In the film Das Boot, while being sunk at Gibraltar, the crew needs to blow the water out of the boat to get it lighter and finally ascend to the surface again. Now today I had the crazy idea that they could have launched their torpedoes (12 torpedoes at a weight of 1.5 tons each, that is 18 tons in total) to lose additional weight.

Sounds crazy, and probably is impossible due to technical limitations. But I wanted to know exactly, and thats why i registered on this forum to ask if any of you guys knows the answer.

Possible explanations I came up with:

- 18 tons is not sizeable compared to the weight of 1000 tons of the u-boat, so it wouldnt have much effect

- Its technically impossible to launch a torpedo at a depth of 280 meters (water pressure) from a type VII boat

- Its too dangerous to launch a torpedo while the submarine is sitting on ground

Thanks for you comments!