Last updated at 13:58, Saturday, 24 May 2008

A BARROW-BUILT submarine needed £5m of repairs after it ran into the sea bed at 15 miles an hour during a badly supervised training exercise for potential sub commanders.

DAMAGED: HMS Trafalgar which run aground while taking part in a military exercise, in November, 2002, needed £5m worth of repairs ministry of defence

Two officers were court martialled and given a reprimand after the 2002 incident aboard HMS Trafalgar, the sub named after the famous naval battle won by Lord Nelson.

Details of the undersea prang were obtained by The Times newspaper under the Freedom of Information Act.

It was caused by basic navigational errors made during a training exercise for three “students” on board who were learning to be submarine commanders.

Tracing paper over the submarine’s chart also covered vital information, including the tide at tidal stream at that point off the Isle of Skye.

The same practice had contributed to previous sub groundings. The official board of inquiry report into the grounding said ninety seconds before the boat hit the seabed somebody was recorded as saying: “We’re going to have to change course. This is too dangerous.”

It hit the bottom heavily on the port side forward at a speed of 14.7 knots.

The inquiry report said: “On impact, the ship’s head was forced to starboard and there was a rapid deceleration, forcing most people to lose their balance and causing at least three minor injuries.”

The three students who included a Lieutenant Commander were taking part in a submarine command course during the exercise, code-named Cockfight.

The inquiry blamed human error and said: “Nuclear submarines should only conduct training of this nature if the arrangements for navigational safety are infallible”.

In Barrow, John Hart, who is president of the Submariners Association, said he thought the report may have painted an over dramatic picture of events.

He said: “It makes them sound like schoolboys, but they only pick the best of the first lieutenants for these submarine commanders’ courses.

“They are very demanding courses. They have to put them through the mill, and they do.”

Of bumping the bottom the ex-submariner said: “It has happened to me a number of times. We did not worry about it.

“ It happened the first time I was on a submarine so I thought it was normal. It was exactly like an aircraft, we stalled and went backward and hit the bottom.”

HMS Trafalgar was launched in Barrow in July 1981.

First published at 11:56, Saturday, 24 May 2008
Published by http://www.nwemail.co.uk