Humor of the Northern Fleet Submariners
A fellow by the name of U. Lliyputin has saved some old 1980s/90s Soviet Navy comics, written and drawn by one O. V. Karavashkin.
Pulling away
Coming into Polyarini. This scene looks almost right out of The Hunt for Red October.
Lliyputin has provided translations and background information on the comics which show how ‘the other side’ lived during the Cold War.
Loading Type 53 torpedoes. The 53-65 (after the year it was introduced) torpedo family are Russian-made, wake-homing torpedoes designed to destroy surface ships and can make 45 kts on their hybrid kerosene turbines, delivering a shattering 678-lb HE explosive warhead. More on the kerosene later.
Type 53s in action.
This on-going battle between submariners and trawlers…
The crew lining up for illegal homebrew made either from torpedo fuel or fermented fruit. Also an ongoing saga of submariners.
Most of the comics seem to revolve around K-241 (Unit 854 in Soviet parlance), a Project 667AU Navaga-class (NATO designation Yankee) SSBN that was launched in 1972 at Severodvinsk and was based at Gadzhiyevo/Yagelnaya Bay or Saida Bay, which were in the same inlet in the Kola Peninsula. The subs carried 16 SS-N-6 SLBMs, had 6 torpedo tubes, and carried 18 Type 53 torpedoes.
They were the first Soviet SSBNs to carry their ballistic missiles within the hull (as opposed to the sail). K-241 was decommissioned June 16, 1992, for scrapping but the comix remain.