"We think that the British will not be able to dock" to the Kursk, Deputy Prime Minister Ilya Klebanov told RTR state television. The one Kursk rescue hatch, which has been previously thought to be in working order "has a very serious crack, which cannot assure the proper vacuum."

His comments came after a team of British and Norwegian divers sent a video camera down to the crippled submarine, stranded on the seabed with 118 sailors on board after a catastrophic accident in the Barents Sea on August 12.

Klebanov said that up to six of the nine compartments that divide the Kursk might have been completely flooded in the accident.

Separately, ITAR-TASS cited undisclosed "well-informed" British sources as saying that the investigation shows that nearly the entire Kursk sub has been flooded." The situation does not fill us with hope," the source told the Russian news agency.

Divers equipped in suits resembling those of astronauts went down to the stricken Russian nuclear submarine, submerged under 108 meters (355 feet) of Arctic water, early Sunday.

Igor Babenko, the deputy chief of the Northern Fleet press service, previously said that any decision about lowering the British LR5 mini-sub would be reached only after the divers report what they have found. "It is too early to speak about when it will be lowered," said Babenko.

Russia's government has been preparing the nation for the worst, warning that Kursk's crew was, in all probability, already dead. Klebanov also cautioned that chances of anyone surviving the accident - apparently caused by at least two shattering explosions -were only "theoretical." Even where they find air, the divers will still have to test the oxygen pressure to determine if anyone could have survived in the submarine. If the air pressure is too high, the Russian sailors will be presumed to have all perished.

Britain's Royal Navy said late Saturday that it was intent on going ahead with the mission aboard a mini-submersible despite the grim Russian predictions of what rescuers might find if they manage to dock with the Kursk.

The original plan was for the three-man LR5 mini-submersible to dock with the Kursk, open the rear escape hatch and attempt to recover any survivors. Since Tuesday, Russian rescue teams have repeatedly failed to dock with the craft.

The Kursk accident, which came during a rare training exercise of the Northern Fleet, sparked an explosion that registered 3.5 on the Richter scale in Oslo. The accident, according to investigators, killed dozens on the spot. And the casualties quickly mounted.

Mikhail Motsak, head of the Northern Fleet's navy command, told RTR that shortly after the blast desperate survivors banged on the hull in Morse code that they were being flooded by water and running out of air.

Motsak said it was highly unlikely that anyone lived though the tragedy as the water rushed in, the air pressure would have risen so high that it would have been impossible for anyone to stay alive, he added.

According to Western military sources, up to 70% of the crew could have been in the section devastated by the explosion, which struck the craft after it had plunged to the seabed.

However, in a startling new hypothesis, Motsak said it was possible that a sailor trying to escape from the submarine - against orders - had sealed his comrades' fate by disabling the submarine's air-pressure system.

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