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Chinese Sub, in Tragic Mystery, Becomes Modern "Flying Dutchman"

Monday, May 5, 2003
By Joe Buff
professional writer on national security and defense preparedness

Through Hong Kong, one senior Chinese official is quoted as saying the submarine was on an "extremely dangerous antisubmarine training" exercise. Another official is quoted as saying the Ming was on a "long-distance navigation training mission." Yet the Beijing officer who cites engine trouble claims the sub was on a special "silent, no-contact drill." Well, which type of mission was it? It couldn't possibly be all three, for various technical and procedural reasons.

Ming-class submarine.
Image Credit: Military.com

Yesterday, English-language on-line news services began to report further allegations or theories regarding the Ming-class Chinese submarine disaster -- explanations or scenarios originating in Hong Kong and Beijing. Some of this has made it into today's American daily newspapers. The only thing the Hong Kong and Beijing reports seem to agree on is that the accident actually occurred about ten days before it was announced last Friday, May 2.

The Beijing explanation is attributed to an anonymous Chinese People's Liberation Army Navy naval officer, in comments which "could not be independently verified," according to today's The Boston Globe and The New York Times. The officer said a possible cause of the deaths was that engine trouble sucked oxygen from within the sub while she was diving, suffocating the crew. This official also claims the crew were all found at their posts, with no sign of panic or alarm or any "frantic efforts to make repairs."

Knowing what I know about diesel subs, I find this particular sort of engine trouble explanation implausible. Here's why:

If an air-intake problem occurs in a diesel sub with hatches closed while diving, it does far more than quietly suck the oxygen from the air. It sucks in air. This is well known by diesel submariners (since World War I!) to cause immediate and extreme pain in the crew's ear canals as the internal air pressure drops precipitately. Leadership personnel in the engine room(s) would react in a heartbeat: Submarine diesel engines have multiple instant-acting cutoff devices to shut them down the moment such trouble is detected -- this is a very basic and standard "casualty" that any elementary crew training program would certainly include, even in China. Besides, all submarines carry large supplies of compressed air for many purposes, including restoring normal atmospheric pressure right away after any such engine trouble. (The Ming-class derives from Russian designs that in turn derive from World War II German U-boats practices. Instant-acting diesel cutoff devices and ample compressed-air tanks seem guaranteed, as a legacy from these earlier models.)

Thus, that the crew could asphyxiate from lack of oxygen due to the engines running, at all -- and especially without most men aboard knowing at once and reacting in ways that would, forensically, be visible in the positions and postures of their bodies -- seems a "rather" low-probability event.
May 5, 2003 Update

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Dan