Photograph by Luca Zanetti from a TIME magazine photostory on Narco subs In the last decade, Colombia has seized at least 32 semi-submersible vessels designed to smuggle drugs over the last decade, as well as five fully-fledged submarines. In the decade following the collapse of the Soviet Union, 170 nuclear submarines were taken out of service, but only 40 of those were ever officially dismantled. Even today, Russia doesn’t have enough resources to entirely scrap their former fleet, so they’re still out there somewhere, rusty and non-functioning, discretely on the market for private buyers or even developing third-world navies.īuilt in the jungle by Colombian cartels designed to carry up to ten tons of cocaine, some are even similar to the nation’s own navy tactical sub. While the sale of submarines catering to tourist attractions and researchers is more visible, decommissioned military attack submarines will go on the market with a little more discretion.
(I’m easily distracted).Ī bathysphere in a Vancouver junkyard, from the instagram account of Emanuel Smedbøl (who you should definitely follow here a daily dose of instagram awesomeness)Īlas, it’s not as easy as one might think in this day and age of online shopping to find a second-hand submarine for sale, and the size of the industry is difficult to gauge.
“ So apparently Vancouver has something of a submarine graveyard,” says graphic designer/ photographer Emanuel Smedbøl alongside his instagram photos that popped up on my newsfeed and subsequently sent me into a spiral of google searches, from “ used research submarines for sale” to “ de-militarised Russian sub for cheap“.
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