Stryder50
Platinum Member
From approximately 51 years ago, makes this sort of thing very rare, especially when compared to hours and miles of operations of all USN nuclear powered vessels during past 70 years.You qualified your claim with "major" which was wise. The Navy are unlikely to talk about accidents too.
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Also, it appears to have been "human error" not a design or manufacture flaw.
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About 370 miles from Puget Sound[1] sailing between Pearl Harbor and Bangor, Washington, the Guardfish suffered a leak in the primary coolant of its nuclear reactor.[2] A crewman performing a leak test on a valve accidentally created a path for coolant to flow out from the primary loop, which circulates through the reactor core.[3] The submarine surfaced to ventilate and decontaminate. Five crewman were sprayed with radioactive steam and required decontamination, followed by hospital care at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard.[4] The Navy did not publicly disclose the accident at the time and classified all records of the event.[5]
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