World

Report: U.S. Theorizes Kursk Torpedo

By CBSNews.com staff CBSNews.com staff

August 24, 2000 / 7:20 PM EDT / CBS

U.S. officials say acoustical tapes made by the American submarine USS Memphis in the Barents Sea, support the theory that a faulty torpedo caused the explosion that sank the Russian submarine Kursk, according to Tuesday's New York Times.

Sonar tapes and other recordings that captured sounds of two explosions believed to have sunk the Kursk on Aug. 12, killing all 118 people on board, contain the strongest evidence of the U.S. theory of a torpedo explosion, said The Times, quoting unnamed senior intelligence officials and senior Navy officers.

U.S. officials believe a rocket-propelled torpedo being loaded or launched as part of an exercise, misfired its engine or its fuel exploding. After two minutes and 15 seconds, a powerful explosion of the torpedo's warhead tore a gaping hole in the submarine's bow, killing most if not all of the crew instantly, the paper said.

Sonar tapes from the Memphis, one of two American submarines that were spying on the Russian naval exercise when disaster struck the Kursk, are being analyzed at the National Maritime Intelligence Center near Washington.

"We have subs that hear everything that goes on," the paper quoted a senior officer in Washington as saying. "It's pretty clear to us what happened."

Russian officials have given several theories to explain why the Kursk sank, including a collision with a foreign submarine and striking a World War Two mine.

The U.S. has dismissed suggestions that one of its subs collided with the Kursk.

A Norwegian seismic institute also reported recording two explosions and Norwegian officials have said the data matched theories of a blast aboard the nuclear-powered vessel, perhaps in a torpedo that may have triggered another, bigger explosion.

Is This The 'New' Russia?

In the Kursk tragedy, Soviet-style secrecy met with fierce criticism from the Russian press. In a Reporter's Notebook, CBS News Correspondent Richard Roth says the sinking of the sub has shown what's new and old in today's Russia.

Click here to read it.

The disaster has been a grueling ordeal for the families, many of whom learned of the sinking from television reports, then endured days of a confused rescue operation, then only heard from Norwegian divers that all aboard were dead.

Even Russia's handlng of the bereaved relatives has drawn criticism.

As CBS News Correspondent Richard Roth reports, when one woman wanted answers from a beleaguered bureaucrat, what she got was a tranquilizer — a hypodermic pumped into her by a Navy medic.

While a Russian psychologist says tranquilizer administration is an accepted Russian practice in such circumstances, to some the image illustrated the callous treatment families were receiving at the time.

Some observers have said the allegation that a foreign vessel was responsible for the disaster is an attempt to deflect blame away from faults within Russia's poorly maintained and cash-strapped armed forces.

During several days of attempts by Russian mini-submarines to dock with the sunken Kursk's aft escape hatch, officials said the hatch was severely damaged. But a Norwegian-British team of divers that eventually succeeded in opening the hatch said it was in good shape.

"There was evidence of what looked liked cracking, but it turned out to be signs of regular movement of the rubber panels ... and that could be construed as damage," one of the divers, Tony Scott, told The Associated Press on Saturday.

There are even reports that Russian officials stymied foreign rescue efforts when the sub first went down.

"At times there were so many wrong details and disinformation from Russia that it was close to endangering the divers," said Norwegian Rear Admiral Einar Skorgen, who commands the armed forces in north Norway. "We couldn't rely on the information we were getting."