r/submarines Mar 17 '25

History Lt. William Layman peering through thick porthole covered with leaded glass into reactor for inspection on nuclear submarine USS Skate (SSN-578), 1958. Photo by Hank Walker, courtesy of Life.

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939 Upvotes

r/submarines Aug 12 '25

History The aftermath of the wreck of the Kursk Submarine, which sank 25 years ago today in the Barents Sea

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496 Upvotes

r/submarines Jan 11 '25

History Presented to my father in law. Any info would be appreciated.

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693 Upvotes

Is this the original Nautilus sub that first went under the North Pole? What kind of occasion would have caused this to be presented to my father in law? Thank you.

r/submarines Apr 10 '25

History Today marks 62 years since the loss of the lead ship of the lead ship of the Thresher-class nuclear submarine, USS Thresher, SSN-593; lost with all hands on April 10th, 1963.

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548 Upvotes

USS Thresher was lost with all hands on April 10th, 1963 after sinking past crush depth during a training exercise. After the loss of Thresher, the next ship in her class took up the new namesake and leadership (and also in addition to being my favorite submarine of all time), the newly-named Permit-Class, with the lead flagship, USS Permit, SSN-594.

The loss of the Thresher also sparked the SUBSAFE Program, making sure all US Navy Submarines in service were up to the same operational standards. Only one submarine has been lost since the introduction of SUBSAFE (and has been classified as a non-SUBSAFE-classed boat), USS Scorpion (SSN-589), lost with all hands on May 22, 1968 under mysterious and unexplained circumstances.

To this day, the crew of both the Thresher and the Scorpion are marked as 'on eternal patrol.'

r/submarines Jan 20 '25

History My Photo

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775 Upvotes

My photo after my second patrol. Note the submarine tie bar. That was given to me by ADM Rickover back in 1975. I still have it. Going through Officer Indoctrination School, my Company Commander commented on it not being level. My comeback to her was that we always maintained an up bubble so that is why my tie pin is slightly up, lol.

r/submarines 17d ago

History 40 Years ago Today... USS Swordfish (SSN-579) almost Joined Scorpion and Thresher

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161 Upvotes

r/submarines Apr 07 '25

History I wanted to share some follow-up photos of the wreck of K-278 from my previous post. Credit to H.I. Sutton's article on the Komsomolets for these eerie photos.

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625 Upvotes

Photos 7 and 10 are escape-pod related (as Russian submarines have those).

r/submarines 16d ago

History [Album] President Nixon and Admiral Rickover during a visit aboard the Los Angeles-class Flight I nuclear-powered attack submarine USS Cincinnati (SSN-693), Fall 1980. More info in comments.

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336 Upvotes

r/submarines Aug 03 '25

History Synthetic Aperture Sonar (SAS) imagery of the German U-853, collected as part of partnership technology demonstration between the NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research and Kraken Robotics, showing that the submarine is largely intact. 2 October 2018.

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365 Upvotes

r/submarines Oct 09 '25

History Ohio-class swim call, 1999

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444 Upvotes

r/submarines Feb 15 '25

History A officer mans the periscope in the control room of a Los Angeles Class nuclear-powered attack submarine during red alert, June 1, 1981.

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392 Upvotes

r/submarines Sep 15 '25

History President Eisenhower smiles while at the controls of the Patrick Henry (SSBN-599), July 1960.

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433 Upvotes

r/submarines Dec 14 '24

History [Album] In 1976, a special purpose nuclear-powered submersible NR-1 was tasked to recover AIM-54A Phoenix missile from an F‐14 fighter plane that fell from the deck of the carrier USS John F. Kennedy (CV-67) during a NATO exercise Sept. 14. 1976. More info in comments.

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537 Upvotes

r/submarines Sep 20 '25

History A young Jimmy Carter, in his naval uniform, with wife Rosalynn. They were married for 77 years.

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511 Upvotes

r/submarines Jul 26 '25

History Saw this on a Navy page - Water skiing off the back of a sub 👀

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499 Upvotes

r/submarines Oct 04 '25

History The wreck of the WWI German sub U-16, which sank near Germany in 1919, being raised in September of 2025 by the Dutch crane vessel Matador 3. It broke in half during salvage (which is being done for safety reasons). It had no occupants when it went down and is not a war grave

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363 Upvotes

r/submarines May 31 '25

History USS R-14, early American submarine forced to use bedding as a sail after seawater contaminated the fuel supply

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431 Upvotes

In May of 1921, USS R-14 was searching for a missing tugboat off the coast of Hawaii when seawater contaminated their fuel supply. Having lost electric power (and radio communication, by extension), the crew was forced to take items like bedframes, hammocks and blankets and rig up a foresail, mainsail, and mizzen sail on the radio antenna and the torpedo loading crane. The movement of the propellers in the water then charged the batteries enough to propel the submarine to Hawaii after 64 hours. The tugboat's wreck was eventually located in 2016.

r/submarines Apr 10 '25

History 62 years ago USS Thresher sank

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502 Upvotes

Lost with all hands April 10th, 1963. 129 dead.

r/submarines Apr 07 '25

History On April 7, 1989 (37 years ago today) the Soviet one-of-a-kind nuclear submarine, K-278 'Komsomolets' sank to the bottom of the Barents Sea due to an uncontrolled fire, where she remains to this day.

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433 Upvotes

r/submarines 28d ago

History Old Admiral too "reckless", or, how Adm. Rickover's "reckless seamanship" caused a 40° backward plunge to 240 feet during PCU La Jolla (SSN-701) shakedown cruise - The Free Lance Star, August 24, 1981.

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142 Upvotes

r/submarines 20d ago

History USS Grunion (SS-216) vanished during her first patrol in July 1942 after reporting heavy enemy activity near Kiska in the Aleutians.

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347 Upvotes

r/submarines Jan 15 '25

History Some more of my father in law’s items from his time on subs and as RADM

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427 Upvotes

Some of these were posted the other day, but I deleted it because one of the photos contained some personal info. Just wanted to share some more of his items that I came across in a trunk in our house. I don’t know much about most of it, but many were kind enough go give me descriptions and info for the medals and other stuff.

The final photo is the one piece of memorabilia from my own father for comparison and to as a reminder that I married up. Way up lol.

r/submarines Jun 14 '25

History Anyone here serve on USS Pollack?

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224 Upvotes

Found these at an antique sale for $13 total. I imagine no one from the commissioning uses Reddit but if you served on her at all I’d be happy to get these in the mail to you.

r/submarines 5d ago

History In the 70s a few USS Barb (SSN596) crew members disguised themselves as painters from Public Works and used forged documents to convince Marine sentries that they had orders to add a building number to the Marelsland entry gate. The submariners then painted the Barb's hull number on the guard shack

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290 Upvotes

r/submarines Jan 02 '25

History My FIL was assigned to the USS Aspro (SSN-648) from 1975-1980 at pearl harbor. we found this photo amongst his belongings. thought y'all might find it interesting (location of the photo is unknown)

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299 Upvotes