Torpedo test facility Seewerk Immenstaad

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The Seewerk Immenstaad torpedo test facility on Lake Constance was a project of the German Air Force for the assembly and testing of torpedoes during the Second World War . The so-called "Seewerk" was planned and built by Luftschiffbau Zeppelin (LZ) in 1943 , but was no longer completed, it was only put into operation temporarily. In 1945 the French Navy confiscated the facility. After the military left, the Dornier-Werke acquired the Seewerk site in 1956, which is now an important location for the Airbus Group .

Torpedo test facility

Torpedo workshop
Torpedo shooting range building of the TVA Neubrandenburg, as it was planned in the Seewerk

Until 1945, torpedo test facilities were the Torpedo Experimental Institutes (TVA) of the Kriegsmarine and the torpedo weapon stations (TWP) of the Luftwaffe , which were responsible for the functioning of the devices, especially after the torpedo crisis in 1941. For this purpose, “dry” power, speed, depth control and straight-line stability were set in workshops. During the subsequent “wet” shooting in from a shooting range building, the launch behavior and the underwater run were checked on a test track and readjusted in several passes until the required precision was achieved.

The LZ Seewerk Immenstaad

The plant planned in 1943

In January 1943, the Reich Minister of Aviation and Commander-in-Chief of the Air Force (Planning Office) gave Luftschiffbau Zeppelin GmbH in Friedrichshafen an order for "a facility for the manufacture and shooting in of aircraft torpedoes on Lake Constance " with a shooting capacity of 1000 and the assembly of 400 aircraft torpedoes of the Type F5b to be planned per month and to be built by autumn 1943. The bay east of Immenstaad was suitable for this project in every respect: water depth 10 to 40 m, sandy and unobstructed subsoil, no shipping traffic. Between Immenstaad and Fischbach , 17 hectares of building land for assembly, repair and storage halls and other buildings with a work area of ​​8,000 m² were acquired from local farmers in the municipality of Immenstaad. The personnel requirement was estimated at 1400 workers. Already at the beginning of construction work, the LZ moved so-called foreign workers from the Raderach camp to the Seewerk camp; the plan of the sea works from June 6, 1944 shows four barracks for 350 people east of the halls. A siding from the Fischbach train station and a departure from Reichsstrasse 31 could easily be established. Both led to the 105 × 209 m workshop. On the sea side, a 300 to 400 m long pier was planned with a harbor basin (60 × 80 m) for torpedo fishing boats and diving boats . A large shooting range building (30 × 40 m) with a 20 meter high control tower was planned at the pier head. There the torpedoes (without explosives) should be shot in the direction of Friedrichshafen Castle Church . Irregularities were to be registered by observers on 16 pontoons along the six-kilometer-long runway and at the end a torpedo boat was supposed to recover the torpedoes with steel nets. The planning had to be revised several times in the following months due to material and labor shortages as well as bomb damage. At the end of April 1944, 85% of the operating facilities were partially badly damaged and unusable.

The provisional 1944/1945

In the autumn of 1943 the dam was heaped up, but further construction caused considerable difficulties due to the soft sea bed. The heavy concrete elements were unstable and the 28-meter-long spruce trunks, which were rammed into the ground for fixation, were soon floating in the lake. Because of this delay, construction of the shooting range building did not begin until the facility started operating in December 1943. It was therefore decided to go for a provisional solution with a reduced number of firing points of 160 torpedoes and 450 rounds per month. As a replacement for the shooting range building, the German Navy seized the passenger ship Oesterreich , which had been decommissioned since 1941, in January 1944 and replaced the previously unfinished Konstanz ship . The Oesterreich was equipped with a compressor and a covered shooting range platform for a torpedo tube set on the aft deck of the ship , the forecastle and upper deck were each equipped with a 2 cm anti-aircraft gun . To transport the torpedoes, the front mast was replaced by a loading boom and field railway tracks were laid on the main deck from bow to stern . The salons became offices and workshops. The anti-aircraft gun Argen was anchored near the bank for anti-aircraft defense, and a railway flak was posted in front of the Fischbach train station. After the heavy air raid on April 29, 1944, the planned series production of air torpedoes by the LZ was no longer possible. A maximum of 80 torpedoes were produced per month. In the torpedo shooting workshop, the Kriegsmarine tested the acoustically self-controlled torpedo wren . This was followed by training on the new type. Only a few torpedoes were shot in from airplanes.

The sea works 1945–1955 under French administration

Shortly before the end of the war and the occupation of the sea works by Combat Command No. 5 of the French 1st Army , Austria reached its home port of Bregenz and was involved in the internment of German Lake Constance ships in Switzerland in 1945 . On May 17, 1945 she was delivered to the French Navy. In contrast to the other Austrian ships, she was not returned but confiscated as a warship . It was used again by the French Navy for torpedo tests in the Laboratoire Gerätewerk d'études sur les torpilles d'Immenstaad , in which German specialists also worked. The Allied Control Council in Berlin prevented with the Control Council Act No. 25 from May 1946 the establishment of an engineering office of Askania in the sea works. As a result, a group of German researchers, led by Heinz Bittel, worked in a torpedo laboratory of the Navy nationale in Saint-Raphaël (Var) .

A seaplane station was set up under the protection of the pier . Four single-engine float planes of the type Latécoère 298 were stationed in the Base de l'Aéronautique Navale 'Z' d'Immenstaad to monitor the maritime border. Part of this location was a prisoner of war camp . It is not known whether the naval torpedo bombers were used for torpedo attempts. Three machines were lost in accidents by September 1945. The Seewerk was dismantled and the concrete pier was blown up before the Navy left in 1947. The site was used by the French military until 1955. In 1948, the unfit and demolished shooting ship Oesterreich was towed to Bregenz, where it lay for another three years before it was renovated and, with its modern appearance, was back in regular service until autumn 2009. It is currently being restored in the old style as the “Museum Ship MS OESTERREICH” by the owner's circle of friends.

The Dorniermole

The dam with two offshore islands is known under this name today because the Seewerk site was bought by the Dornier Works in 1956, but without the blown pier. The concrete blocks on the dam were filled with gravel in the late 1960s. In the meantime, the bird islands are overgrown with plants and are under nature protection . A small recreation area has formed at the foot of the dam, in front of which is the buoy field of a sailing club.

In the Friedrichshafen City Archives there are some torpedo fragments as relics from this time. Divers reported of two sunken, iron, motorized Lauen - small barges. To the west of the dam were three large, originally French, flying boats of the Kriegsmarine that had sunk an English plane in 1944. The wrecks, including a Latécoère 631 , the world's largest aircraft at the time, were later lifted by a Swiss salvage company. The former Seewerk is now owned by Airbus Defense and Space GmbH , around which a technology center has developed.

Find an exercise torpedo

In February 2017, a torpedo was discovered during the routine analysis of aerial photos by the water police and the ordnance disposal service in search of explosive devices from the Second World War. It was stuck in the shallow water area (Wysse) about 400 m from Friedrichshafen-Seemoos in ten meters of water, almost two meters deep in the silt. After extensive preparations, it was recovered on March 8, 2017 and turned out to be a training version of a German F5W air torpedo: 5.4 m long, caliber 45 cm, weight 950 kg, without explosives. The relatively well-preserved specimen was shot down by Austria more than 70 years ago and sank before it reached its target. According to the information from the ordnance disposal service in Baden-Württemberg, the torpedo is a prototype, a training weapon without explosives. It will be used by the service to train staff.

See also

literature

  • Manfred Bauer: The Seewerk in Immenstaad in: Immenstaader Heimatblätter 16, editor Heimatverein Immenstaad eV 1996, pp. 97–117.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The article is based on the article by Manfred Bauer: Das Seewerk in Immenstaad in: Immenstaader Heimatblätter 16, editor Heimatverein Immenstaad e. V. 1996, pp. 97-117.
  2. ↑ The first six zeppelins were built in this bay between 1900 and 1909 .
  3. ↑ Source: LZ Archive 04/0574
  4. ↑ Christa Tholander: Foreign workers 1939 to 1945: foreign workers in the Zeppelin city of Friedrichshafen. Klartext, Essen 2001, ISBN 3-89861-017-9 , p. 536.
  5. ↑ Torpedo catch boat of the Luftwaffe (TWP Madüsee).
  6. ↑ The rebuilt Austria with camouflage in 1948 in Bregenz .
  7. ↑ Arnulf Dieth: Red-White-Red on Lake Constance: Austrian shipping through the ages. Hecht, Hard 1995, ISBN 3-85298-013-5 . P. 46
  8. ^ Karl F. Fritz: The future of Austria is uncertain in Schwäbische Zeitung from January 7, 2014
  9. ^ The hunt for German researchers. Section: Et les Français? . The measures concerning the Seewerk were decided a month before the occupation.
  10. ^ Report by Manfred Bauer on a lecture by Elmar Wilczek on November 14, 2013.
  11. ^ Copy of an advice from February 20, 1946 in: Immenstaader Heimatblätter, Heft 10, 1986, p. 84.
  12. ^ Official spelling of the association "Freundeskreis MS Oesterreich" ( Memento from January 31, 2017 in the Internet Archive ). Austria was the spelling of the original ship from 1928–1953; after that the spelling was Austria .
  13. ↑ Source: Documents of the executing gravel company.
  14. ↑ Bodenseeufer LSG sub-area No. 13 and the mouth of the Lipbach (FFH).
  15. ↑ Dive report with video film.
  16. ↑ To the Immenstaad site.
  17. ↑ They were created using side-view radar as part of the depth of field research project of the Langenargen Institute for Lake Research
  18. ^ Press release Baden-Württemberg from February 9, 2017
  19. ↑ Schwäbische Zeitung online from April 17, 2017.

Coordinates: 47 ° 39 ′ 57.4 "  N , 9 ° 23 ′ 18.1"  E