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Deep Submergence Vessel ''NR-1'' was a unique United States Navy nuclear-powered ocean engineering and research submarine, built by the Electric Boat Division of General Dynamics at Groton, Connecticut. ''NR-1'' was launched on 25 January 1969, completed initial sea trials 19 August 1969, and was home-ported at Naval Submarine Base New London. ''NR-1'' was the smallest nuclear submarine ever put into operation. The vessel was casually known as "Nerwin" and was never officially named or commissioned. The U.S. Navy is allocated a specific number of warships by the U.S. Congress. Admiral Hyman Rickover avoided using one of those allocations, and he also wanted to avoid the oversight that a warship receives from various bureaus. ==History== ''NR-1's'' missions included search, object recovery, geological survey, oceanographic research, and installation and maintenance of underwater equipment. ''NR-1'' had the unique capability to remain at one site and completely map or search an area with a high degree of accuracy, and this was a valuable asset on several occasions. Through the 1970s and 1980s, ''NR-1'' conducted numerous classified missions involving recovery of objects from the floor of the deep sea. These missions remain classified and few details have been made public. One publicly acknowledged mission in 1976 was to recover parts of an F-14 that was lost from the deck of an aircraft carrier and sank with at least one AIM-54A Phoenix air-to-air missile. The secrecy normal to USN submarine operations was heightened by Rickover's personal involvement, and he shared details of ''NR-1'' operations on a need-to-know basis. Rickover envisioned building a small fleet of ''NR-1'' type submarines, but only one was built due to budget restrictions. Following the loss of the Space Shuttle ''Challenger'' in 1986, ''NR-1'' was used to search for, identify, and recover critical parts of the ''Challenger'' craft.〔 It could remain on the sea floor without resurfacing frequently, and was a major tool for searching deep waters. ''NR-1'' remained submerged and on station even when heavy weather and rough seas hit the area and forced all other search and recovery ships into port. In 1995, Dr. Robert Ballard used the ''NR-1'' and its support ship to explore the wreck of , the sister ship of , which sank off the coast of Greece while serving as a hospital ship during World War I. On February 25, 2007, ''NR-1'' arrived in Galveston, Texas, towed by ''Carolyn Chouest'', in preparation for an expedition to survey the Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary and other sites in the Gulf of Mexico. ''NR-1'' was deactivated on November 21, 2008 at the U.S. Navy submarine base at Groton, Connecticut, defuelled at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine, then sent to Puget Sound Naval Shipyard to be scrapped. On November 13, 2013, the U.S. Navy announced that salvaged pieces of the sub would be put on display at the Submarine Force Library and Museum in Groton.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「American submarine NR-1」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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