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Rescue workers in search of the submarine
The »KRI Nanggala 402« has now been found and all 53 seafarers on board have been declared dead
Photo: Kurniawan / dpa
The Indonesian naval submarine was found four days after it disappeared off the coast of Bali.
This was announced by the army chief of the Southeast Asian country, Air Marshal Hadi Tjahjanto, on Sunday.
He pronounced all 53 crew members dead.
"With this authentic evidence, we can confirm that the› KRI Nanggala
-
402 ‹
sank
and all 53 seafarers on board died while on duty," said Tjahjanto at a press conference.
According to army and naval officers, the submarine was broken into at least three parts.
The President expresses his condolences to relatives
President Joko Widodo had already expressed his condolences to the members of the occupation.
The army and the navy changed the status of the submarine KRI Nanggala-402 from “lost contact” to “sunk” or “sunk” on Sunday.
On Saturday the naval commander Yudo Margono announced that a submarine-like object had been located with sonar measurements at a depth of 850 meters.
Indonesia's navy also claimed to have discovered suspected parts of the interior of the submarine in the water, including a bottle with lubricant for the periscope and fragments of prayer rugs.
According to calculations by the Indonesian Navy, the oxygen reserves on board the »KRI Nanggala-402« should only last until Saturday morning.
The boat, built by Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Werft in Kiel in the late 1970s, lost contact with the fleet during an exercise on Wednesday.
At the time it was about 95 kilometers north of Bali.
According to calculations by the Indonesian Navy, the oxygen reserves on board the »KRI Nanggala-402« should only last until Saturday morning - and only if the boat is undamaged.
Did a power failure cause the accident?
The cause of the accident is still unclear.
According to the authorities, there may have been a power failure in the submarine, which meant that the crew could no longer appear.
Margono ruled out an explosion.
Rather, everything indicates that the submarine broke apart at a depth of 800 meters under the water pressure, as it was not designed for this depth.
An Australian warship and an American special aircraft had recently participated in the search.
clh / dpa / Reuters