But August is a dangerous time in Russia: once the rest of the world goes on vacation, things start happening—political coups, financial defaults, wars in the Caucasus. The year 2000 was no exception. On August 12 two powerful explosions ripped through Kursk, a Russian nuclear submarine, with 118 crew members on board. Most of the men died instantly, but twenty-three managed to seal themselves off in a rear compartment of the vessel while it sank into the sand 350 feet below the sea’s surface.
