An investigation has been launched into the reported discovery of Royal Navy documents marked “official sensitive” in a Wetherspoons pub toilet.
According to reports he files carried detail about HMS Anson – the latest of the navy’s advanced nuclear-powered attack submarines.
The files were allegedly left in the Furness Railway pub in Barrow-in-Furness, with a source telling The Sun they were found on the floor of a toilet cubicle on what was “quite a lively night”.
The source said they were discovered alongside a Royal Navy lanyard, adding: “Anyone could have found them.”
The navy said they were “generic” documents containing no classified information.
In a statement, a Royal Navy spokesman: “These are generic training documents that carry no classified information.
“However, we take all security matters extremely seriously and will investigate the circumstances of their discovery.”
A naval source told the newspaper that the papers were part of a reference manual that is readily available on board.
Any personnel working on the vessel would have used the manual, they added.
Former submarine captain commander Ryan Ramsey said it appeared that someone had taken the documents from the vessel “to study”.
“It is good to see their commitment to training, but the pub is probably the wrong place,” he told The Sun.
The Furness Railway pub is a 20-minute walk from the BAE Systems shipyard – one of the world’s largest builders of complex warships and where HMS Anson was built.
The 97m-long (318ft), 7,800 tonnes submarine is the fifth Astute-class attack submarine sailed from BAE Systems.
According to the Ministry of Defence, Astute-class submarines are “the first nuclear-powered submarines to be designed entirely in a three-dimensional, computer-aided environment” and represent the “cutting edge of the UK’s military capabilities”.
HMS Anson is capable of circumnavigating the globe without resurfacing, the MoD said – able to purify water and air, meaning its range is “only limited by the amount of food on board”.
The vessel is now at His Majesty’s Naval Base in Clyde, Scotland.
