Episode 663: The Kursk: Russia’s Epic Fail

On this episode of the Sofa King Podcast, we look at the sinking of The Kursk. The Kursk was a Russian nuclear sub and was declared “unsinkable.” However, a constantly declining military budget let their navy start to fall apart. On Aug 12, 2000, during a massive fleet-wide training exercise, the ship fell silent. Well, not exactly silent since seismographs on the other side of the world reported two explosions, one equaling a 4.2 on the Richter Scale. What followed was an epic failure in the Russian Navy’s response, the government’s inactivity, and Vladimir Putin’s callous nature. Everyone on The Kursk died, and their corpses were only discovered by foreign divers since the Russians couldn’t do it themselves. This is a sad story of a government and bureaucracy that left its sailors to die.

Visit Our Sources:

https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/navy-ships/a23494010/kursk-submarine-disaster/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kursk_submarine_disaster

https://www.rferl.org/a/the-kursk-catastrophe-a-lesson-for-putin-is-fading-from-russian-attention-20-years-later/30778500.html

https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/the-coronavirus-and-the-kursk-submarine-disaster

https://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=82260&page;=1

https://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=82720&page;=1

Overview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7RL_UdWCPlw

Raising The Kursk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQJ6IMREvz8