Team in U-boat recovery dive

Ally · 09-17-2007, 02:07 PM

An exploratory dive to assess the chances of recovering a sunken U-boat is to take place off the Donegal coast.

The vessel - which did not see any war action - sank while being towed from Scotland to Londonderry to be scrapped.

Derry City Council plans to raise the Nazi submarine - U-778 - which lies 16 miles north west of Malin Head in about 70 metres of water.

The aim is to house the boat in a museum where people can get a glimpse of one of the iconic vessels from WWII.

It is estimated there are about 150 of them lying off Malin Head - all vivid reminders of the Battle of the Atlantic during WWII.

Even in the murky depths the outline of the U-boat is quite clear, with divers saying the aerials and periscopes are still intact.

Geoff Millar from Dive North, who is leading the dive, said a gale had forced his team to delay the exploratory dive.

"When they were towing it after the Second World War, it got caught in a gale off Malin head," he said.

"It sank while being on its way to being stripped.

"The U-boat was completed at the end of the war, so it never saw any real action - it was literally brand new.

"The war was over, so they said let's take it away and strip it. This boat is in excellent condition.

"We were down at this U-boat two years ago, and it still has its compasses, everything is still on it and it is fully intact."

(BBC)

**dalehall** · 09-17-2007, 02:17 PM

Wow.. How cool would that be?? Too bad it's been down so long. It would still be cool to go see out of the water.

Ally · 10-03-2007, 11:14 AM

**Update

The body of a 45-year-old diver who died at the site of a sunken German U-boat off the County Donegal coast has been recovered.

Michael Hanrahan, a father of four from Dublin, died during a dive at the submarine, 16 miles off Malin Head on Tuesday.

The dive team was filming the U-boat when the diver got into difficulties.

Other members of the team tried to help him - but they were unsuccessful. It is not clear what led to the accident.

The team was assessing the chances of recovering the U-boat.

Paul Moore, from BBC Radio Ulster's Your Place and Mine, spent Tuesday with the divers at Malin Head, for a feature he was doing for the programme.

"It was just such a huge shock, because they were just so excited about it and they seemed to know just what they were doing," Mr Moore said.

"It's just such a tragedy for the family."

He said later he was looking at photographs he had taken of the divers.

"I was looking at these photographs and realising that one of these divers was still there, had had this accident and was now dead," he said.

"Four hours earlier I had been talking to these guys - just four typical guys just loving what they were doing."

Derry City councillor Shaun Gallagher paid tribute to Mr Hanrahan.

"He was a gentle giant and a lovely man - we're just devastated," he said.

It is the second fatal diving incident off the north-west coast in the last two months.

At the end of July, Paul Jackson, a police officer from Humberside, had been looking at wrecks off Tory Island but failed to resurface.

The U-boat, which did not see any war action, sank while being towed from Scotland to Londonderry to be scrapped.

Derry City Council plans to raise U-778 and house it in a museum. The boat is lying in about 70 metres of water.

It is estimated there are about 150 such boats lying off Malin Head, all vivid reminders of the Battle of the Atlantic during World War II.

The council said that "because of the depth of the waters involved, the procedure was expected to be highly technical".

(BBC)

MgicTwnger · 10-03-2007, 12:59 PM

One submarine wreck I would love to see is a WWI (yes one) German sub which lies 250' down in lake Michigan near Chicago. The UC-97 was built near the end of that war and never saw actual service. It was surrendered to the Allies and brought to the US to be used as a fundraiser. It was towed to the Great Lakes and spent two years tied up at Chicago's Navy Pier.
It was sunk in 1921 in accordance with the Treaty of Versailles and was not found again until 1992. Since then salvage operations have been discussed, but nothing has come of it.