The Russian navy submarine that Russian media outlets identified as the one that caught fire during a mission on Monday, killing 14 sailors on board, may have been designed to cut undersea internet cables.
The vessel caught fire near the naval base of Severomorsk on Monday, and the sailors died of smoke inhalation, Russia's defense ministry said in a statement.
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Dead sailors stopped a 'planetary catastrophe' aboard a secret submarine…
On Tuesday, Russian Vladimir Putin called the incident a "great loss," canceled a scheduled event, and called an urgent meeting with his defense minister, Sergei Shoigu. Putin also ordered an inquiry into the accident and asked Shoigu to "personally receive reports" on it, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported.
But Moscow has remained cagey on details of the vessel and its work, prompting suspicion and accusations of a cover-up.
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According to the independently run RBC news agency and Novaya Gazeta newspaper, the vessel was the AS-12, a nuclear-powered vessel. Both outlets cited unnamed sources in their reporting.
The AS-12, also known as "Losharik," was launched in 2003, but details of its capabilities and work have largely remained secret, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Reuters reported.
BBC Monitoring described US officials as saying the AS-12 is designed to cut undersea cables that keep the world's internet running.
US and other Western officials have long warned that Russian ships have been active near major undersea fiber-optic cables that carry calls, emails, texts, and trillions of dollars' worth of daily financial transactions.
Norwegian authorities said on Tuesday that they had not detected any abnormal radiation, Reuters reported.
Telegeography
Moscow has provided no details on the type or model of the vessel.
The Bell, a Russian news site critical of the government, likened Russia's apparent secrecy around Monday's fire to the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986.
According to Reuters, the site said: "Nearly a day without information about the accident in a nuclear facility and the need to look out for Norwegian statements about the level of radiation should have given a shudder to those who remember the Chernobyl nuclear power station."
The defense ministry on Tuesday described the submarine vessel as one designed to study the bottom of the sea in the interests of the navy, according to a statement in Russian carried by the Interfax news agency.
The ministry said the fire happened during bathymetric surveys, which measure the depth of the sea bed.
This article was written by Alexandra Ma from Business Insider and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network. Please direct all licensing questions to legal@newscred.com.
