Soviet Union Dumped Nuclear Submarines, Radioactive Waste Into the Ocean Despite Ban

The discarded Soviet submarine K-159 Bellona Foundation

The Soviet Union had been dumping radioactive waste into the sea for decades by the time the communist bloc collapsed in 1991, even though other nations had abandoned the practice by the early 1970s.

“Most nuclear states had similar practices before the early 1970s,” including the U.S. Navy, said Dr. Eugene Miasnikov, the head of the Center for Arms Control, Energy and Environmental Studies, according to the Moscow Times.