WWII Wrecks

Indonesian divers have discovered the wreck of a WW2 Nazi U-boat, with 17 skeletons of its crew still aboard. A tip-off from local divers led a team to the wreck, located 100km northeast of Karimunjawa Island off Java.

U-168

Initial research concluded the sub to be  U-168, a hunter-killer of the German 'Kriegsmarine' that claimed several Allied vessels before being sunk by torpedoes in 1944. Numerous artefacts were also recovered including dinner plates bearing swastikas, batteries, binoculars and a bottle of hair oil.

U-533 was a Nazi German U-Boat (Type IXC/40) that operated during World War II between April 15, 1943 and October 16, 1943. It was first launched on September 11, 1942 with a crew of 53, under the command of Helmut Hennig.

It was sunk by a Royal Air Force Blenheim bomber while it was operating in the Gulf of Oman. Of the crew of 53, only one survived by staying afloat without a life jacket for 28 hours until he was rescued by the HMS Hiravati near Khor Fakkan.

Walter Elcock, now 89 and living in Georgia, recalls the landing and how he managed to snag a wire on the carrier with the plane's tailhook and hung from it a few seconds before the wire broke.

"I went straight underwater," Elcock recalled. He unbuckled and kicked for the surface, maybe 10 feet away, thinking that he wouldn't be able to stay afloat wearing all of his heavy flight gear. Fortunately almost immediately, a Coast Guard ship pulled him out.

In the 1930s, the Soviet Union built a series of submarines called the S class, based on German designs.

In the summer of 1942, the S7 sank the Swedish cargo ships Margareta and Luleå, delivering iron to Germany. Shortly after, the sub was cruising on the surface at night, off the Swedish coast not far from Norrtälje, when she was spotted by the Finnish submarine Vesihiisi. The Vesihiisi fired one torpedo and the S7 sank quickly.

Sea Hunters, L.P., a division of the Portland Maine based shipwreck research and recovery company Sub Sea Research, embark to recover of one of the world's wealthiest wrecks.

The submarine was reported lost Aug. 16, 1942.  Underwater video footage captured by an expedition hired by sons of the commanding officer, Lt. Cmdr. Mannert L. Abele, allowed the Navy to confirm the discovery.

Japanese anti-submarine attack data recorded no attack in the Aleutian area at the time of the Grunion's disappearance, so the submarine's fate remained an unsolved mystery for more than 60 years, the US Navy said.