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EXTRA
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NEWS |
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Dateline
- October 6, 2007(June 8, 2007)
Britain's Behemouth Submarine |
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Britain
launches massive sub that hear a ship from across the Atlantic
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She is four
years
late and a massive 900 million over-budget.
But when the
Royal Navy's super-sub HMS Astute finally arrived, she
made for an awesome sight.
More complex
than the space shuttle, and able to circumnavigate the
globe without surfacing, the 7,400-ton monster is the
largest and deadliest hunter-killer submarine ever built.
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Camilla officially
launched the submarine at the ceremony |
The
Duchess of Cornwall cracked a bottle of beer brewed by the sub's
crew on her prow to officially name the "boat", in Navy
jargon, before she was gingerly wheeled out of her shed at the
stately speed of one metre per minute. |
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The
specifications for Britain's biggest submarine make for mind-
boggling reading, but it was the sheer size of the black behemoth
which made its mark on the 10,000 dockyard workers, schoolchildren,
VIPs and Navy personnel invited to the ceremony in Barrow-in-Furness,
Cumbria. |
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The massive
submarine is slowly moved into position |
As long as a football
pitch, at 318ft, and as wide as four double- Decker buses, HMS
Astute is a third longer than any sub which has gone before.
Her nuclear-powered
engine will propel her through the water at more than 20 knots,
yet the UK's first stealth sub makes less noise than a baby
dolphin, making her as good as undetectable by enemy ships.
Astute's sonar is
so advanced that if she was lying in the English Channel she
would be able to detect ships leaving New York harbour 3,000
nautical miles away (although the details of how she can do
this are classified).
The nuclear reactor
will never need refuelling, and with an ability to make oxygen
and drinking water out of sea water, the sub could stay underwater
for its entire 25-year lifespan were it not for the needs of
the crew.
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Once she goes into
operation in 2009, Astute will carry a 98-man crew and stay
at sea for 12 weeks on a routine patrol.
She will carry 38
Tomahawk cruise missiles, with a range of 1,240 miles, meaning
Astute could attack targets in North Africa with pinpoint accuracy
while sitting off the coast of Plymouth.
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Spearfish torpedoes
will also be on board for attacking ships and other subs.
But Astute will not
carry nuclear weapons the UK's Trident missiles are launched
from the Vanguard class of submarines.
The Navy's submarine
chief Captain Mike Davis-Marks said: "The Astute class
of submarines will quite simply be unbeatable worldwide for
many years to come.
"Astute will
have a capability that will keep us right at the top of the
premiership of the world's navies the Manchester United of submarine
nations. With our proud heritage, Britain deserves nothing less."
Astute is the first
of four vessels to be built by BAE Systems at a total cost of
3.85billion, or 960million each.
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The Astute
submarine under construction at Barrow |
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