A Scorpene-class submarine of the Indian Navy collided with a fishing trawler off the Goa coast during the operation “Sea Vigil 24,” a coastal defense exercise, late on Thursday night.

Eleven fishermen from the 13-member crew on board the Indian fishing vessel Marthoma were rescued, while the search for the remaining two crew members is ongoing by Indian Navy and Coast Guard vessels.

“Search and rescue efforts for the missing fishermen are underway, coordinated with the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre in Mumbai. Six naval ships and surveillance aircraft have been deployed, with additional assets diverted to the area to augment the search efforts,” said an Indian Navy spokesperson.

The Indian Navy declined to share details regarding the damages to the diesel-electric submarine, which is armed with long-range guided torpedoes and anti-ship missiles.

Earlier in July, a major fire on board the frontline guided missile frigate INS Brahmaputra, which was undergoing maintenance and refit at the Naval Dockyard in Mumbai, raised questions about the Indian Navy’s safety protocols in the Mumbai harbor.

The submarine collision marks a series of tragedies plaguing the Indian Navy’s western coast over the past ten years, raising concerns about the severe shortage of naval officers and resources to manage the aging fleet.

“It is a major embarrassment for the Indian Navy, conducting coastal defense exercises, to be involved in an accident with a fishing vessel,” fumed a senior naval commander. “The fact that a fishing vessel in close proximity went undetected until the collision with the stealth submarine exposes security breaches in coastal defense.”

The collision occurred 70 nautical miles northwest of the Goa coast when the submarine was in transit, after participating in the joint coastal defense exercises and was surfacing.

The Indian Navy had concluded the fourth edition of the ‘Pan-India’ Coastal Defense Exercise Sea Vigil-24 on Thursday, which spanned an unprecedented scale in terms of geographical reach, covering the entire 11,098 km coastline and an Exclusive Economic Zone of 2.4 million square kilometers. The coastal defense exercise had participation from six ministries and 21 state and central security agencies.

A multi-agency search and rescue operation was launched by the Indian Navy, Coast Guard, and Coastal Police with the help of local fishing communities to locate the missing fishermen in the dark waters.

The Western Naval Command has been plagued with several disasters in the past 10 years, including major fires, collisions, and explosions onboard warships and submarines in Mumbai Harbor.

An explosion onboard INS Ranvir, docked in Mumbai, led to the death of three sailors and injured eleven others in January 2022. Another major disaster occurred in August 2013 when a fire on the submarine INS Sindhurakshak in the naval dockyard ignited warheads and set off two torpedoes, damaging other vessels in the naval dockyard and killing 18 naval personnel. In December 2013, another naval frigate, INS Talwar, collided with a fishing trawler, and INS Tarkash suffered damage to its hull when it hit the jetty while docking at the Mumbai naval base.

In January 2014, INS Betwa ran aground and collided with an unidentified object while approaching the Mumbai naval base, and in December 2016, INS Betwa tipped over and crashed on its side while undocking in Mumbai, killing two sailors and injuring 14 others.

A fire on the Kilo-class submarine INS Sindhuratna resulted in smoke that led to the suffocation and death of two officers in February 2014. A toxic gas leak onboard INS Kolkata, docked in Mumbai, killed naval commander Kuntal Wadhwa in March 2014.