History of Nuclear Submarines
What is a Submarine?A submarine is a marine vessel capable of traveling underwater for a specified period of time. Today, submarines can be classified into two types, namely military submarines and research submarines. Military submarines are extensively used for naval operations of militaristic nature. Research submarines are used for deep sea studies. Military submarines prior to the cold era used a combination of diesel engines andelectric batteries for propulsion. There were many problems regarding conventional submarines like emission of diesel engines or not being able to stay underwater for a very long time, etc. The United built the first nuclear submarine, USS Nautilus, to overcome the shortcomings of conventional submarines.
How do Nuclear Submarines Work?
Nuclear submarines are powered by nuclear reactors. Inside nuclear reactors, a neutron is deployed in order to split uranium atoms. The atomic structure of uranium, once split, forms a huge amount of heat and gamma radiation. This heat emitted, is in turn used to heat water. The reactor is surrounded by a hollow coil. Water is circulated in the hollow coil, at an extremely high pressure, which prevents it from converting to steam. The hot water is then let out into another hollow coil that contains water at normal temperature. This is then converted into huge amounts of steam. The steam is transferred to steam turbines and electricity is generated. This
Many modern nuclear submarines have been facilitated with more and more sophisticated facilities and equipment, as enormous power generation is possible due to nuclear reactors. Some modern submarines use specialized equipment to extract air from sea water, dissolved during the process of oxygenation.
Risk and Precautions
Modern day nuclear submarines, though sophisticated and advanced, are very dangerous. The primary reason is the huge amounts of fuel in the reactor. If a reactor is damaged in action or during naval operations, it can contaminate vast areas of the ocean. Manufacturers and developers are deploying many different alloys and protective casings to protect nuclear reactors, however, it can never be made damage proof.
Some submarines are also capable of launching sea-to-surface nuclear weapons. This advancement has further increased levels of damage that are possible in a nuclear war. A submarine capable of launching nuclear warheads is even more dangerous to the environment because, if hit by a torpedo or any other weapon, the damaged submarine can cause unimaginable levels of contamination.
Many nations have made enormous advancement in nuclear submarines, enabling them to even become the habitat of crews for extended periods of time, much like the fictitiousNautilus which was home to the crew, in the popular story 'Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea'.
A nuclear submarine works on nuclear technology rather than conventional air-breathing diesel engines. Nuclear submarinesoperate on nuclear reactor technology, the same technology that is used to produce
Nuclear submarines have numerous advantages over conventional diesel submarines such as they don’t need to surface frequently as they are independent of air. Unlike conventional submarines, power generated by nuclear reactor is huge and hence, they can run at high speeds for prolonged periods and neither need refueling intervals as they can operate under water throughout their lifetime (generally 25 years). These few points of nuclear powered submarines scored over conventional diesel submarines, make them stealth weapons.
History
The idea of making a nuclear submarine first emerged around 1950 when the Cold War between the US and Soviet Union (USSR) was at zenith. Both the countries were trying technologies to build nuclear powered submarines to overcome the drawbacks of conventional ones. Both the countries knew what a lethal weapon nuclear submarines would be. The US was successful in making a headway start with launching USS Nautilus, the first nuclear powered submarine in the world, on January 21, 1952. The submarines could encircle the world for 4 months without resurfacing.
It was American Admiral Rickover who first came up with the idea of making a nuclear submarine. In July 1951, the USCongress gave a green signal to Captain Rickover to proceed with the development of nuclear submarine, at the Naval Reactors Branch of Atomic Energy Commission. The task of building the reactor was given to the Westinghouse Corporation, which is now a leader in nuclear technology.
The Soviet Union started its nuclear submarine program in the 1950s too. Its research work was done at Institute of Physicsand Power Engineering at Obninsk. They began testing their models in 1956 and finally after many obstacles like radiationleaks and steam generation problems, their first nuclear powered submarine entered service in Soviet Navy on 1958.
A Brief Timeline of Nuclear Submarines
1954: 1st nuclear powered submarine, USS Nautilus was launched.
1961: Soviets claim to have fastest and largest fleet of nuclear submarines.
1963: In one of the worsts nuclear disasters, USS Thresher is lost with 129 men on board.
1986: Soviet Yankee-class submarine sinks in Atlantic Ocean with nuclear missiles on board.
1989: A Mike-class Soviet nuclear submarines sinks 500 kilometers from Norway.
2000: Russian nuclear submarine Kursk sinks.
2009: China becomes the fifth country in the world to launch rockets from a nuclear submarine.
An interesting fact is that although Russia is the country to suffer most number of nuclear submarine accidents, it produced approximately 4 to 5 nuclear submarines from each of its 4 submarine yards during the Cold War. Indeed amazing! They made about 245 nuclear submarines between the 1950s and 1997. If one adds all the nuclear submarines of world, the resulting figure still won’t be able to break the Soviet Unions figure of 425 nuclear submarines.
Since, the cost of building the nuclear submarines is very high, only a few countries have been able to make and maintain these. Countries like US, Russia, France, UK and China have operational nuclear propulsion submarines at present. However, countries like India, Brazil and Argentina have been working on similar projects.
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