Researchers Find German U-Boat, Freighter Sunk Off NC Coast More Than 70 Years Ago During WWII Battle
Hidden battleground: @NOAA team finds U-boat, freighter wrecks from #WWII battle off NC coast. 1.usa.gov/1zjhF9T http://t.co/5Rs3Di0QcS
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NOAA's Ocean Service (@noaaocean) October 21, 2014CAPE HATTERAS, N.C. (CBS Charlotte) — A historic discovery was made off the coast of North Carolina as two vessels involved in World War II’s Battle of the Atlantic were found more than 70 years after they sank.
Researchers with the National Oceanic and Administration’s Office of National Marine Sanctuaries found the German U-boat 576 and the freighter Bluefields nearly 30 miles off the North Carolina coast in an area known as the Graveyard of the Atlantic.
“This is not just the discovery of a single shipwreck,” Joe Hoyt, a NOAA sanctuary scientist and chief scientist for the expedition, said in a statement. “We have discovered an important battle site that is part of the Battle of the Atlantic. These two ships rest only a few hundred yards apart and together help us interpret and share their forgotten stories.”
The two vessels went down on July 15, 1942. The German U-boat sank the freighter Bluefields and damaged two other ships after they left Norfolk, Va., for Key West, Fla., to deliver cargo to help the war effort when the ship was attacked by the U-576 off Cape Hatteras. The German U-boat was then bombed by U.S. Navy Kingfisher aircraft and shot at by the merchant ship Unicoi.
The two vessels were found on the seabed less than 240 yards apart.
“Most people associate the Battle of the Atlantic with the cold, icy waters of the North Atlantic,” David Alberg, superintendent of NOAA’s Monitor National Marine Sanctuary, said in a statement. “But few people realize how close the war actually came to America’s shores. As we learn more about the underwater battlefield, Bluefields and U-576 will provide additional insight into a relatively little-known chapter in American history.”
No lives were lost on the Bluefields, but the wreck site for U-576 is considered a war grave for its crew.
“In legal succession to the former German Reich, the Federal Republic of Germany, as a rule, sees itself as the owner of formally Reich-owned military assets, such as ship or aircraft wreckages,” the German Foreign Office said in a statement through NOAA. “The Federal Republic of Germany is not interested in a recovery of the remnants of the U-576 and will not participate in any such project. It is international custom to view the wreckage of land, sea and air vehicles assumed or presumed to hold the remains of fallen soldiers as war graves. As such, they are under special protection and should, if possible, remain at their site and location to allow the dead to rest in peace.”
NOAA partnered with the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management in 2008 to document vessels lost during WWII off the coast of North Carolina.
