U 662
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U 662 ( previous / next - all submarines ) |
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 Graphic of a class VII C submarine |
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| Type : | VII C |
| Field Post Number : | M - 43 109 |
| Shipyard: | Howaldtswerke , Hamburg |
| Construction contract: | October 9, 1939 |
| Build number: | 811 |
| Keel laying: | May 7, 1941 |
| Launch: | January 22, 1942 |
| Commissioning: | April 9, 1942 |
| Commanders: |
April 9, 1942 to February 14, 1943 |
| Flotilla: |
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| Calls: | 4 patrols |
| Sinkings: |
3 British merchant ships with 18,609 GRT (1 British merchant ship with 7,174 GRT damaged) |
| Whereabouts: | sunk in the South Atlantic on July 30, 1943 (44 dead, 3 prisoners of war) |
U 662 was one of the Navy in World War II employed submarine of type VIIC . In his four patrols it sinks three British merchant ships 18,609 GRT and damaged another with 7174 BRT, with a total of 52 people were killed. On July 21, 1943, the submarine was sunk off the Amazon estuary by a US Consolidated PBY Catalina . 44 of the 47 crew members died; only three survived and were taken prisoner by the US .
Construction and equipment
U 662 had a water displacement of 769 t on the surface and 871 t under water. She was a total of 67.1 m long, 6.2 m wide, 9.6 m high with a 50.5 m long pressure hull and had a draft of 4.74 m. The submarine, which was built in the Howaldtswerke in Hamburg , was powered by two four-stroke F46 diesel engines with 6 cylinders each and a charging fan from the Kiel Germania shipyard with an output of 2060 to 2350 kW, with two electric motors GU 460 / 8-27 from AEG with one Power of 550 kW driven. It had two drive shafts with two 1.23 m tall propellers. The boat was suitable for diving to a depth of 230 m.
The submarine reached speeds of up to 17.7 knots on the surface and up to 7.6 knots under water. When surfaced, the ship could travel up to 8,500 nautical miles at 10 knots, and up to 80 nautical miles submerged at 4 knots. U 662 was with five 533 mm torpedo tubes - four at the bow and one at the stern - and fourteen torpedoes , an 88 mm SK C / 35 cannon with 220 rounds of ammunition, a 37 mm FlaK M42 18/36/37 / 43 and two 20 mm FlaK C / 30.
team
The crew strength of the submarine was 44 to 60 men. On his last trip there were 47 men.
Calls
After its commissioning, U 662 was tested under the command of Corvette Captain Wolfgang Hermann, born in 1908, from April 9, 1942, initially in Hamburg , from April 30 in Kiel and other Baltic ports, and served in the 5th U-Flotilla in until September 15, 1942 Kiel as a training boat to be equipped for the first patrol from 17 to 21 September 1942 in Kiel.
On September 22nd, 1942 U 662 left the port of Kiel for its first patrol. In the following days, Kristiansand , Stavanger , Bergen (Norway) and again Kristiansand were approached, from whose port the submarine left on September 27, 1942 with the destination North Atlantic. Here it was part of the submarine groups "Panther", "Leopard", "Südwärts" and "Delphin" and was supplied with fuel by U 463 on October 23, 1942 . U 662 reached the port of Lorient on November 18 without being successfully sunk .
On December 19, 1942, U 662 ran from the port of Lorient to operate again in the North Atlantic off Newfoundland. It now belonged to the submarine groups "Spitz" and "Jaguar". On December 29, 1942, U 662 sank the British merchant ship Ville de Rouen with two torpedoes with 5598 tons, whose 71 sailors were rescued by other ships. On January 10, 1943 and again on January 30, 1943, the submarine was supplied with fuel by U 463 . On February 7, 1943, U 662 entered the port of Saint-Nazaire . The commandant Wolfgang Hermann was accused by the naval command of lacking skill in combat and at the same time was found to have impaired vision, which is why he had to give up command. This was taken over on March 10, 1943 by Lieutenant Heinz-Eberhard Müller (1916–1988).
On March 23, U 662 left Saint-Nazaire and operated again in the North Atlantic, this time as part of the submarine groups "Adler", "Meise", "Specht" and "Fink". On March 29, the submarine was able to sink two British merchant ships and damage one. Of the 57 men on the Empire Whale with 6,159 tons, 47 died in the sinking, and only 10 survived, while of the 103 men on the Umaria, which was also sunk, all of them were rescued with 6,852 tons. When the Ocean Viceroy with 7174 tons was damaged , 5 of 52 crew members died. U 662 was supplied with fuel and provisions by U 487 on April 20, 1943 and by U 463 on May 9, 1943 . On May 15, 1943, the submarine returned to Saint-Nazaire.
Last use and end
On June 26, 1943, U 662 set sail in Saint-Nazaire on its last patrol to operate in the North Atlantic, then off the Azores and finally east of the Caribbean . The submarine was unsuccessful this time and was supplied with fuel and provisions by U 487 on July 9, 1943 . On July 20, U 662 attacked the convoy TF-2 off the mouth of the Amazon , but could not get close enough to any enemy ship. An American Consolidated B-24 bomber coming from Suriname attacked without hitting the submarine. An attack by a US Douglas B-18 Bolo was also unsuccessful. U 662 continued to pursue the convoy and was then attacked by several Consolidated PBY Catalinas of the US Squadron VP-94 from Amapa , Brazil , with Lt. Stan Fremder and his Catalina fought several hours with U 662 . On July 21, 1943, Lt. (jg) RH Howland Catalina P-4 with his Catalina , U 662 . The anti-aircraft gun of the submarine had damaged the Catalina , but the ammunition was coming to an end after the long fighting. Both 20mm anti-aircraft guns were destroyed by the Catalina fire, and all crew members on the tower and several on deck were fatally wounded. The three depth charges , one of which was a direct hit, tore holes in the submarine. Five crew members were thrown into the water, including the seriously wounded Kapitänleutnant Heinz-Eberhard Müller, one of whom soon succumbed to his wounds. The four who were initially still alive had two lifeboats dropped by a Catalina . They sat in one of them while drilling a hole in the other to collect rainwater. They drifted at sea for 16 days without food, drinking rainwater and urine. The whole time they were circled by sharks . They constructed a sail and were able to sail up to 3 knots, but once capsized. It was only with great difficulty that they could turn the boat again and climb into it. On August 6, 1943, they met the US warship USS Siren , from which they were taken on board. The 20-year-old corporal Willi Lübke died on the same day, while the other three - the two corporal Hermann Grauff (21) and Ferdinand Marx (20), but also the seriously wounded 28-year-old captainleutnant Heinz-Eberhard Müller - survived and were brought to the USA as prisoners of war . Commander Müller, seriously injured in the war, returned to Germany in February 1944 as part of a prisoner exchange , where he was in the hospital in Glücksburg until June 1944 . He only died in 1988 at the age of 72.
See also
literature
- Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The submarine war 1939-1945. Volume 1: The German submarine commanders. Preface by Prof. Dr. Jürgen Rohwer, Member of the Presidium of the International Commission on Military History. ES Mittler and Son, Hamburg / Berlin / Bonn 1996, pp. 98, 164. ISBN 3-8132-0490-1 .
- Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The submarine war 1939-1945. Volume 2: Submarine construction in German shipyards. ES Mittler and Son, Hamburg / Berlin / Bonn 1997, pp. 73, 235. ISBN 3-8132-0512-1 .
- Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The submarine war 1939-1945. Volume 3: The German submarine successes from September 1939 to May 1945. ES Mittler and Son, Hamburg / Berlin / Bonn 2008, p. 283. ISBN 3-8132-0513-8 .
- Rainer Busch, Hans-Joachim Röll: The submarine war 1939-1945. Volume 4: The German submarine losses from September 1939 to May 1945. ES Mittler and Son, Hamburg / Berlin / Bonn 2008, p. 119. ISBN 3-8132-0514-5 .
- Erich Gröner , Dieter Jung, Martin Maas: The German warships 1815-1945. Volume 3: Submarines, auxiliary cruisers, mine ships, net layers. Bernhard & Graefe Verlag, Munich 1985, ISBN 3-7637-4802-4 .
- Clay Blair : The Submarine War - The Hunted 1942–1945 . Heyne Verlag, 1999. pp. 176f., 222, 334, 355, 442, 477. ISBN 3-4531-6059-0 .
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