A probe has been launched after documents marked “officially sensitive” were found lying on the floor of a toilet’s pub in UK’s Cumbria (Image: Twitter/@warshipworld)
HMS Anson is one of the most advanced hunter-killer submarines of the world and was welcomed into the Royal Navy fleet August last year
The Royal Navy will launch a probe to investigate how official documents of one of its £1.3bn “hunter killer” submarines were found in the toilet of a pub in Wetherspoons, the Sun and the Press Associated said in a report.
The files carrying details about HMS Anson were left in the Furness Railway pub in Barrow, Cumbria. The report said the documents marked “official sensitive” showed the inner workings of the nuclear-powered submarine.
Submariners would use the information in these documents to learn how to isolate and depressurise elements of its system, the PA Media report said.
“These are generic training documents that carry no classified information. However, we take all security matters extremely seriously and will investigate the circumstances of their discovery,” a Royal Navy spokesman told PA Media Media.
The Sun in its report said that the pub was packed with patrons when the papers were found on the floor of the cubicle. The pub is not very far away from the BAE systems shipyard in Barrow-in-Furness where the submarine was being constructed.
The submarine is the fifth of new Astute-class attack submarines scheduled to join the Royal Navy fleet. These submarines can fire tomahawk missiles and the Royal Navy says these are the UK’s “largest, most advanced and most powerful attack submarines”.
“HMS Anson is £1.3bn of both naval stealth and striking power – able to gather vital intelligence, protect other Royal Navy vessels from threats above and below the waves and destroy enemy military infrastructure with pinpoint accuracy,” the Royal Navy’s website says.
People familiar with the developments told PA Media that these documents help submariners and contractors to understand how systems interact but do not reveal how they work. They said that these files only consisted of designs of systems onboard but did not reveal how they work.
Another person familiar with the developments told the Sun that it was a matter of luck that any Russian spy did not find them pointing out that detail on HMS Anson’s hydraulics, which control torpedo hatches, steering and buoyancy, were in the dossier.
Official sensitive documents in the UK are categorised one level below ‘Secret’.
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