| Remember when the British navy ruled the seas? Sadly, this is not that navy. |
[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] A Royal Navy nuclear submarine equipped with Trident missiles suffered a huge malfunction that sent it into an endless dive before the vessel was righted moments before the crew faced being crushed by underwater pressure, it was claimed today.The Vanguard class sub had been carrying 140 crew when its depth gauge suddenly failed while on a mission in the Atlantic.
It caused a frantic scrabble with engineers managing to stop the submarine and its nuclear reactor from plunging further just moments before disaster struck.
The deep sea vessel, carrying Trident 2 missiles, was on patrol when the depth indicators stopped working, with its crew falsely believing it was level when in fact it was diving deeper into the ocean.
It was only when engineers at the back of the sub found a second gauge indicating they were headed towards the 'danger zone' that they sounded the alarm.
'It's not the engineers' job to control the sub's depth but they saw how deep they were and realised something was wrong,' a source told The Sun.
In January, defence chiefs launched an urgent investigation after workmen allegedly used glue to repair broken bolts inside a nuclear reactor chamber onboard HMS Vanguard.
The unsuitable repairs to the bolt heads, which had sheared off after being over-tightened, were discovered during a routine check aboard the sub, according to The Sun.
Repair work was being undertaken as part of a dry dock refurbishment at HMNB Devonport in Plymouth, which is behind schedule by four years and £300million over budget.
Defence Secretary Ben Wallace is said to have demanded 'assurances about future work' carried out on the 15,900-ton vessel by established contractor Babcock following the discovery.