Back in August 2024, a team of volunteer divers with Lost in Waters Deep found a shipwreck off the coast of northeastern Scotland. The divers recorded a ton of footage, took a ton of pictures, and conducted all sorts of fancy scans. Today, they can confirm that the ship is the HMS Hawke, a British warship sunk by a German U-boat during WWI. Best of all, it’s in excellent condition for a sunken warship lost in the ocean for over a century.
On October 15, 1914, the Hawke was attacked by a German U-9 submarine and Otto Weddigen, a U-boat commander so prolific at sinking British warships that he was awarded the Pour le Mérite, Germany’s highest military honor. The guy has an extensive Wikipedia profile. Weddigen sunk four British warships before dying in battle five months after sinking the Hawke.
Weddigen fired a torpedo at the Hawke that killed 524 crew members and sank the ship in less than eight minutes. Only 70 sailors survived. The hawk is so well preserved that divers found several artifacts on the deck, including Royal Navy cookware and a well-preserved set of large guns positioned on the bow and stern.
Overall, the ship was largely undisturbed, likely due to its settling at a depth of around 360 feet and the fact that no one had ever explored it before now.
The Hawke’s discovery can be attributed to the ongoing efforts of Lost in Waters Deep, an organization of volunteers with the mission of locating and preserving as many shipwrecks in Scottish waters as they can find.
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The post Shipwreck of Lost WWI Warship Discovered Off the Coast of Scotland appeared first on VICE.
