was pressured to abort a secret operation and recall one in all its $3.5 billion strategic nuclear submarines, the Vanguard Class ship HMS Victorious, after a hearth broke out onboard . Vanguard Class ships are among the many most closely armed on this planet when it comes to nuclear weapons payload, with the Victorious reportedly absolutely armed with a complement of 16 intercontinental vary ballistic missiles – every of which may carry as much as eight warheads for a complete of as much as 128 warheads per ship. Injury attributable to the fireplace hearth included the destruction of {an electrical} converter, forcing the ship to floor within the north Atlantic to flush out poisonous fumes earlier than making an unscheduled return to Scotland for repairs. A Royal Navy spokesman refused to touch upon the small print of the incident, however claimed that Britain’s “steady at-sea [nuclear] deterrent is unaffected.”
Though the fireplace onboard the HMS Victorious occurred in late September, it was solely reported in early November. The incident follows experiences that the primary ship of the Vanguard Class, the HMS Vanguard, would stay in dry dock for the foreseeable future as new technical points continued to be found. The submarine has been in deep upkeep for over seven years since 2015 at a value of over $600,000. It additionally follows whistleblower experiences that workers working at Royal Naval Armaments Depot Coulport, the place nuclear weapons for the submarines are saved, had been evacuated as a result of a “critical radiation breach.” A previous report in early 2020 by the discovered that mismanagement of nuclear weapons infrastructure for the submarine fleet had price the British Armed Forces $1.75 billion. Britain’s submarine fleet has typically confronted much less controversy and fewer scandals when it comes to price and efficiency than its floor fleet, with belongings such because the Kind 45 Class destroyers having develop into infamous for his or her very poor efficiency and reliability data. Stories of points with the submarine fleet have however been more and more continuously lately.
