(RightWing.org) – A Royal Navy patrol boat watching Russian warships off the British coast had a sinister surprise last month when the Russian group turned out to contain an attack submarine.
The HMS Tyne, a 260-foot Offshore Patrol Vessel, was shadowing the Russians as they transited the English Channel, and found that as well as a missile-armed patrol boat and a tug, there was also a KILO-class attack submarine. The diesel-electric KILO is notoriously hard to detect, carries torpedoes and includes a payload of up to four cruise missiles.
.@hms_tyne returned to Portsmouth today after monitoring 🇷🇺Russian intelligence-gathering vessel Viktor Leonov and supporting tanker Sergey Osipov sheltering in the Moray Firth
HMS Tyne and 🇵🇹 NRP Corte Real also shadowed corvette Vasily Bykov & Kilo-class submarine in North Sea pic.twitter.com/btiof4AzqW
— NavyLookout (@NavyLookout) November 10, 2020
The Tyne is now riding herd on an even more dangerous Russian intruder – a spy ship. On November 9, British sailors on board located the signals intelligence collector Viktor Leonov and her support ship in the Moray Firth, in northwest Scotland.
Officially the Russian ships were sheltering from high waves caused by Storm Aidan – but their “refuge” was only 30 miles from RAF Lossiemouth, a major British air force base.
Russia’s navy has become increasingly intrusive in the last few years; in 2017 Viktor Leonov cruised from Cuba right up the US East Coast, closing to within 30 miles of several US naval bases. Definitely, something worth keeping an eye on.
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