WWII Wrecks

Second World War

(Unrelated filephoto). A Grumman TBF Avenger is one of the planes that BentProp has located.

University of Delaware help find WW2 plane wrecks

During bloody battles in 1944 between American and Japanese almost two dozen aircraft had fallen into waters around Palau, leaving around 70 airmen missing in action.

The Japanese wanted to use the islands for battle preparation and refuelling grounds — and so did the Allies. Numerous aircraft were lost in the waters of Palau, submerged for decades with little closure for the families of fallen airmen.

Nazi submarine wreckage discovered off Indonesia
Nazi submarine wreckage discovered off Indonesia

WWII Nazi U-boat discovered in Java Sea

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.

Possible wreck of WW2 minisub located off Northern Ireland

Alex Attwood has banned diving at the site of the discovery near the Foyle Bridge. He said it was important that the wreck was not disturbed until it was positively identified.  "The wreck is in quite low water, it is quite accessible," Mr Attwood told the BBC.

BBC Northern Ireland Environment Correspondent Mike McKimm said that was unlikely to be a full-sized submarine.

"A German U-boat, for example, would sit almost 10m high and would have been visible, even at high tide in the Foyle, which has an average depth of just over 5m."

Bell Island Wrecks

Just knowing that Vikings started a settlement here a thousand years ago and that the first fishermen from Europe began arriving in the 1500’s adds to a sense of history that cloaks the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. It’s a sense that I’m acutely aware of on this sunny day in June on board the vessel, Ocean Quest, as the skipper, Bill Flaherty, navigates across Conception Bay towards Bell Island.

A rendition of U-533 resting on the seabed off Oman

German WW2 u-boat located off Oman

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.

A Grumman F6F-5N Hellcat night fighter

World War II fighter plane salvaged from Lake Michigan

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.

"I grew up hearing the story of this crash," said Elcock's grandson, Hunter Brawley, 36, of Atlanta, Georgia.