Scapa Flow battleship wreck images released

[maximus otter]

Three-dimensional images of the wrecks of German warships scuttled in 1919 off Orkney have been released.

The German fleet was scuttled at Scapa Flow in 1919

Experts carried out a week-long study of the seven vessels at historic Scapa Flow by monitoring the wreckage and surrounding seabed.

The survey used high-resolution sonar, which scanned the ships from the sea surface to generate 3D images.

They will be used to update nautical charts, analyse how wrecks deteriorate, and to assist divers.

The wrecks are the only remains of the large vessels of the German High Seas Fleet, scuttled in June 1919.

The three battleships and four light cruisers are legally protected as scheduled ancient monuments of national importance.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/north_east/6129152.stm

maximus otter

 

[shaldag]

now that is cool.:thumbup:

Thanks Max, and a dram of "The Old man of Hoy" to you.

 

[Triton]

Okay I'm not clear, isn't Scapa Flow where there's a big Royal Navy base? Why did the Germans go there to scuttle their ships?

 

[gbaker]

Okay I'm not clear, isn't Scapa Flow where there's a big Royal Navy base? Why did the Germans go there to scuttle their ships?

I seem to recall that the Germans undertook a successful submarine raid sinking a few British ships in WW II.

History.net has an article about the Germans scuttling their own ships during WW I. At work an don't have timew to read it.

 

[Cougar Allen]

Okay I'm not clear, isn't Scapa Flow where there's a big Royal Navy base? Why did the Germans go there to scuttle their ships?

Well, um, that's what happens when you get into a war and then the war ends and, um, you didn't win....

 

[Eager]

After the armistice, seventy-four ships of the Kaiser's navy were ordered into Scapa Flow to surrender. In November 1918 they arrived and for the next six months lay at anchor. The skeleton crew that manned the vessels were unhappy with the situation - poorly supplied directly from Germany these men grew steadily more mutinous.

In June 1919 the peace terms were announced. It is thought that Admiral Von Reuter, the German officer commanding at Scapa, read of these terms within the pages of "The Times" and as an act of final defiance decided to scuttle the fleet. When the British fleet left its anchorage for exercises, the order to scuttle was issued.

As the German warships slipped beneath the waters of Scapa Flow, the event was watched in awe by a party of Stromness schoolchildren who had travelled out to view the ships.

http://www.orkney.org/tradition/scapaflow1.htm

 

[mete]

"peace terms" ?? They guaranteed that WWII would occur !!

 

[macdo]

Many of those scuttled ships were salvaged in the 20s and 30s. Impressive job with divers fitting tall steel towers through which they were filled with air to refloat. Deep cold and moving water. Scapa Flow is a remote, cold and barren place - just sheltered enough by the islands around
My father remembers seeing some of them towed to Burntisland on the Forth (near Edinburgh) to be cut up for scrap. I remember the breakers yard there still cutting up ships in the 60s (though those woudl be there as a result of naval shrinkage from '45 onwards.