16:25 2001-07-04 From Pravda RU
http://english.pravda.ru/culture/2001/07/04/9335.html

The crew of the first Soviet nuclear-powered missile-carrying submarine cruiser K-19 saved the world from a nuclear catastrophe 40 years ago. It could have been something similar to the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power station. The above was said Wednesday by one-time Soviet Navy Commander-in-Chief Admiral Vladimir Chernavin, Chairman of the Russian Submariners Union. He spoke at a meeting to mark the 40th anniversary of the accident on the first Soviet nuclear-powered missile-carrying submarine K-19.

Vladimir Chernavin said that the K-19 crew and its commander, Captain Nikolai Zateev, had displayed great courage and heroism. Up to the last minute, they fought to rescue their submarine, then on combat duty in the northern Atlantic. Eight sailors died and 23 got heavy dozes of radiation as they were trying to cope with the breakdown of the nuclear power unit.

For his part, Vladimir Bentsianov, the chairman of an emergency relief veterans' committee, said at the meeting that his committee had asked Russian President Vladimir Putin to posthumously confer on Nikolai Zateev, commander of the K-19 submarine, the Hero of the Russian Federation title.