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Comment by ljf | Hacker News Reader

Off topic, but always amazed me that the Russian submarine in this film has a swimming pool (more like a plunge pool) but still seems wild.

https://youtu.be/JrULRXlAlMU?si=kvh64qy64E7aqXPY

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From the yt comments:

One of the crew members' memoir (Эдуард Овечкин "Акулы из стали") mentions that the pool was filled with freshwater. The crew rarely used the pool themselves, because they could find better use for that much water. The author had an interesting story about this swimming pool. One day, a high-ranking officer came with inspection. He was very rude and the crew didn't like him in return, especially since he sat in the captain's chair (only the captain was supposed to sit there). Then this officer wanted to take a swim and he ordered the crew to prepare a pool. As the author was drawing water, he and other crew members decided to urinate in the pool. And then watched as this officer was swimming there, barely containing the laughter. When they finally told the captain about this in control room some time later, the submarine was sailing without control for several minutes, because everyone was laughing on the floor.

It's like the old public swimming pool joke. "Check the pH!" "Hmm, mostly p, not much H."

A normal ballistic missile submarine has one pressure hull, with a large section of ballistic missiles taking up the middle of it. This submarine has two pressure hulls, on either side containing no missiles, but sandwiching the missiles between them. In theory this means that you can torpedo the sub from a side, and the missiles are still okay. But it also means that the sub has ludicrous amounts of space available. No missiles taking up pressure hull space, and two, not one pressure hulls. So everything on this sub got to be more spacious and there was room for extras.

Yeah, the Typhoon sub was like two submarines side-by-side inside the external shell. The scene in the movie where Alec Baldwin fights the KGB agent between the missile silos ("Some things there don't react well to bullets") couldn't have happened as the missile tubes are between those internal hulls, though one could have argued this sub was built differently with it's "silent drive".

Still an amazing movie.

Diagram here: https://imageio.forbes.com/specials-images/imageserve/5f40d7...

Submarine life is inherently miserable. Anything the military can do to make their life less miserable does wonders for morale which leads to a better functioning sub.

They military also spends a lot on making sure that they are very well fed - as much as they can be under the circumstances:

The tour guide in the galley of USS Blueback noted that if the ice cream machine didn't work the submarine was not considered operational and required immediate repair.

If a British tank's tea-making facilities aren't working, it's the same.

Being on a sub is intensely mentally wearing. Months at sea, no interaction with the world outside.

Feeding the sailors lavishly is one of their few perks.

It only seems wild in light of how the US relates to its military. For all the hype about life in the russian navy, you are still much more likely to see sailors suntanning on a russian ship than any USN boat.

Look at this footage. Look at the guys on the helo deck. When russian sailors have time off, they take it seriously.

https://youtu.be/fVXxTS2f8CE

My ship celebrated July 4, 1994 off the coast of Mogadishu by holding a “steel beach picnic” on the flight deck. Everyone ran around under the noon equatorial sun in swimsuits while people grilled burgers, set up little inflatable pools to lounge in, played volleyball and soccer, and otherwise acted like we were at Ocean Beach on a hot day. At night we had fireworks (including rounds from the 5” guns) and the CIWS shot a stream of tracer bullets. It was glorious.

The US Navy spends long hours working hard, but I promise you it plays hard when possible.

Sometimes they even play football with two footballs!

USN certainly does events. That is that culture. The Russians are more about day-to-day comforts: fewer big party days but more everyday stuff.

A German film crew shot a documentary onboard a Typhoon class submarine (the TK-20 Severstal) in 2001, showing many aspects of daily life onboard, including the launch of a RSM-52 ICBM [1] (unfortunately awful video quality).

In hindsight, they catched a brief window in recent history where a western film crew would be allowed on board of a Russian ballistic missile submarine – remember that 2001 was the year when Putin gave a speech in the German parliament (in German language!) speculating about a new common safety architecture eventually succeeding NATO.

[1] https://youtu.be/cVWBhpjwXxo?si=IQkR6Pbx4dh86y0F&t=1172

Presumably there's some point in the film where you see this is actually in a sub rather than a propaganda film made elsewhere?

It’s real, there are photos from a real tour of a Typhoon submarine

This [1] seems to be a Quora post featuring such images. Very cool, didn't know that!

[1]: https://www.quora.com/Did-the-Typhoon-class-of-submarine-rea...

There are two decomissioned Typhoons visible on Google Maps, with parking spaces and cars for scale: https://maps.app.goo.gl/ov8Ppr6PE6X1gG1B9

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