In a rare admission of a military failure, North Korea has revealed that one of its warships sank last month resulting the deaths of several sailors. 

“Submarine chaser number 233 fell while performing combat duties in mid-October,” said North Korea’s state news agency KCNA, releasing images of leader Kim Jong-Un and several officials visiting a memorial which included multiple gravestones with images inscribed on them.

North Korean official media did not say how many people died in the accident.  But it said that Kim had ordered the military to take “measures to find all their bodies”; that suggests a high death doll.

The ship went down off Wonsan on the east coast of the Korean peninsula, during an unspecified military exercise.  South Korean media reports suggest the age of the ship could have been a factor in the sinking.  North Korea has a lot of military gear, but much of it is believed to be old, out of date, and deteriorating.