HMCS Chicoutimi--Preparing For Action

Royal Canadian Navy submarine personnel must be breathing a sigh of relief as HMCS Chicoutimi completed a camber dive. (RCN photo at left via the Ottawa Citizen.)

The camber dive, which took place recently at Ogden Point in Victoria, is a major step toward getting the boat to operational condition.
It has been a long process. Originally built as one of the last Royal Navy conventional diesel-electric submarines, Chicoutimi started out life as HMS Upholder, the name vessel of the class.

Britain's Ministry of Defence had other plans, however, and tied up the Upholders in favour of going to an all-nuclear submarine force. After years of dithering, the Canadian government purchased the four boats of the class. Only one of them, HMCS Victoria, is currently operational.

In my next blog I'll look at Chicoutimi's hard-luck timeline.

And speaking of timelines, five months from now my cold war submarine thriller, Terror on the Alert, will hit the stands.