Soviet submarine K - 159 K - 159 was a Project 627A " Kit " ( NATO reporting name November class ) nuclear - powered submarine of the Soviet Northern Fleet . Her keel was laid down on 15 August 1962 at the Severodvinsk " Sevmash " Shipyard No . 402 . She was launched on 6 June 1963 , and commissioned on 9 October 1963 . Radioactive discharge accident . On 2 March 1965 , " K - 159 " suffered an accident involving radioactive discharges into her steam generators , almost certainly primary coolant leaks from the tubes into the steam chest and thence into the turbines , contaminating her entire propulsion plant . If so , the leaking tubes were plugged , because she continued to operate for another two years before entering the shipyard from 1967 through 1968 for overhaul and to have her steam generators replaced . She returned to the shipyard from 1970 through 1972 for further repairs and refuelling , and then again from 1979 through 1980 for still more repairs . Decommissioning and after - service life . " K - 159 " was decommissioned on 30 May 1989 and laid up in Gremikha ; her reactors were not defuelled . She remained in layup with little or no maintenance for 14 years . Her outer hull rusted until in many places it had " the strength of foil " . The poor condition of Russia ' s fleet of decommissioned nuclear submarines concerned many other countries , and in the summer of 2003 , five countries made a combined donation of more than US $ 200 million in support of decommission and disposal of those hulks . In anticipation of receiving those funds , Admiral Gennady Suchkov , Commander of the Northern Fleet , decided to tow all the 16 laid up submarines from Gremikha to shipyards where they would be dismantled . " K - 159 " was the 13th hulk to be towed . Because " K - 159 " s hull was rusted through in so many places , it was kept afloat by spot - welding large empty tanks to her sides as pontoons . Those tanks , however , were manufactured in the 1940s , were not air - tight , and were no better maintained than the submarine ' s hull . Foundering and sinking . On 28 August 2003 , " K - 159 " and her pontoons were manned by ten Russian sailors and taken under tow to Polyarny . That crew kept the pontoons pressurized and the submarine hull pumped out , but during the early morning hours of 30 August they encountered a squall that ripped away one of the pontoons . " K - 159 " did not sink immediately , but was clearly in distress . Northern Fleet was notified at 0120 , and Admiral Suchkov arrived at headquarters 20 minutes later . Suchkov made no attempt to rescue the submarine crew ( 3 ) . By 0300 the wreck had sunk in the Barents Sea , 238 meters down , with nine of her crew and 800 kilograms of spent nuclear fuel containing some 20 petabecquerels ( 600 kilocuries ) of radioactivity . The Military Prosecutor General ' s office brought charges against Captain Second Class Sergei Zhemchuzhnov who was overseeing the towing operation . President of Russia Vladimir Putin removed Suchkov from service on the recommendation of Navy Chief of Staff Vladimir Kuroyedov . Putin appointed Vice Admiral Sergey Simonenko acting Commander of the Northern Fleet . Before that , he headed the headquarters of the Northern Fleet . The Russian government is considering plans to raise the wreck of " K - 159 " . Admiral Kuroyedov believes that " we should not leave nuclear objects lying on the seabed " . Initial plans were to do so in August or September 2004 , but they were postponed . In 2007 , the British Ministry of Defence began preparations for a salvage operation As part of that recovery planning , the Scottish company Adus was hired to evaluate the wreck . A high - resolution sonar generated image of K - 159 was published on 1 April 2010 . Legal actions . Shortly after the loss of the submarine , the widows of four of the nine deceased submariners filed a lawsuit against the Russian Defence Ministry demanding compensation of one million rubles ( about $ 37 , 500 ) each in moral damage s , a lawyer acting for them said . The Ministry objected to the suit , saying that the widows should press charges against Suchkov , who was convicted by a court martial of criminal negligence leading to the submariners ' deaths . Last Crew . The bodies of Smirnov and Zhadan were recovered immediately . Tsibul ' skij was rescued alive and recovered in the Severomorsk Military Hospital . The other seven were presumably trapped in the wreck . References . 3 ) http : / / www . tmt - index . com / news / article / admiral - convicted - in - sinking - of - k - 159 / 230921 . html " The Moscow Times " , 19 May 2004 : " Admiral Convicted in Sinking of K - 159 " and http : / / en . rian . ru / russia / 20060927 / 54316975 . html " Rianovosti " 27 sept 2006 : " Court postpones K - 159 submarine hearings until October 23 - 1 "