Articles

Operation Deadlight Expedition II

by Innes McCartney

Day Three: 6 May, 2002

Target:
U-2511
Depth: Weather and sea conditions:
70m Wind 2-3 northerly, fair and sunny

Diving report:
We spent most of today in an aimless search of three charted 'submarine' positions that we attempted locating last year. We had a magnetometer with us today, but the result was the same. The wrecks are simply not there. The survey information came from sources between 1980 and 1995 and we now consider this information to be a dubious as the official report into Operation Deadlight.

We therefore opted for plan B and headed back to Schnee's U-2511. This is simply the world's greatest submarine dive. As per last year, she lies in stunning visibility on a white sand bottom, surrounded by millions of fish.

I penetrated the wreck, and entered the crew space aft of the torpedo room. Many batteries could be seen along with much cabling. All the bulkhead hatches are open. A large Conger eel attempted to make my withdrawal from the wreck a little tricky. It seemed to like its reflection in the lens of my video camera.

Interestingly, I noticed that the schnorchel is in place on the conning tower. We missed it last year because it is covered in marine growth, but it is all there.

A great dive.

Comments:
We are going to look to the west tomorrow. There are several U-boats there and we hope to be able to locate enough to keep us going for the next few days. The fantastic weather continues.

Innes McCartney

This article was published on 13 May 2002.

Operation Deadlight Expedition II

Day One: 4 May, 2002 - Diving on the U-1271 since U-861 is hard to locate.

Day Two: 5 May, 2002 - The broken down wreck of U-1009, plus the Laurentic.

Day Three: 6 May, 2002 - Going back to the U-2511 which Innes describes as the world's greatest submarine dive.

Day Four: 7 May, 2002 - A dive on the U-1104 in a nice Atlantic swell.

Day Five: 8 May, 2002 - Another unidentified U-boat location, plus a steamer from WWI.

Day Six: 9 May, 2002 - A dive on another unidentified boat which turned out to be an awesome dive on the other type XXI boat there!

Day Seven: 12 May, 2002 - Finally Oesten's elusive U-861 is located.

Day Eight: 13 May, 2002 - No diving due to poor weather conditions.

Day Nine: 14 May, 2002 - No diving due to poor weather conditions.