SALVING U-BOAT VICTIMS

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 288, 1 September 1919, Page 5

SALVING U-BOAT VICTIMS

FOUR YEARS' OPERATIONS

440 VESSELS VALUED AT

£50,000,000 GERMAN SUBMARINES RAISED By Telegraph—Press Association-Copyright London, August 30. The ".Daily Chronicle" states that RearAdmiral Phillpotts has completed four years' salvage operations and salved M 0 vessels, valued at £>0,000,000. Tho Admiralty has wholly relied upon steamers with extraordinary pumps and six lifting lighters, converted from hopper dredgers, which, with nine-inch wire, will support a strain of two thousand tons. In one instance they salved the collier Rosyth, of 2700 tons. The Rosyth was recoramissioned within three mouths, although submerged for seven months. The salving of £1,900,000 in bullion from the Laurentic involved the forcing of strong rooms with explosives, the divers working at a depth of 23 fathoms.

In some cases patches like the lid ot a '-oil-top desk were placed over torpedo wounds, and vessels refloated but mined before they reached harbour, and weeks of arduous work wasted. Salvage craft within ten days refloated a. convoy of three merchantmen and two destroyers which grounded in a fog. Two oi these were recovered by the novel method of a destroyer racing around at top speed, creating a wash and lifting the 6tranded vessels clear. A similar method was used in the case of the Narragansetr, which was iit danger-of breaking her back off the Isle of Wight. The salvage workers "raised some ■ Üboats, including one sunk 3a miles off the Tyne, with a displacement of 700 tons. The authorities desired to examine the submarine closely. She was taken in tow and brought to the mouth of the Tyne, where ehe was held up for four hours before being allowed to enter. During the delay the submarine slipped from the wires. She was again grappled up and brought into harbour. . When the armistice was signed the salvagers were engaged in examining a U-boab which was entangled in a. defensive net and then mined. A diver, who was seeking papers, discovered the crew and all the officers,, and found protruding from a hatchway n/pair of hands whose lifeless fingers clutched the documents lie sought—Aus.-N.Z. Cable Assn.