Russian Ship Accidentally Fires Sea-to-Shore Missile

MOSCOW, Sep 15, 2000 -- (Agence France Presse) One of Russia's largest anti-submarine warships accidentally fired at a town on the far east coast, RIA-Novosti cited the Pacific Fleet press service as saying Friday.

Nobody was wounded when the large-caliber shell was mistakenly fired by the Admiral Pantilev at the Slavyanka settlement in the Khasansk region on Thursday during a naval exercise, the fleet said in a statement. But the shell left a crater 1.5 meters deep after it exploded in marshy terrain 200 metres (yards) from Slavyanka.

The fleet denied reports in Russian media that the explosion had resulted in casualties, adding: "One local resident of advanced age suffered concussion."

The press service blamed the Admiral Pantilev's gunners for the accident.

On Thursday, a Russian lawmaker claimed the ill-fated Kursk nuclear submarine, which sank last month in mysterious circumstances with the loss of 118 crew, was probably destroyed by a misfired torpedo during naval wargames.

Sergei Zhekov, a member of a parliamentary probe into the August 12 disaster, said a Russian warship had launched five missiles in a mock attack on the Kursk, but only four had been found afterwards. ((c) 2000 Agence France Presse)

http://www.russiatoday.com/news.php3?id=199532

-- Carl Jenkins (Somewherepress@aol.com), September 16, 2000