LONDON, Aug 5 (Reuter) - A British navy nuclear submarine has been recalled to port because of a radioactive leak in its cooling system, defence officials said on Saturday. The defence ministry said HMS Sceptre was recalled to its base in Faslane, Scotland as a precaution and insisted there was no danger to the crew or the public. "We are taking this action as a precaution to ensure we maintain our high safety standards," a ministry spokesman said. "This is not considered to be a major problem." The 4,500-ton boat, built in 1978, was on patrol off the coast of Britain when leaks in its nuclear reactor's primary and secondary cooling systems were detected. The Royal Navy suffered similar problems in the early 1980s when three Polaris nuclear submarines were found to have hairline cracks in their cooling systems. Two have since been disposed of. More News Alerts Taiwan Defense Expansion British Frigate, German Submarine Collide British Sub Propulsion Problems Finback Followup BT Back to The Naval Sitrep #6 Table of Contents Back to Naval Sitrep List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1999 by Larry Bond and Clash of Arms. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com