Poster Submarine Sturgeon class

The Sturgeon Class was a class of Nuclear Attack Submarine (SSN) in service with the United States Navy from the 1960s until 2004.

The Sturgeon-class submarines, programmed in the 1950s, were essentially extended and improved variants of the Thresher / Permit-Class which directly preceded them. The main difference was a larger mass, allowing a return of the intelligence collection masts to the American nuclear submarines.

The dive bars mounted on the massif could rotate 90 degrees, allowing the submarine to surface through thin ice. Because the S5W nuclear reactor was used (the same as the Skipjack and Thresher / Permit) and its displacement increased, the maximum speed of the Sturgeon was 26 knots, 2 knots slower than the Thresher / Permits.

The armament of the Sturgeon-class submarines consisted of four torpedo tubes with a diameter of 553 mm, built under the massif slightly inclined outwards. They were equipped to carry Harpoon missiles, Tomahawk cruise missiles, and MK CAPTOR 60 and MK37 SLMM mines, as well as Mark 48 torpedoes.

As a nuclear attack submarine, the Sturgeon class performed the tasks typical of this class of ship. Among the fall escorts of carrier groups as well as the spinning of nuclear submarine launcher enemy. In addition another mission was to guard the passage named GIUK in order to be able to prevent the Soviet Navy from having an opening in the Atlantic Ocean.

Thanks to its larger mass, and therefore more antennas for electronic warfare than their predecessors, the Sturgeon-class submarines played an important role as spy ships.

These submarines were phased out in the 1990s and early 21st century, while their successors, the Los Angeles class, followed by Seawolf and Virginia, entered service.