At 20.03 hours on 27 Jan 1940 the neutral Faro (Master John Birger Christensen) was damaged by one torpedo from U-20 about 15 miles southeast of Copinsay, Orkneys. The torpedo detonated about 20 metres from the ship and caused a leak. The crew abandoned ship in two lifeboats and one with eight men in it drifted away in the darkness. The master and six crew members in the other boat stayed close to the ship and reboarded her at dawn next day. They tried to save the Faro but her bow already settled so low that the propeller was out of the water. After the anchor chain broke she drifted ashore and was wrecked in the Taracliff Bay, Deerness. The survivors were taken off by breeches buoy. The missing lifeboat was washed ashore on Copinsay later that day, with only one man alive, and three bodies.