A Dutch submarine that was out of radio contact for several hours surfaced Friday off the Scottish coast, ending a huge air and sea search for it, the Defense Ministry said.
The submarine came to the surface at 12:55 p.m. and made radio contact with a nearby Canadian warship. Both vessels were part of a joint anti-submarine military exercise, a Defense Ministry spokesman said.There was no sign the submarine was in any difficulty, he said.
A search was begun for the diesel-electrical submarine after it failed to respond to radio messages and a red flare was spotted at 6:30 a.m. in the area where it was thought to be. Efforts to contact the ship were unsuccessful, the spokesman said.
The spokesman said the flare sighting and lack of radio communication "in no way means the ship is in trouble" because it is not unusual for submarines to be temporarily out of radio contact. He also said it was not known if the flare came from a submarine.