U455 was laid down in September 1940 and launched from Deutsch Werke’s yard in Kiel in August 1941 with Kptlt Hans-Heinrich Giessler at her helm. She conducted 10 patrols from 28^th February until April 1944 but only sank 3 ships for a total GRT of 17,685 tonnes. Her final skipper was Kptlt Hans-Martin Scheibe, one of the famous Olympia Crew who chose the Olympic rings as their class symbol. He was 25 when he died with his 50 man crew, having been in the Kriegsmarine for seven years

Her loss on the 5^th April 1944 lead to her being missing until 2005 with her crew still entombed within.

    On another scorchingly hot day – 37 degrees – we loaded our kit and ourselves onto the boat and headed out to sea for the 40 minute trip to a wreck I have wanted to dive for years. Water was consumed copiously on the way out, as we rocketed passed tankers discharging (as MT Haven had done) and a beautiful sailing vessel plying the seas. The sea however was not as flat calm as the day before so we bounced a little. Due to the heat, most of us had not kitted up at all and were still in shorts and t shirt which kept us so much cooler as the wind scremed across our faces.

    With five minutes to go we started to kit up as best we could in the bouncing RIB, slowly, carefully, hoping that nothing important blows overboard!

    Getting to the site we were joined by another boat – a shame as yesterday we had the Haven all to ourselves, but oh well! – with a funny apparatus onboard. A mount for dual scooters, not something I have ever seen before and seemingly a little bit much for an essentially vertical wreck (she lies at a 45 degree angle with the bow at 85m and the aft end at the break around 117m)?

    With us kitted up it was time for bailouts on. Mercifully we had help. In such a crammed environment as a RIB this would have been a nightmare to do on our own and frankly not something I was looking forward to. The assistance was gratefully received.

    All ready I splashed into the water, once again grateful for the cool embrace of Neptune and headed over to the shotline, joining one of my buddies and wait for the second member of our buddy team. At the shot our team lead and I did a bubble check, confirmed all good and hung around for a moment or two. With the three of us together we descended, seeing the wreck appear out of the darkness at 70m, the bow desperately seeking sunshine that was never going to come. I ‘landed’ on the starboard side and kept descending past the hydroplanes and slowing past the tower to hit my max depth at 115m.

    It seemed that there was not a huge amount to here with visibility a mere 3 or so metres it was impossible to see the stern so I told out team leader I was going to head back to the tower and see the hatch location. At this depth deco racks up unbelievably fast so I was not going to hang around. Having been in the water for 11 minutes – only one of which was on the wreck – I already had my first deco stop at 48m! So I quickly shot up to the tower and peered through the outer open hatch to see if the inner was shut. It was not. Partially open this must have been a truly awful experience for the crew to see and not be able to do anything about – if anyone had been alive to see this. The explosion which destroyed this boat was just aft of the tower in the Diesel Engine room, probably directly below the main air induction. Either way, the crew in the control room may not have been alive to see their fate sealed, perhaps this is why the hatch is slightly open?

    Travelling along the deck plates I spotted a giant conger eel lurking between the frames as well as a number of bright pink and white prawns (does anyone know their name?) before reaching the bow and seeing a curious sight that I was under the impression was the GHG (an early hydrophone) although was confused because I thought that these were placed on the upper deck and not the side aft of the hydroplanes. It turns out I was wrong, this was just a random weight! Passing the anchor windlass I hit the shot line at the bow – 85m. Unwilling to leave I had a massive amount of decompression to do so I had to. At this stage I think I had about 120 minutes of decompression so needed to get a wiggle on.

    At one of the upturned sofnolime containers filled with air that seemingly mark each stop there was a brown and white stripped fish with a rather jagged spine area. I have no idea what it it but he was very very curious about us as we passed by his domain. I have spoken previously about how close fish get on CCR but this guy came really close! He probably at one stage swam within about 2/3 inches of my mask. Incredible and yes as usual when it comes to fish I did think about Tom doing his thing with the fish!

    The stops started at 48m for 1 minute and then slowly lengthening to 56 minutes at 6m. I recovered my divevolk at about 18m and immediately got started. 5 or so episodes of South park I found myself without much deco left, I think it was about 5 minutes, not enough for a new episode so I clipped it on and started taking photos instead before noticing a fish below me that had either a flap of its mouth hanging off or had eaten some paper (which seemed unlikely). Either way, I would not be able to investigate it so chalked it up to one of those weird things in the ocean and carried on.

    Having had our safety diver remove our excess gear (deep bailouts) and count us off to make sure we were all present, I was rather unencumbered at this stage although not too badly trimmed – a surprise! The safety diver came back a few times to check on us, see if we needed anything and a general check up before exiting and waiting for us on the boat.

    With my deco now done and a number of others still on the trapezes or zipping around on their scooters, I went up to 3m for a few minutes before exiting the water gently.

    Dekitted on the boat I was handed a roll with some sort of firm meat and some kind of sauce inside (mayonnaise?) and of course a sugary drink. My first word after the dive was simply ‘wow’. I was numb. Those in the forward compartments must have survived the initial blast as well as the sinking so how long was it before they suffocated or committed suicide in the forward torpedo room out of sheer desperation – the hatch remains closed – yet the bow still rises at a 45 degree angle indicating presence of air there. How long will this continue?

    It was only on the way back to port, with the sun on my face grateful to have witnessed such tragedy and survived the dive that it hit home. The same sun I felt on my face was the same sun that those German sailors would never feel again, the same breeze that they once frolicked in that I was now feeling whip over me while they slept in their iron coffin.

    They were on the wrong side of history but they were still husbands, brothers, sons, uncles and perhaps fiances who would never return. Lost forever perhaps beyond the lifespan of many of their contemporaries and families. I hope that once the wreck was discovered, some form of closure came to their families, some form of knowledge of where they lay, destroyed by their own mine field.

Max Depth: 115.2m.

Minnimum Temperature: 15 degrees.

Average temperture: 24 degrees.

PO2 on the bottom: 1.3

PO2 on Deco: 1.5

Dive Time: 151 minutes.

CNS: 109%.

GF: 40/75.