From the Glasgow Keelie FB page.

Everyday leading up to Workers Memorial Day next Wednesday (28th), we will post a story illustrating workers killed by negligence. This one relates to the military & how the Navy uses the Clyde and waters beyond:                                              The Fishing is six times more dangerous than any other workplace and it doesn’t help when your nets catch a nuclear submarine.

Since 1970 there may have been up to 150 fisherfolk drowned because submarines snagged their fishing nets. In 2015, trawlers from Scotland- Aquarius and Northern Ireland - Karen and France had their nets caught by submerged submarines. Further back in 1990 the wooden trawler Antares from Carradale, Kintyre, sank in the Firth of Clyde while fishing for herring off Arran because HMS Trenchant a nuclear submarine caught its nets as it passed underneath. This hunter killer submarine was loaded with Spearfish heavyweight torpedoes and driven by a student at the time of the disaster. All four fishing crew were drowned, Dugald John, 20, Skipper Jamie Russell, 36, William Martindale, 24, and Stewart Campbell, 29.

The Firth of Clyde is used by MOD for its Perisher mock battle course where it trains Navy Officers from all over the world to drive a nuclear sub. On that night Jamir Russell and the crew were fishing in the deep waters of the Arran Trench with two other fishing vessels nearby. HMS Trenchant was in the same area conducting the Perisher course. A student was in command of the sub, under the supervision of their commanding officer. The sub heard loud banging and when it surfaced there was fishing net on its hull. It attempted to contact the two boats it could see without success. It contacted Faslane to say it had net on it but the 2 boats looked fine and carried on teaching its Perisher course.

The Secretary of the Clyde Fisherman’s Association heard of the incident, radioed the two boats who confirmed a third vessel had disappeared, maybe gone out to sea or docked. More phone calls confirmed it had not. A search found only fish boxes and oil floating on the surface. The following day, sonar of one of the search vessels picked up a new, uncharted wreck on the seabed. It was confirmed to be the Antares. The sub had caught the nets of the boat immediately dragging it and filling it with water.

Experts found that NO BLAME at all could be attached to the crew of the Antares who were going about their legal business of commercial fishing.

ALL BLAME was placed on the crew and commanding officers of HMS Trenchant. The official findings of the investigation were that there was a “partial breakdown in both the standards and structure of watchkeeping on board HMS Trenchant’.

The families found it ‘inconceivable’ that the following year, near the anniversary, the MOD went ahead with Perisher training students just extending the distance of nuclear subs from fishing boats to 3000 yards. NOTHING stops the WARmongering financial racket.