The wreck of a First World War German submarine, missing in action since 1915, has been discovered at a depth of 30m, 90km off the East Anglian coast.
The discovery was made by offshore wind farm developers Scottish Power Renewables (SPR) and Vattenfall, whilst undertaking detailed seabed scanning for the development of wind farm projects off the coast of Norfolk and Suffolk.
The wreck, which has remained undetected for over 100 years, is 57.6m long, 4.1m wide, and 4.6m high.
Over 60 wrecks have been discovered during scanning work, but the majority were anticipated and the discovery of the uncharted German submarine was not expected.
Charlie Jordan, SPR’s project director for the East Anglia ONE wind farm project said, ‘The scanning team were expecting to see wrecks, but such a discovery was quite a surprise and has been extremely interesting.’
Three years after its initial discovery in September 2012, the wreck was officially identified as German submarine Type U-31, which left for patrol on 13 January 1915 never to return.
Mark Dunkley, marine archaeologist at Historic England added, ‘SM U-31 was commissioned into the Imperial German Navy in September 1914. On 13 January 1915, the U-31 slipped its mooring and sailed north-west from Wilhelmshaven for a routine patrol and disappeared. It is thought that U-31 had struck a mine off England’s east coast and sank with the loss of its entire complement of 4 officers, 31 men.
‘U-31 was the first of eleven Type U-31 submarines built between 1912 and 1915. The class were considered very good high sea boats with good surface steering; 8 were sunk during operations while 3 surrendered and were scrapped after the war. Of those lost during operations, the whereabouts and fate of two, including U-31, were unknown.
‘Investigations on U-31 should now focus on the cause of the accident while respecting the wreck U-31 as a military maritime grave.’
As an official military maritime grave, the wreck will remain undisturbed in its final resting place.
Read the Original Article at Military History