Admiral says Kursk survivors lived up to 3 days

Associated Press

MOSCOW — Twenty-three sailors in the stricken Kursk nuclear submarine may have suffered through three days of agony in freezing darkness, waiting in vain for a rescue, a senior Russian admiral said Wednesday.

"I personally think that life in the ninth compartment came to an end on the third day," Vice Adm. Vladislav Ilyin, the first deputy chief of the Russian Navy’s staff, said at a news conference.

His statement contradicted the conclusion of prosecutors, who said that sailors in the stern could have lived only several hours before succumbing to toxic carbon monoxide fumes from the fire that broke out after the explosion that sank the vessel in August 2000. All 118 crew members perished.

Ilyin didn’t spell out what prompted him to challenge the prosecutors, saying only that he was guided by his experience as a submariner.

Most of the crewmen were killed instantly by the powerful blasts that ripped open the Kursk’s hull and dumped it onto the Barents Sea floor. However, 23 crewmen remained alive for at least several hours, according to letters later found by rescuers. Officials have released only excerpts.

The failed rescue operation drew massive criticism at home and abroad. The government hesitated for several days before accepting foreign aid, while Russian submersibles were unsuccessful in attaching themselves to the Kursk’s escape hatch.

When foreign divers reached the Kursk a week after the catastrophe, it took them only hours to open the hatch. The public later learned with shock that the navy had dismissed all of its own deep-sea divers years before the disaster.

"It’s even more painful to hear that 23 people might have survived for three days, and they failed to rescue even one of them," said retired Capt. Anatoly Safonov, whose son, Lt. Maxim Safonov, died on the Kursk. Ilyin, flanking him at the news conference, insisted that the government had done all it could to rescue the crew.

The Kursk’s wreckage was raised and put in dry dock in October, where officials have searched for clues to the disaster and removed remains of the crew.

Officials have said the Kursk’s sinking was triggered by an explosion of a practice torpedo that detonated other weapons in the bow. They have refused to say what caused the initial explosion, but have removed torpedoes of the type that exploded from navy arsenals.