Artist's cutout of
descending to the ocean floor. Courtesy of fas.org.
NR-1 Class Submersible Research Vehicle:
Laid down: 10 June 1967 at the Electric Boat Division of General Dynamics Corp., Groton, CT.; Launched: 25 January 1969;
Delivered: to the US Navy and placed in service as NR-1, 22 October 1969. NR-1 was be towed by USNS Grasp to Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine for the inactivation process in December 2009. The Boat was then towed to Puget Sound Naval Shipyard.
Specifications: Displacement: Surfaced, 365 t., Submerged, 393 t.; Length: 145'; Beam: 12'; Draft: 15';
Speed: Surfaced, 4.5 kts, Submerged, 3.5 kts; Complement: 2 officer, 3 enlisted, 2 scientists;
Armament: none; Operating Depth: 2,375 feet (724 meters); Propulsion: pressurized-water reactor, single propellers. NavSource
and 1980s, "NR-1" conducted numerous classified missions involving
recovery of objects from the floor of the deep-sea. These missions
classified and few details have been made public. One publicly
mission in 1976 was to recover parts of an F-14 that was lost from the
an aircraft carrier and sank with at least one of the then-new AIM-54A
missiles. The secrecy normal to USN submarine operations was hightened
Rickover's personal involvement. Rickover shared details of "NR-1"
operations on a need-to-know basis. Rickover envisioned building a
of NR-1 type submarines, but only one was built due to budget