This article was originally published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and is reprinted with permission.
A tsunami triggered by an undersea earthquake off the coast of Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula on July 30 appears to have damaged the Rybachiy naval base — Russia’s main base for nuclear submarines in the Pacific.
Satellite imagery showed that one of the base’s floating piers had been damaged. The 8.8-magnitude earthquake occurred just 140 kilometers from the base.
Two of Russia’s Yasen-class nuclear-powered attack submarines were seen docked at the base prior to the tsunami.
Sidharth Kaushal, a research fellow at the UK-based Royal United Services Institute, told The Telegraph that a surface ship, not a submarine, was docked at the damaged pier, and there was no evidence of damage besides that to the pier.
The quake is the strongest seismic event in the region since 1952, according to Russia’s Geophysical Service of the Academy of Sciences.
The earthquake highlights Kamchatka’s location in one of the world’s most active seismic zones — the Pacific Ring of Fire — where tectonic movements frequently generate powerful earthquakes and volcanic activity.
