By David Sharp
The Associated Press
KITTERY, Maine — Those who have spent time on Navy submarines will tell you that few combustible materials are aboard. But don’t tell that to the firefighters who rushed to the Miami when a blaze swept through the billion-dollar nuclear-powered submarine.
“It’s like going into a chimney,” said Portsmouth Naval Shipyard firefighter David Funk, who said that insulation and wiring fueled a smoky fire that became hot enough for aluminum to burst into flames.
On Friday, two days after the blaze began, workers at the shipyard finished pumping fresh air into the fire-damaged sub, allowing Navy investigators to enter to begin the first damage assessment.
It remains to be seen whether the submarine can be salvaged.
U.S. Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, both members of the Armed Services Committee, visited the shipyard Friday and met with its commander.
They thanked a small contingent of firefighters, including Funk, who battled the blaze as the sub’s metal hull trapped the heat inside.
Three Navy investigative teams were dispatched to Portsmouth Naval Shipyard to help determine what caused the fire, the senators told reporters.
The blaze started early Wednesday night shortly after a shift change at the shipyard, where the sub was being overhauled in dry dock. A handful of shipyard workers were in the forward compartments, where the fire began, Collins said.
The fire wasn’t extinguished until the next morning. More than 100 firefighters responded from more than a dozen agencies as far away as Groton, Conn., and South Portland.
The Miami fire damaged the torpedo room, crew quarters and command and control areas in the front of the submarine, but the nuclear-propulsion components at the back of the sub weren’t harmed.
One defense analyst suggested that the repairs would be so costly that the 22-year-old sub would be scrapped, a scenario that would be reminiscent of the Bonefish, a diesel-electric sub decommissioned and scrapped after a fire at sea in 1988.
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