HALIFAX (CP) -- Senior navy officials went on the offensive Thursday, challenging media reports that suggested they initially downplayed the severity of a deadly fire that disabled the second-hand submarine HMCS Chicoutimi.
``This is something that is being portrayed in the media, but it's not true,'' Commodore Tyrone Pile, commander of the Atlantic Fleet, said in an interview with The Canadian Press.
``At no time did I say the fire was not serious. I've reviewed the transcripts ... The whole focus of the story ... was that we were downplaying a serious incident. And we were not.''
Pile was responding to a report that quoted one of Chicoutimi's senior officers as saying he was stunned to learn through faxed news stories that navy officials had initially described the Oct. 5 fire as minor.
Lieut. Pete Bryan said that soon after the fire broke out he used a satellite phone to tell Canadian officials in Halifax there had been a major fire on the submarine.
``I told them that we'd had a major fire ... that we had lost propulsion and power,'' Bryan told CBC TV from Glasgow, Scotland. ``I gave an estimate as to the casualties I knew at that time, but as to the exact medical condition at that time, I just said we had three casualties that were suffering from smoke inhalation.''
In Ottawa, Defence Minister Bill Graham seemed to contradict Pile's version of events by saying he was perplexed by the mixed messages he received from the navy after the fire was first reported.
``I am extremely concerned about the difference between what actually occurred and the information that we received,'' he said outside the House of Commons after question period.
``There was a problem about the nature of the information that was received. Immediately, it was ascertained there was different information ... But I remain determined the inquiry will indicate why this occurred ... because it's important for us to have accurate information.''
A source within the Defence Department confirmed that the initial information that came to Ottawa through the navy's chain of command indicated that the fire was minor.
``I was shocked when I found out somebody had died,'' said the source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. ``Everybody was.''
Meanwhile, the navy officer who received the first distress call, Cmdr. Randy Truscott, said he could hear about 60 per cent of what Bryan told him because of the poor quality of the transmission.
``I didn't hear (the word) `serious,''' Truscott said Thursday. ``This end of the phone conversation was a lot like hearing a reporter in the middle of a hurricane ... where you have a lot of wind and wave noise. I don't think the antenna of the sat phone was always pointed in the right direction.''
Still, Truscott said he heard enough to determine the submarine was in real trouble.
``The fact that he said there was a fire and no power, no propulsion, casualties _ it was very clear to me that they were in serious trouble and that we needed to take immediate action. And that's what we did.''
However, the first public account of the fire from the Canadian navy came from navy spokesman Mike Bonin in Halifax, who said: ``There was a small fire on board. It was quickly put out.''
Later in the day, during a news conference in Halifax, Pile described the fire as a ``small setback.''
When asked to describe the extent of damage, he said he didn't know.
``I do not have any of those specific details, but the fire was sufficiently large enough that it caused smoke inhalation issues for some of the crew.''
It wasn't until the next day that Pile described the fire as ``major.'' He also revealed the crew had used almost all of its firefighting gear to battle a stubborn blaze that caused extensive damage to two decks.
Pile then blamed the British for suggesting the fire was not a big deal.
``We relied a lot on our information from the operation centre in the United Kingdom and the initial reports coming out of the boat were that it was a minor fire and we reported it as such,'' Pile told reporters Oct. 6.
Nine sailors aboard the sub were injured in the fire, which left the powerless sub pitching and rolling in heavy seas off the coast of Ireland for several days.
Lieut. Chris Saunders, a 32-year-old combat systems engineer from Halifax, died of smoke inhalation while he and two others were being airlifted to a hospital Sligo, Ireland.
The Canadian military is conducting an inquiry into the fire.
As well, an all-party House of Commons committee is investigating the $750-million lease-to-purchase program the navy used to acquire the second-hand subs from Britain's Royal Navy.
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