This week a group of Norwegian fishermen took to the sea to catch fish. Then a 7,800-ton US Navy nuclear-powered submarine became entangled in their net and an alarm call reached the Coast Guard. Fishermen initially thought it was a large fish, but it was unimaginable that it could be a submarine. Business Insider reported this news in a report.
According to the report, while fishing off the coast of Tromsø, fishermen thought they had caught a type of large sea fish called halibut in their nets. However, the 377-foot-long and 7,800-ton nuclear powered submarine USS Virginia was caught in their net. It was proceeding towards the harbor with a Norwegian Coast Guard vessel. The submarine dragged their net to a distance of about two nautical miles.
Harald Engen was delivering halibut to a village on Norway's west coast, broadcaster NRK News reported. He then receives a message saying that a US submarine has caught the boat's net while sailing close to the surface and is dragging the boat out to sea.
'I've heard of other ships sailing over fishing nets,' Engen said. But no one in the region has ever heard of submarines.'
U.S. 6th Fleet spokesman Lt. Pearson Hawkins told Insider that no one was injured in the incident and the Navy is investigating exactly what happened.
Both the Norwegian Coast Guard and the US Navy have indicated that fishermen will be compensated for the destroyed nets.
A similar incident happened in 1999, which turned out to be quite tragic. A British fishing boat was entangled in a Royal Navy net and the boat sank. Four crew members died.
