South Korean Submarine Returns Home After Historic Pacific Voyage

(ATTN: UPDATES photo)

By Kim Seung-yeon

SEOUL, Sept. 1 (Yonhap) -- A flagship submarine of the South Korean Navy returned home Tuesday after completing the first and longest round-trip transit across the Pacific Ocean, the armed forces said.

The 3,000-ton indigenous ROKS Dosan Ahn Chang-ho arrived at the Jinhae Naval Base, 161 days after it departed from the same base on March 25, the Navy said.

The 28,000-kilometer voyage included making port calls in Hawaii and Guam to participate in U.S.-led Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) multinational drills, before traveling to Victoria, western Canada in May.

The trans-Pacific journey marks a milestone in South Korean submarine history and the first for a vessel designed and built with domestic technology, the Navy said in a release.

"It is an accomplishment that demonstrates the operational endurance, equipment reliability and crew habitability of South Korea's advanced, indigenous warship to the international community," it said.

During RIMPAC, the vessel boasted its superior combat and stealth capabilities by successfully executing 28 simulated attacks without being detected by enemy vessels.

Its participation in combined drills with Canada's Royal Navy was an opportunity to verify interoperability between the two navies and demonstrate multinational command capabilities, the Navy said.

The Navy was scheduled to hold a welcome ceremony later in the day for Dosan Ahn Chang-ho's return at the Navy Submarine Force Command in Changwon, about 300 kilometers south of Seoul.