Currently, the question of the placement of the special submarine “Khabarovsk” is under consideration. One of the possible options for deployment is Kamchatka, military department sources told Izvestia news agency. There the “Khabarovsk” will be part of the Russian Pacific Fleet. According to Izvestia’s interlocutors, the final decision has not yet been made.
The Russian Defense Ministry is already working on the placement of submarines and the preparation of the necessary ground infrastructure for the nuclear drone “Poseidon”. Currently, the question of the placement of the special submarine “Khabarovsk” is under consideration. One possible location could be the Kamchatka Peninsula.
In Vilyuchinsk, in the immediate vicinity of Petropavlovsk, the Russian Navy is planning to build a modern submarine base for the Pacific Fleet. Viljutschinsk is a closed city in the Russian region Kamchatka with 24’000 inhabitants. The work is expected to be completed by the end of 2021. According to the Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Navy Nikolai Evmenov, all base facilities at the Vilyuchinsk site will be put into operation by the end of the year. At the same time, new technologies for seismic safety of objects are introduced. The rumors about the stationing of the “Khabarovsk” in Vilyuchinsk were neither denied nor confirmed by officials.
The “Khabarovsk” is the first submarine that will have the nuclear-powered underwater drone “Poseidon” on board. The submarine was designed and built from scratch. This special submarine was laid down in 2014 according to project 09851 at “Northern Machine-Building Enterprise” in Severodvinsk on the White Sea. According to media reports, it is already in Arctic waters and is scheduled to be handed over to the Navy before the end of 2021.
Nothing was disclosed about the exact characteristics of the submarine. All that is known is that it is equivalent to a submarine cruiser in size and crew size. The length will be more than 100 m, and the width will be about 12 m. The total displacement in submerged condition will be at least 10’000 tons. It was reported that six underwater drones of the type “Poseidon” are carried.
The second “Poseidon” carrier in its testing phase
Construction of another “Poseidon” carrier, the submarine K-329 “Belgorod” was completed and the submarine is already in the test phase.
The multi-purpose submarine cruiser “Belgorod” is of the same type as the “Kursk”, which was wrecked on August 12, 2000. Construction began as early as 1992, but was interrupted in 1997 for financial reasons. The submarine was already three-quarters built by this time.
By the end of 2012, construction had already resumed under a new project 09852, adapted for underwater torpedo use.
The main armament of both special submarines will be the unique “Poseidon” robotic torpedoes. Thanks to their own nuclear power plant, they have an almost unlimited range. Each torpedo carries a powerful thermonuclear warhead. Such devices can be used for a retaliatory strike against coastal targets and squadrons of enemy ships in the event of a major nuclear war.
Heiner Kubny, PolarJournal
More on the subject:
