The plan was to send the ROV back down to the wreck along with three technical divers. The team decided to return to U-111 to glean more information before summer weather gave way to more unpredictable autumn conditions. “That’s when we decided hey, there’s got to be something there,” Petkovic recalls. When Cassway typed the coordinates into the database, multiple hang records popped up. While hang logs identify underwater obstructions for fishing vessels to avoid, they indicate something else to divers: potential shipwrecks. Cassway consulted a database of “hang logs,” locations where fishermen have reported snagging their nets. In the summer of 2021, he called his dive buddy Rusty Cassway, who captains a dive vessel out of Cape May, New Jersey, and read off a set of coordinates. But information Petkovic was collecting suggested a different location-a spot slightly landward of where the coastal shelf plunges hundreds of feet. Navy records indicated that U-111 went down in 1,600 feet of water. On August 31, 1922, the storied U-boat was hauled out into the Atlantic, its hatches opened, and explosive charges detonated. The sub was eventually raised and towed to Norfolk, where it sank and was raised a second time. Plans called for the U-boat to be sunk off the North Carolina coast in 1921 as part of the so-called “ Billy Mitchell fleet.” (Mitchell, an Air Force brigadier general, wanted to demonstrate the superiority of the fledgling Air Force over the Navy by destroying a fleet of ships from the sky.) But as U-111 was being towed from Maine to Cape Hatteras, the sub foundered and sank off Virginia Beach. A heroic effort by the chief gunner’s mate saved the vessel and crew. ![]() And U-111 had a salvaged, low-power radio with limited reach.įour days into the Atlantic, a soluble plug secretly installed by German saboteurs gave out, nearly sinking the submarine in the middle of the night. sailors at the time relied on magnetic compasses to navigate, while the German U-boat was outfitted with a more sophisticated-and unfamiliar-gyrocompass. More than half the crew had never set foot on a submarine before, much less operated an enemy sub with signage in a foreign language. When the U-boat finally launched four days later, the commander made a fateful decision: Rather than chase the convoy, he would attempt a solo voyage along the shortest-and deadliest-course across the Atlantic: the Northern Route, the iceberg-strewn passage that claimed R.M.S. U-111 was still undergoing repairs when the convoy set sail for the Azores on April 3, 1919. The last-minute exchange put Daubin and his 32-person crew behind schedule. A handful were saved for Allied forces to dissect and discover, by reverse engineering, the prized technology behind German diesel engines, periscopes, and gyroscopes. Sabotage and survivalĬommissioned by the German Imperial Navy in 1917, the 235-foot U-111 patrolled the waters of the North Atlantic, sinking three Allied merchant ships before the Kaiser’s surrender in November 1918.Īfter Armistice, all seaworthy U-boats were sent to the British North Sea port of Harwich, where most were cut up for scrap. But years of research led Petkovic to a different conclusion-and a historic discovery for the team of R/V Explorer. ![]() Navy records indicated that U-111 sank off Virginia on August 31, 1922, in 1,600 feet of water-far beyond the limit of any human diver. He’s one of a small number of so-called “technical divers” who explore depths wildly exceeding the standard 120-foot limit observed by recreational divers. waters, and the submarines hold a special fascination for shipwreck divers like Petkovic. There are more than a dozen German U-boat wrecks from both World Wars in U.S.
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