The K-19 Meltdown

The K-19 Meltdown

The K-19 set out to sea on June 18, 1961. Holding a total of 139 sailors, being the massive nuclear submarine that it was the K-19 was still not fully manned. Heading out to sea for a month long war game everyone aboard already suspected something was not right about the sub, many speculated it was cursed from the beginning. The journey began, but not on the right foot.

The commander on board of the K-19 was Captain Zateyev who assisted the acting Executive Officer Vladimir Yenin. Although Yenin was Executive officer who out ranked Captain Zateyev, Zateyev was highly respected and appreciated by the crew because he had been commander since before its construction. Zateyev was not left with much to work with because he was assigned a very young and inexperienced crew.

After two weeks at sea all was well, the mission was carried out as planned. The crew went on ahead and celebrated Captain Zateyev’s 35th birthday with homemade ice cream and a double ration of wine. At this point the location of K-19 was southeast of Greenland awaiting instructions. As soon as word was heard from Moscow the crew began to head on north toward the Arctic. The mission continued with out any complications and there were still no speculations of nuclear failure.

On the July 4th 1961, Captain Zateyev received the some heart wrenching news about the subs nuclear reactor. The water pressure in the starboard nuclear reactor’s cooling system had dropped to zero. What looked like a rupture in the primary coolant loop were actually the pumps of the coolant system that had stopped which was causing the system to over heat which would soon lead to a nuclear meltdown. With out coolant, the temperature in the reactor core would rise unchecked. The leak was in the piping that circulated cooling water through the reactor. At this point there was nothing that could be done to stop the reactor from catastrophically overheating and causing a meltdown of the nuclear reactor.

No Submarine crew had ever been confronted with this kind of deadly emergency, and the series of technical breakdowns they had already faced. They did not know what the results could be of a thermal explosion that could be caused and mark the end of the nuclear meltdown. While experts today say that an explosion like that could have been identified as an accident, it was harder to predict what the reactions would have been in 1961 due to the tensions of superpowers and of the cold war. However a thermal explosion would have seriously damaged or even sunk the K-19 and scattered a significant amount of radioactive contamination to the surrounding sea and air. About two hours into the crisis, the captain gave orders to surface the sub and radio for help. Adding to the already terrorizing situation the sub’s antenna fails. There was no call for help.

By this time the captain and his officers decided that their only hope was to somehow get water into the nuclear reactor pressure vessel to cool the core. To do this, crewmen would have to open the shielded reactor area within the compartment 6 and face a lethal radioactive cloud. Everyone involved knew it was a suicide mission but it had to be done. Eight men entered the compartment to try to rig a system for getting water into the reactor. The first cut an air-vent valve from the reactor releasing some hydrogen gas and a small amount of radioactive steam. The hydrogen gave off a pale violet, and the welding torch ignited into a pale blue flame making the scene surreal. The team continued to work fighting small fires, intense heat, and increasingly debilitating radiation sickness.

After about an hour of hard excruciating work the men finally managed to weld a pipe supplying water onto the stub of the former air-vent valve. Cooling water was now flowing into the stricken reactor. Now that the crew “thought” that all was now fixed and well they stumbled out one by one vomiting yellow and white foam, with their skin and faces horrifically reddened and swollen. As hours passed the crew members had to return to the compartment to repair the failing valves and a leak in the badly rigged piping. As the crew continued to struggle to cool the reactor, deadly radiation continued to spread through the sub. The first wave of radiation was released when the shielded reactor area was opened and radioactive steam was sucked into the sub’s ventilation system.

The fight to cool the reactor continued on for hours, as water was piped in to cool the reactor, more and more radioactive steam was created and too sucked into the sub’s ventilation system. Also, as the crew members continued to pump radioactive coolant water out of the reactor compartment radiation from the drain piping was being released into other compartments. This was happening with the crew not even knowing it. After four hours into the crisis Captain Zateyev knows that the men in compartment 6 would die. He also knew that everyone else would