VietNamNet Bridge – “The experiment was not successful. It could not fulfill the things we planned,” Nguyen Quoc Hoa, the inventor of Truong Sa submarine, after the test at sea on May 30.
In pictures: Mini-submarine Truong Sa tested at sea
Hoa himself steered Truong Sa, with the national flag on the side of the ship, to the open sea for the testing on May 30. The waters for the test were at the shipyard area of the Dai Duong Shipyard at Diem Dien Port in Thai Binh Province.
After four hours of weathering the waves and wind in the estuary, the businessman announced the ending of the test. Truong Sa, escorted by two ships, came back to the Diem Dien harbor safely.
During the test, Truong Sa could not do anything more than moving backward and forward on the water. It’s capability of diving and resurfacing in deep water under high water pressure was not experimented.
Hoa, when talking with reporters right after the test finished, said: “I have to say that the test was not successful. It could not fulfill the things we planned. Being a scientist and a businessman, I understand that I need to face facts”.
When asked about the reasons behind the failure, Hoa said: “I made a mistake that made the sub not in the best condition when it was undergoing the test. But I still forced Truong Sa to go to the sea”.
“On the afternoon of May 29, after the ship was launched, I felt very excited and I decided to try a drive. However, as I did not have experiences to steer a ship when facing a high seas, I caused the sub’s rudder collide into a large ship which was parked at the dock,” he said.
“Then I discovered that the propeller got bent, while many cogwheels of the actuator were broken. The problems were fixed by me and my workers. However, when the sub went to the sea and had to go through a large passage, we realized that the entire rudder shaft and gearbox were seriously broken,” he explained.
According to Hoa, when the sub was several nautical miles far from the dock, he discovered that there was another problem with the gearbox. This caused the ship to only move forward; it could not move backward. After the ship went several miles more, it became difficult to steer as the fixed rudder became unusable.
“Why did I decide not to test dive? I felt it would be unsafe if I did this. Besides, I was afraid that if I had made the ship dive, it would have been caught in a sandpit, which would have made the ship sink vertically,” Hoa said.
“After some thoughts, I decided to finish the test because safety should come first,” he concluded.
However, the experiment was not completely in vain. Hoa realized that the hull of the sub was strong enough to bear the high pressure of 20 meters of water and had good balance.
However, he believes that Truong Sa needs a more powerful engine and propeller, while other work still needs to be done. It is expected that the additional work would cost VND100 million and take one month to finish.
“I will put Truong Sa into its experimental trial after one month,” Hoa said.
Thanh Mai