British divers and a German historian who found the German World War II submarine U-672 in the English Channel say it stayed hidden for over eight decades due to a paperwork mistake.
German war historian Axel Niestle, who helped the British Gasperados Dive Team find the U-672, told the BBC Tuesday that the submarine went unlocated because “a clerical error in the documents” recorded the craft’s position at a point 46 miles away from where it was sunk. The U-boat remained, its position misrecorded, until the diving team found it around 230 feet underwater in August.
Dominic Robinson, one of the divers involved, told the BBC that “once we started moving around it and I started seeing the individual features — I saw the snorkel, I saw the conning tower, all those kind of things — I knew that we were going to get the video needed to identify it.”
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The Nazi sub was attacked by the HMS Balfour on July 18, 1944, around 175 miles southwest of London, according to the Historic England website. The 52 U-boat sailors scuttled it and were recovered alive.
“They were bobbing around in the sea and then the very next day they were found by British aircraft, British vessels and then taken away to the prisoner of war camp,” Mr. Robinson told the BBC.
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