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Private Notes
In August 1944, during the 2nd World War, four Allied ships are mysteriously destroyed without warning off the coast of Southern England. Sixty years later, in the English Channel, 20 kilometres south west of the Isle of Wight, 55 metres down, the sea reveals a 2nd World War German submarine unlike any found before. Using revolutionary investigative techniques, a team of underwater detectives discover a story of invention and heroism, and a secret stealth technology. Identified as U-480, it was the first U-boat to go into successful action with a special coating that made it invisible to sonar. But not even this could save the submarine from a fatal trap set by the Allies.
The most effective submarine detection device the wartime Allied Navy develops is ASDIC. It sends out pulses of sound and listens for echoes from the thick steel hull of U-boats. As the war progressed, this and other techniques meant that U-boats from being the hunters became the hunted and the Germans began to lose the submarine war. To regain the upper hand, in August 1944, the Germans dispatch a very special submarine U-480 to lie in wait under the main shipping lanes that cross the English Channel. 4 ships, totalling 14,000 tonnes and including the Canadian warship, HMCS Alberni and the British minesweeper HMS Loyalty were sunk without warning. But how in one of the most heavily-patrolled sectors of the English Channel was the submarine able to make its fatal attacks completely undetected?
Dives down to the submarine 60 years later reveal it is covered in a strange rubber coating. Is this responsible for the submarine remaining undetected? Remarkably a crewmember of the U-480 survived the war and talks about life in the submarine and what he thought was the secret of its success.
But the Allies had a plan to deal with these troublesome submarines. Only now do previously Top Secret files reveal the devious traps they laid and how they enticed the Germans to fall into them. Close examinat
In June 1915, the SS Armenian, a large steamship managed by the White Star Line, the owners of the Titanic, heads into the Bristol Channel from the United States. She is carrying over 1400 mules destined for the Western Front. As the unarmed vessel nears the British coast, a German submarine spots the former liner and fires warning shots. To avoid capture, the Armenian makes a run for it. As the U-boat continually pounds her with shells, the captain orders the crew to abandon ship. Once the remaining crew is safely off in lifeboats, the German U-boat fires a torpedo into the stern of the steamship. It only takes minutes for the Armenian to sink to the bottom of the Atlantic with her unfortunate cargo of 1400 mules still on board. Twenty-nine American crewmembers, mainly muleteers, also die causing a major international incident since the United States has not yet officially entered the war.
More than 90 years later, the infamous White Star Line vessel has still not been found. Many have searched the waters off the coast of Cornwall, but the Armenian has proved to be elusive. Now, a new expedition of international divers is hunting for the ship known as the Bone Wreck. Using state of the art dive and survey equipment, the team aims to be the first to find this long-lost vessel.
Underwater surveys have revealed several possibilities, and the divers’ first objective is to go down to two large wrecks near the point the captain of the Armenian noted as the location where he believed the ship went down. But even though one of those wrecks is full of bones, neither proves to be the Armenian. The expedition is forced to follow other lines of enquiry in order to locate the missing ship. Unexpectedly, German archives reveal the actual log from the German U-boat that sank the mule transport. The German commander’s coordinates are at least 30 kilometres from where the ship was reported to have sunk and where the team has been searching. How could they have got it so w
Eighty kilometres off the northern coast of Ireland the Queen Mary, the most famous liner in the world, carrying 10,000 American and Canadian troops to Britain, rams and sinks her escort ship, HMS Curacoa. The British cruiser Curacoa is sliced in two and takes just six minutes to sink. 338 of her crew die as the giant liner does not stop to pick up survivors. The story becomes one of the 2nd World War ‘s best- kept secrets.
Who is to blame for the sinking? For the first time an extreme dive expedition searches for evidence from the wreck itself which lies in deep Atlantic waters, 125 metres below.
Royal Navy crewmen of the Curacoa who survived tell their tale. Personnel aboard the Queen Mary also share their memories. US Army Air Corps veterans witnessed the horror of the sinking. Their moving stories, together with dramatic reconstructions of the events leading up to the tragedy, paint an accurate picture of an important and largely untold wartime story.
The 4,500-ton HMS Curacoa was a light cruiser that had seen service in the First World War. She was past her prime, but had been converted for an air defence role. As the Queen Mary entered British coastal waters Curacoa’s job was to protect her from German aircraft.
The 81,000-ton Queen Mary had travelled across the Atlantic from New York. Camouflaged to escape detection, she sailed fast and zigzagged. No German U- boat could keep up with her; her twists and turns made it hard for a submarine to aim torpedoes. Her ability to evade the enemy led her to become known as the ‘grey ghost’.
In order to provide effective anti-aircraft cover the Curacoa needed to stay close to the Queen Mary. On October 2nd 1942 she was too close. Did Curacoa steer a fatal course towards the Queen Mary or was the Queen Mary to blame? What will the dive to the wreck reveal?
As the troopship SS Leopoldville steams towards France from England on Christmas Eve, 1944 with Allied soldiers on board, a torpedo rips into her side. After a fatal delay, the ship sinks within sight of the port of Cherbourg, leaving men to jump into the bitter winter seas. Nearly 800 soldiers do not live to see Christmas Day. Now, an international team of divers brave some of the English Channel’s most treacherous and dangerous waters in an attempt to reach the wreck. They aim to uncover clues to help answer the question: why did so many young men have to die?
The Leopoldville is a Belgian liner taking 2,235 American reinforcements to repel a massive German attack - the Battle of the Bulge. But just off the coast of France, a German torpedo strikes the crowded troop carrier amidships, killing nearly 400 young soldiers instantly. The others make their way to the upper decks of the Leopoldville. They stand patiently waiting to be rescued.
In a daring rescue attempt, her escort, HMS Brilliant, manoeuvres alongside the larger liner. In rough seas, soldiers on the Leopoldville line up to jump down onto the smaller vessel. But the destroyer can only take a few hundred and has to head for the shore. There is a no further rescue attempt. Some 1,200 soldiers are still left on board. Two and a half hours after the torpedo hit, the Leopoldville slips beneath the waves.
Today divers braving some of the English Channel’s most treacherous and dangerous waters, 56 metres down, see evidence of the chaotic last moments of the ship, but can they find any evidence as to why the men were apparently abandoned and what, if anything, could have been done to save them? In particular they involve Belgian divers, keen to also tell another side of the story.
Fairly or unfairly, American survivors are very critical of the Leopoldville’s crew, who they say left them to their fate. Although the official reports apportion blame to a breakdown in communications none of this informa
...Deep sea divers reveal how the "unsinkable" HMS Audacious now lies on the bottom of the sea 14 miles off of Ireland.
