Explorers find sunken German U-boat off Mass.

[Chris0nllyn]

On April 16, 1944, the U-550 torpedoed the gasoline tanker SS Pan Pennsylvania, which had lagged behind its protective convoy as it set out with 140,000 barrels of gasoline for Great Britain, according to the U.S. Coast Guard website and research by Mazraani.

The U-boat slipped under the doomed tanker to hide. But one of the tanker's three escorts, the USS Joyce, saw it on sonar and severely damaged it by dropping depth charges.

The Germans, forced to surface, manned their deck guns while another escort vessel, the USS Gandy, returned fire and rammed the U-boat. The third escort, the USS Peterson, then hit the U-boat with two more depth charges. The crew abandoned the submarine, but not before setting off explosions to scuttle it. The submarine hadn't been seen again until Monday.

Explorers find sunken German U-boat off Mass. #| ajc.com

Very cool story!

[Gilligan (Premo)]

Great find. With the proliferation of cheaper and more effective scanning sonars and the like, a lot of sunken relics are being discovered these days.

My grandfather was the skipper of a sub patrol cutter off the Atlantic coast in '42..but then went on to convoy escort duty in '43 and for the duration of the war. In '42, the Germans clearly had the upper hand and not as many of their subs were sunk by us. By 1944..different story altogether.

[Giantone]

Originally Posted by Chris0nllyn

Explorers find sunken German U-boat off Mass. #| ajc.com

Very cool story!

The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming (1966) is an American comedy film. Based on the Nathaniel Benchley novel The Off-Islanders, the film was directed by Norman Jewison and adapted for the screen by William Rose.

The movie tells the Cold War story of the comedic chaos which ensues when the Soviet submarine Спрут (pronounced "sproot" and meaning "octopus") accidentally runs aground near a small New England island town. The all-star cast includes Carl Reiner, Eva Marie Saint, Theodore Bikel, Jonathan Winters, and in his first film, Alan Arkin.







The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Gilligan (Premo)]

German...the vessel is a sunken German submarine...


HTH.

[Larry Gude (Premo)]

Originally Posted by Gilligan

My grandfather was the skipper of a sub patrol cutter off the Atlantic coast in '42..but then went on to convoy escort duty in '43 and for the duration of the war. In '42, the Germans clearly had the upper hand and not as many of their subs were sunk by us. By 1944..different story altogether.

Kewl! That had to have been nerve wracking.

My grandfather bombed Japan 17 times from the right seat of a B29. Tried to sink the whole Island. Didn't work but, they kept trying!

[Gilligan (Premo)]

Originally Posted by Larry Gude

Kewl! That had to have been nerve wracking.

!

Very. He and I were very close but he seldom talked about the "bad stuff".

And then Homer Hickham tracked him down and wrote this book about the 1942 Battle of the Atlantic, using my grandfather, his crew, and their little cutter as the focal point for his history book. From that book I learned how things really were..and they were really bad for our side in the beginning of the war.

Homer Hickam official Web site – The Dinosaur Hunter, October Sky/Rocket Boys.

I read this one in the mid 90's

Torpedoes in the Gulf: Galveston and the U-Boats, 1942-1943