This year’s featured boat for the PLAN Submarine Force’s 72nd birthday is… 406, the lone Xia‑class SSBN. Yes, that Xia. China’s first boomer, the one that has been “almost retired” for two decades but somehow keeps showing up like Uncle Larry who refuses to leave the family hot pot dinner.
So what’s actually confirmed about 406?
According to yesterday’s CCTV segment, she’s still around, still floating, and still “supporting” the PLAN by serving as a familiarization platform for new submariners. In practice, that means she’s the classroom model, a training aid if you will. The “this is what a boomer looks like on the inside” walk‑through exhibit. Add in a motivational video about the glory of PLAN to educate NUBs (“Non‑Useful Bodies”), and voilà, she’s technically still “in service.”
Launched in April 1981, which makes her 45 years old, 406 is now the longest‑serving nuclear‑powered submarine in the PLAN’s orbit. Calling her “still going” is generous as she’s not going anywhere. However, she is still physically present, as the CCTV screenshots below dutifully prove. Even CCTV, which normally bathes PLA hardware in soft lighting and patriotic adjectives, couldn’t hide the rust streaks on this harbor queen.
Net‑net, straight from the official PR department:
There is absolutely nothing happening in the PLAN’s nuclear submarine force right now. Things are so quiet that CCTV had to celebrate the service life of a 45‑year‑old submarine that hasn’t left the pier in ages. If this is the highlight of the year, then yes nothing to see here. Absolutely nothing.
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
January 11th.
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