Golf-class submarine

Golf II class submarine
Class overview
Operators:
Preceded by: Zulu V class
Succeeded by: Hotel class
In service: 1958–1990
Completed: 24
General characteristics
Displacement:
  • 2,794 tons surfaced/3,553 tons submerged (629)
  • 2,300-2,820 tons surfaced/2,700-3,553 tons submerged (629A)
Length:
  • 98.4 m (323 ft) (629)
  • 98.9 m (629A)
Beam: 8.2 m (27 ft)
Draught:
  • 7.85 m (25.8 ft) (629)
  • 8.5 m (629A)
Propulsion: 3 × diesel engines, each 2,000 bhp (1,500 kW); 3 × electric motors, 5,200 shp (3,880 kW); 3 shafts.
Speed: surface - 17 kn, 9.500 nmi/5 kn; submerged - 12kn
Range: 70 days endurance
Test depth:
  • 260 m (design)
  • 300 m (maximum)
Complement:
  • 80 (629)
  • 83 (629A)
Armament:
  • 3 × missile tubes
  • 3 × Project 629 boats D-1 launch system with R-11FM missiles
  • Remaining boats D-2 launch system with R-13 missiles
  • 1966 onwards 629A upgrade D-4 launch system with R-21 missiles
  • 6 × 533 mm torpedo tubes

Project 629, also known by the NATO reporting name of Golf class, were diesel electric ballistic missile submarines of the Soviet Navy. They were designed after six Zulu class submarines and were successfully modified to carry and launch Scud missiles. All Golf boats had left Soviet service by 1990. All have been since disposed of.[1][2][3] According to some sources at least one Golf-class submarine is operated by China, to test new SLBMs.[4]

Class history

Project 629 was started in the mid-1950s along with the D-2 missile system which it was to carry, and was based on the Foxtrot. Design task was assigned to OKB-16, one of the two predecessors (the other being SKB-143) of the famous Malachite Central Design Bureau, which would eventually become one of the three Soviet/Russian submarine design centers, along with Rubin Design Bureau and Lazurit Central Design Bureau ("Lazurit" is the Russian word for lazurite). The submarine was originally designed to carry three R-11FM ballistic missiles with a range of around 150 km. These were carried in three silos fitted in the rear of the large sail behind the bridge. They could only be fired with the submarine surfaced and the missile raised above the sail but the submarine could be underway at the time. Only the first three boats were equipped with these—the remaining ones were equipped with the longer range R-13 missiles.

The first boats were commissioned in 1958 and the last in 1962.

The boats were built at two shipyards — 16 in Severodvinsk and 7 in Komsomolsk-na-Amure in the Far East. Fourteen were extensively modified in 1966–1972 and became known as 629A's by the Soviet Navy and Golf IIs by NATO (the original version having been designated Golf I). The major change was the upgrade of the missile system to carry R-21 missiles which could be launched from inside their tubes with the submarine submerged and increased speed. In later years a few were converted to test new missiles and others had different conversions.

All boats had left Soviet service by 1990. In 1993, ten were sold to North Korea for scrap.[5] According to some sources, the North Koreans are attempting to get these boats back into service.[6]

In 1959 the project technology was sold to China which built a single modified example in 1966, which is still in service.

Several views of a Project 629A (Golf II) ballistic missile submarine

Project Azorian

Main article: Project Azorian

On March 8, 1968, 1,560 nautical miles (2,890 km) northwest of Oahu in the Pacific Ocean the Golf II class submarine K-129 exceeded its crush depth for unknown reasons and imploded, the accident being registered by the SOSUS network. The entire crew of 98 was lost and the vessel sank with three ballistic nuclear missiles as well as two nuclear torpedoes. The United States recovered parts of the submarine in July 1974 from a depth of around 5 km, in an operation named Project Azorian.[7]

Two nuclear submarines that had been facing retirement, USS Halibut (SSGN-587) and USS Seawolf (SSN-575), were rebuilt and pressed into service as deep sea search vehicles. After Halibut discovered a sunken Soviet submarine containing at least one intact ballistic missile complete with nuclear warhead, Melvin Laird, United States Secretary of Defense under President Richard Nixon, approved Azorian. Six years later, 350 nautical miles (648 km) north of the Hawaiian Leeward Islands, a mechanical claw descended 17,000 feet (5,200 m) to the bottom of the Pacific and, guided by computers on board the Glomar Explorer, clamped onto the mass of twisted, rusting steel and began slowly raising it to the surface. It is unknown for sure how successful the effort was, but the United States has admitted to recovering a portion of K-129, which included six bodies of Soviet sailors that were buried at sea with full honors.[8]

Variants

References

External links

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