Shark class

Shark class
General data
Ship type :	Submarine
Construction series:	S-class
Navies :	Royal Navy Soviet Navy
Builders :	Chatham Dockyard ( Chatham ) Cammell Laird ( Birkenhead ) Scott's Shipbuild. ( Greenock )
Units:	8th
Technical specifications
Crew :	39 men
Displacement :	surfaced: 768  tn.l. submerged: 960 ts
Length :	63.58 m
Width :	7.28 m
Draft :	3.4 m
Drive :	Diesel engines : 1550  PS (1156 kW ) Electric motors : 1300 PS (969 kW)
Speed :	surfaced: 13.75  kn (25  km / h ) submerged: 10 kn (19 km / h)
Driving range :	popped up: 3800  NM (7038 km) at 10 kn
Diving depth :	95 m
Alarm dive time:	25-30 seconds
Armament
Artillery :	1 × 3 ″ -L / 50- (76-mm) deck gun
Air defense :	2 ×  .303 ″ (7.7-mm) MG
Torpedoes :	6 × 21 ″ (533-mm) tube in the bow 12 torpedoes or sea ​​mines

The Shark-Class was the second sub-assembly of the British S-Class . The eight submarines were used in World War II .

Building history and structural features

see: Construction history of the S-Class and structural features of the S-Class

Between 1933 and 1938, the eight boats of the second sub-assembly of the S-Class were built at three different shipyards:

Shipyard	Submarines
Chatham Dockyard	4th
Cammell Laird	3
Scott's Shipbuilding & Engineering Co.	1

The submarines were slightly larger than the predecessors of the first assembly, but had the same drive power. Only the HMS Sunfish was equipped with a 1900 hp diesel unit, which corresponded to the diesel drive of the third and fourth sub-assemblies built later.

During the war, several boats were fitted with an external stern torpedo tube. The total number of torpedoes carried increased to 13. The submarines had active and passive acoustic reconnaissance equipment such as ASDIC from the start . Radar was retrofitted from 1941 .

As with the boats of the first construction lot, the pressure hull was not completely welded, but partially riveted. The submarines of the third and fourth construction lots built during the war were completely welded and could dive deeper.

history

see: History of the S-Class and Detailed History of the S-Class

When the war began on September 1, the Royal Navy had eight Shark-class submarines, which were stationed in both the North Sea and the Mediterranean . The boats from the Mediterranean were immediately ordered to the North Sea.

Britain's declaration of war took effect on September 3, 1939 at 11:00 a.m. The first fighting between German and British units took place just four minutes later, when a German submarine unsuccessfully attacked HMS Spearfish with torpedoes.

In the following three months, the submarines patrolled the North Sea and repeatedly attacked German units without success.

HMS Salmon achieved its first combat success in the Shark class on December 4, 1939. The British submarine sank the German submarine U 36 with torpedoes southwest of Kristiansand .

On December 13, 1939, the HMS Salmon attacked a German formation from a great distance in the North Sea at 56 ° 47 '  N , 4 ° 0'  E with torpedoes and hit the light cruisers Nuremberg and Leipzig . Both warships suffered severe hits and were out of action for several months.

On April 10, 1940, German units occupied Denmark and Norway in the largest triphibian operation in military history to date . The sea ​​landing, known as the Weser Exercise Company , led to heavy fighting between the German navy and the Allied navies, which resulted in heavy losses on both sides .

In the course of the intense fighting, the Shark boats were able to damage or sink several transport ships of the German invaders. The most spectacular success was undoubtedly when, on April 11, 1940, the HMS Spearfish almost sank the "pocket battleship" Lützow in the Skagerrak with torpedoes. The badly hit ironclad barely escaped total loss and, after lengthy repairs, was not operational again until March 1941.

The fighting in the North Sea also claimed heavy losses from the Shark class . In 1940 the Royal Navy lost four Shark boats in combat. Another submarine was lost in 1941.

The three remaining submarines patrolled the Bay of Biscay and off the coasts of Norway in the following period with moderate success .

The HMS Sunfish was handed over to the allied Soviet Union on April 10, 1944 and put into service by the Soviet Navy under the name W-1 ( В-1 ) on June 26, 1944 . The submarine was mistakenly attacked and sunk by a British bomber on July 27, 1944 on the march from Dundee to Murmansk . The entire crew of Soviet and British seafarers was killed.

The two remaining submarines were destroyed in 1945. One boat was sunk off Malta as a sonar target, the other scrapped in Canada .

Boats of the class

see also: Group 2 of the S-Class

HMS Shark
Builder :	Chatham Dockyard	No:	N 54
Keel laying :	June 12, 1933	Launch :	May 31, 1934
Commissioning:	December 31, 1934	End of duty:	July 6, 1940
The Shark ( English for " Hai ") was used in the North Sea and attacked on July 5, 1940 by German aircraft off Norway and badly damaged. There were 2 dead and 19 wounded. Then the crew surrendered. The boat was towed away by German minesweepers, but sank when it was removed. The survivors went into German captivity.
HMS Sealion
Builder:	Cammell Laird	No.:	N 72
Keel laying:	May 16, 1933	Launch:	May 31, 1934
Commissioning:	December 21, 1934	End of duty:	1945
The Sealion (English: sea ​​lion ) was used in the North Sea, the Biscay and in the Northern Arctic Ocean . The submarine was sunk on March 3, 1945 as an ASDIC exercise target (sonar target) off the Isle of Arran .
HMS Salmon
Builder:	Cammell Laird	No.:	N 65
Keel laying:	June 15, 1933	Launch:	April 30, 1934
Commissioning:	March 8, 1935	End of duty:	July 16, 1940
The salmon (English: salmon ) was used in the North Sea. The submarine has been missing in the North Sea since July 1940. It probably ran into a German sea mine. There were no survivors.
HMS Snapper
Builder:	Chatham Dockyard	No.:	N 38
Keel laying:	September 18, 1933	Launch:	October 25, 1934
Commissioning:	June 14, 1935	End of duty:	February 12, 1941
The snapper (English: Schnapper ) was used in the North Sea and the Biscay. The submarine is missing in the Bay of Biscay. There were no survivors.
HMS Seawolf
Builder:	Scott's Shipbuilding & Engineering Co.	No.:	N 47
Keel laying:	May 25, 1934	Launch:	November 28, 1935
Commissioning:	March 12, 1936	End of duty:	June 23, 1945
The Seawolf (English: Seewolf ) was used in the North Sea and in the open North Atlantic. The submarine survived the war and was scrapped in Montreal in November 1945 .
HMS Spearfish
Builder:	Cammell Laird	No.:	N 69
Keel laying:	May 23, 1935	Launch:	April 21, 1936
Commissioning:	December 11, 1936	End of duty:	August 1, 1940
The Spearfish (ger .: Marlin ) was used in the North Sea. The British submarine was from the German submarine U 34 130 nm northeast of Aberdeen at position 58 ° 7 '  N , 1 ° 32'  O sunk. The entire crew was killed.
HMS Sunfish W-1 (В-1)
Builder:	Chatham Docks	No.:	N 81
Keel laying:	July 22, 1935	Launch:	September 30, 1936
Commissioning:	July 2, 1937	End of duty:	July 27, 1944
The Sunfish (ger .: sun or moon fish ) was established after the outbreak of war in the North Sea and on 10 April 1944, the Soviet Union passed. The Soviet Navy officially put the submarine into service on June 26, 1944, named W-1 ( В-1 ). During the transfer to Murmansk, the W-1 was sunk by mistake by a British Liberator bomber. There were no survivors.
HMS Sterlet
Builder:	Chatham Docks	No.:	N 22
Keel laying:	July 14, 1936	Launch:	September 22, 1937
Commissioning:	April 6, 1938	End of duty:	April 18, 1940
The Sterlet (see Sterlet ) was used in the North Sea. The submarine was lost in April 1940. It was probably in the Skagerrak by German U-hunters UJ-125 , UJ-126 and UJ-128 sunk. There were no survivors.

literature

• Erminio Bagnasco: Submarines in World War II. Motorbuchverlag, Stuttgart 1996, ISBN 3-613-01252-9 .
• Robert Hutchinson: Fight Under Water - Submarines from 1776 to the Present. Motorbuchverlag, Stuttgart 2006, ISBN 3-613-02585-X .
• Anthony Preston: The History of the Submarines. Karl Müller Verlag, Erlangen 1998, ISBN 3-86070-697-7 .
• Peter Padfield: The Submarine War 1939-1945. Ullstein Taschenbuchverlag, Munich 2000, ISBN 3-548-24766-0 .

Web links

Commons : S Class  - Collection of Pictures, Videos and Audio Files

• S-Class on uboat.net (English)
• S-Class at submariners.co.uk (English)
• S-Class at battleships-cruisers.co.uk (English)

References and comments

The PONS large English dictionary , ISBN 3-12-517178-4 , was used as the basis for translations from English to German .

1. ↑ The uboat.net (see: web links ) gives 670 GRT for the overwater displacement of the Shark class  (register bins for military vehicles are, however, unusual, a “gross register bin” is impossible due to a lack of a calculation basis). Robert Hutchinson and Erminio Bagnasco (see: literature ) give 768  ts .
2. ↑ The uboat.net specifies 960 GRT for the underwater displacement of the Shark class (register bins for military vehicles are, however, unusual, a “gross register bin” is impossible due to the lack of a calculation basis). Hutchinson and Bagnasco give 960  ts .
3. ↑ ^{a b} The HMS Sunfish from the second construction lot was equipped with the enhanced diesel drive of the third and fourth construction lot . The diesel drive achieved an output of 1900 hp (1420 kW). The maximum speed of the Sunfish above water was 15 kn (28 km / h).
4. ↑ HMS is the abbreviation for His / Her Majesty's Ship and the name prefix of British ships. HMS means His / Her Majesty's Ship .
5. ↑ The uboat.net states December 31, 1934 for the Shark to be commissioned. Hutchinson gives October 5, 1934.
6. ↑ Hutchinson does not mention the sterlet . Bagnasco and uboat.net assign it to the 2nd assembly.