page_title: Soviet submarine K-3 Leninsky Komsomol
section_title: 1967 accident
hierarchical_section_title: Soviet submarine K-3 Leninsky Komsomol / 1967 accident
caption_attribution_description: Русский: Марка СССР: Атомная подводная лодка «Ленинский комсомол». Серия: Боевые корабли Военно-Морского Флота СССР English: USSR stamp: Nuclear Submarine Leninsky Komsomol. Series: Soviet Warships Español: Sello soviético de 20 kopeks de 1970. Submarino atómico "Leninski Komsomol". Sello basado en la obra de V. V. Zavyalov.
context_page_description: К-3 was a project 627 "Кит" submarine of the Soviet Navy's Northern Fleet, the first nuclear submarine of the Soviet Union. The vessel was prototyped in wood, with each of five segments scattered between five different locations about Leningrad, including the Astoria Hotel. She was built in Molotovsk, launched on 9 August 1957, commissioned in July 1958, and homeported at Zapadnaya Litsa on the Kola Peninsula. K-3 was designed by Vladimir Peregoudov. Her initial captain was Leonid Osipenko, and the executive officer was Lev Zhiltsov, who had the important task of assembling the first crew.
context_section_description: On 8 September 1967, while transiting the Norwegian Sea, a fire broke out in the submarine's hydraulic system, and crew members in the compartment when the fire broke out had to evacuate the compartment. The flames spread to other parts of the submarine. The automatic extinguishers were based on carbon dioxide gas, which killed the crew members who were in the first and second compartments in the submarine. When the dividing door in the bulkhead from the third compartment was opened to see what had happened to the people in the second compartment, the gas spread, and more people lost consciousness. The forward compartments were then completely sealed off, and the submarine surfaced. Four days later, Leninsky Komsomol returned to base. 39 crew members died in the fire.
  The subsequent investigation determined that the most probable cause of the fire was ignition of an explosive concentration of hydraulic oil, and that the reactions of the crew were prompt and correct. Numerous rewards were recommended for the crew, including seven nominations for Hero of Soviet Union—four of them posthumous. A later commission from Moscow, however, found a cigarette lighter in the torpedo compartment and found the position of a sailor's body suspicious.  They ruled that the sailor's smoking had caused the fire and prohibited any award.
  In 1991 a memorial was erected in Zapadnaya Litsa to the men lost aboard К-3. In 2007 the Russian Awards Committee (Российский наградной комитет) issued the medal "For 50 Years Of The Submarine "Leninskiy Komsomol"".
  As of April 2017, K-3 is being prepared to be put on display as a museum ship. Its nuclear reactor was removed while dry docked at the Nerpa shipyard in Snezhnogorsk, Murmansk Oblast, with plans to float the submarine out by the end of the month.
caption: K-3 Leninsky Komsomol on a Soviet postage stamp
exif: {"Image Tag 0x0301": "20000/9091", "Image Tag 0x5110": "1", "Image Tag 0x5111": "23616", "Image Tag 0x5112": "23616"}