HMS Venturer (P68)
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| Career |  |
|---|---|
| Builder: | Vickers Armstrong, Barrow-in-Furness |
| Laid down: | 25 August 1942 |
| Launched: | 4 May 1943 |
| Commissioned: | 19 August 1943 |
| Decommissioned: | 1946, sold to Norway |
| Renamed: | HNoMS Utstein |
| Struck: | January 1964 |
| Fate: | Broken up |
| General characteristics | |
| Displacement: | 545/740 tons (surface/submerged) |
| Length: | 206 ft (63 m) |
| Speed: | 11.25/10 knots (surface/submerged) |
| Test depth: | 300 ft (91 m) |
| Complement: | 37 |
| Armament: | 4 × 21 in (533 mm) bow torpedo tubes and 8 torpedoes, 3 inch (76 mm) deck gun, three .303 calibre machine guns for anti-aircraft defence |
HMS Venturer (P68) was a World War II British submarine and the lead boat[1] of the V-Class (officially called the "'U'-Class Long hull 1941-42 program").
She sank U-771 on 11 November 1944 7 nautical miles (13 km) east of Andenes, Norway, off the Lofoten Islands. Her most famous mission, however, was her eleventh patrol out of the British submarine-base at Lerwick in the Shetland Islands, under the command of 25-year-old Jimmy Launders, which included the only time in the history of naval warfare that one submarine intentionally sank another while both were submerged.
Sent to the Fedje area, Venturer was then ordered on the basis of Enigma decrypts to seek, intercept and destroy U-864 which was in the area , and carrying a cargo of 65 tonnes of mercury and Messerschmitt jet engine parts to Japan,[2][3]
On 6 February, 1945, U-864 passed through the Fedja area without being detected, but on 9 February Venturer heard U-864's engine noise. Launders had decided not to use ASDIC since it would betray his position and spotted the U-boat's periscope as her captain looked for his escort. In an unusually long engagement for a submarine, and in a situation for which neither crew had been trained, Launders waited 45 minutes after first contact before going to action stations. Launders was waiting for U-864 to surface and thus present an easier target. Upon realizing they were being followed by the British submarine and that their escort had still not arrived, U-864 zig-zagged underwater in attempted evasive manoeuvres, with each submarine occasionally risking raising her periscope.
Venturer had only eight torpedoes as opposed to the 22 carried by U-864. After three hours Launders decided to make a prediction of U-864's zig-zag, and released a spread of his torpedoes into its predicted course. This manual computation of a firing solution against a three-dimensionally manoeuvring target was the first occasion on which techniques were used and became the basis of modern British torpedo computer targeting computer systems. Prior to this attack, no target had been sunk by torpedo where the firing ship had to consider the target's position in three dimensional terms, where the depth of the target was variable and not a fixed value. The computation thus differs fundamentally from those performed by analogue torpedo fire-control computers which regarded the target in strictly 2D terms with a constant depth determined by the target's draft.
The torpedoes were released in 17 second intervals beginning at 12:12, and all taking four minutes to reach their target. Launders then dived Venturer suddenly to evade any retaliation. U-864 heard the torpedoes coming, dived deeper, and turned away to avoid them. The first three torpedoes were avoided, but U-864 unknowingly steering into the path of the fourth. Exploding, U-864 split in two, and sank with all hands coming to rest more than 150m (500ft) below the surface. Launders was awarded a bar to his DSO for this action.
During her career she also sank five merchant ships.[4]
[edit] Footnotes
- ^ "U & V Class Single Hull Coastal Submarines". Submariners Association - Barrow in Furness Branch. http://www.submariners.co.uk/Boats/Barrowbuilt/UV_index.php. Retrieved 2008-11-09.
- ^ "Toxic timebomb surfaces 60 years after U-boat lost duel to the death". Times online. 19 December 2006. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2511387,00.html. Retrieved 2008-11-09.
- ^ "Norway tackles toxic war grave". BBC News website. 20 December 2006. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6193979.stm. Retrieved 2008-11-09.
- ^ "HMS Venturer". Uboat.net. http://uboat.net/allies/warships/ship/3585.html. Retrieved 2008-11-09.
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