Lost WW2 British submarine found sunk off the coast of Malta

[TomSea]

Lost WW2 British submarine found sunk off the coast of Malta

VALLETTA (Reuters) - The wreck of a British submarine, which vanished at the height of World War Two, has been discovered lying at the bottom of the sea off Malta, university marine archaeologists said on Thursday.

HMS Urge had been based with other submarines in Malta and had carried out several deadly missions when the British navy ordered it and rest of the flotilla to redeploy to Egypt because of a relentless German siege of the Mediterranean island.

Urge set sail on April 27, 1942, carrying a 32-strong crew, 11 other naval personnel and a journalist. However, it failed to reach Alexandria on the agreed rendezvous date of May 6 and its fate has always been a mystery - until now.

Read more at: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-malta-britain-submarine-idUSKBN1XA1OM

[PeteS in CA]

The RN didn't "approve" of submarines, and as a consequence RN submarines were not very good. Fortunately, RN sailors were very good and made boats such as the U Class do well in the confined waters of the Mediterranean. Here are some stats comparing the U Class to its German and US contemporaries:

U Class: 630//730 tons; 6 tubes, 2 external, bow only; 10 torpedoes; 11.25kn/10kn

Type VIIC U-Boat: 769/871 tons; 4/1 tubes; 14 torpedoes; 17.7kn/7.6kn; 750 feet max

Type IXC U-Boat: 1120/1232 tons; 4/2 tubes; 22 torpedoes; 18.2kn/7.7kn; 750 feet max

Gato Class: 1524/2424 tons; 6/4 tubes; 24 torpedoes; 21kn/9kn; 300 feet test

Balao class: 1526/2424 tones; 6/4 tubes; 24 torpedoes; 20.25kn/8.75kn; 400 feet test

One can infer differing roles for the several designs. The German Type IX U-Boats were intended to range the entire Atlantic Ocean, to the US East Coast, the Caribbean, and South Atlantic. USN Gatos and Balaos were designed with the Pacific Ocean and potential war with Japan in mind. German Type VII U-Boats were designed with the North Atlantic and war with Britain in mind. The U Class was designed to operate near the home isles and the Med.

Crew sizes varied by class, but I toured the Balao class USS Pampanito (used in "Down Periscope") and at 6 feet tall, it was very cramped. Scale that to a VIIC or U Class! USN submariners tended to be around 5'6", but still ... not for the claustrophobic!

[dfwgator]

"One of our submarines is missing"


Error 404 (Not Found)!!1

[PeteS in CA]

For anyone sufficiently terminally curious to wonder why I didn't include a Japanese I-Boat in my comparison above, this is a decent start on an explanation, http://www.combinedfleet.com/ss.htm . Even if you ignore the Kaidai types (first column of the chart), which were older (and some scraped, pre-war), and special use types (last column), the IJN has quite an array of designs. In general, their I-Boats were similar in size or a bit larger than USN Gatos and Balaos. Some I-Boats had seaplane hangars. Their medium sized RO-Boats were larger than a Type VII but smaller than a Type IX.

Speaking very broadly, the IJN did not settle on a primary purpose for their submarine fleet and as a result had a wide variety of sub-classes for different special roles. The USN, OTOH, experimented with roles, sizes, speeds, and propulsion technologies in the '20s and early '30s, but by the early-mid '30s had settled on size and role and on an evolution path that led to the Gatos, which started coming into commission at the start of WW2 (and the previous Gar and Tambor classes were almost identical) and the Balaos, which came a bit later in the war (and at war end the Tench class was coming into commission). Having a single GP class probably paid significant dividends in manufacturability.

[Joe Wooten]

The RN didn't "approve" of submarines, and as a consequence RN submarines were not very good. Fortunately, RN sailors were very good and made boats such as the U Class do well in the confined waters of the Mediterranean. Here are some stats comparing the U Class to its German and US contemporaries:

U Class: 630//730 tons; 6 tubes, 2 external, bow only; 10 torpedoes; 11.25kn/10kn

Type VIIC U-Boat: 769/871 tons; 4/1 tubes; 14 torpedoes; 17.7kn/7.6kn; 750 feet max

Type IXC U-Boat: 1120/1232 tons; 4/2 tubes; 22 torpedoes; 18.2kn/7.7kn; 750 feet max

Gato Class: 1524/2424 tons; 6/4 tubes; 24 torpedoes; 21kn/9kn; 300 feet test

Balao class: 1526/2424 tones; 6/4 tubes; 24 torpedoes; 20.25kn/8.75kn; 400 feet test

One can infer differing roles for the several designs. The German Type IX U-Boats were intended to range the entire Atlantic Ocean, to the US East Coast, the Caribbean, and South Atlantic. USN Gatos and Balaos were designed with the Pacific Ocean and potential war with Japan in mind. German Type VII U-Boats were designed with the North Atlantic and war with Britain in mind. The U Class was designed to operate near the home isles and the Med.

Crew sizes varied by class, but I toured the Balao class USS Pampanito (used in "Down Periscope") and at 6 feet tall, it was very cramped. Scale that to a VIIC or U Class! USN submariners tended to be around 5'6", but still ... not for the claustrophobic!

No kidding! I took our scout troop to overnight sleepovers on the USS Silversides in Muskegon MI several times. Before they put the bunks in the middle, you had to sleep in the Navy bunks in the aft or forward torpedo rooms. Way too narrow and short for a slightly overweight 6 footer.

https://silversidesmuseum.org/

[PeteS in CA]

No kidding! I took our scout troop to overnight sleepovers on the USS Silversides in Muskegon MI several times. Before they put the bunks in the middle, you had to sleep in the Navy bunks in the aft or forward torpedo rooms. Way too narrow and short for a slightly overweight 6 footer.

https://silversidesmuseum.org/

Quite a distinguished career, https://www.hazegray.org/danfs/submar/ss236.txt , 14 war patrols!

[sneakypete]

Quite a distinguished career, https://www.hazegray.org/danfs/submar/ss236.txt , 14 war patrols!

@PeteS in CA

I may be wrong,but I'm not sure they could put enough people on the deck of a submarine to get me inside it.

[PeteS in CA]

@PeteS in CA

I may be wrong,but I'm not sure they could put enough people on the deck of a submarine to get me inside it.

I didn't serve in the military, so I didn't serve in submarines. USS Pampanito is a museum in SF, along with a Liberty ship. Across the Bay, USS Hornet (CV-12, not CV-8) is a museum at Alameda, and there is a Victory Ship, Red Oak Victory, that is a museum at Richmond.