The Pennsylvania Sun ship, an American vessel, was exposed to a large fire caused by a torpedo from a German submarine U-boat during the Battle of the Atlantic in World War II. After the huge fire was extinguished, the charred skeletons of its victims were found on the ship.
At 07:49 on July 15, 1942, the Pennsylvania Sun vessel, unescorted by an American battleship, was sailing on a zigzag course at about 25 km/hour when she was hit by a single torpedo from the German submarine U-571 about 200 km west of Key West. The torpedo struck the port midsection between tanks 5 and 6, blowing off the port wing of the bridge, killing the quartermaster and the ship's crew, and igniting the cargo. The ship's cargo ignited and the vessel quickly turned into an inferno.
The captain steered the vessel southeast at full speed for five minutes, then ordered the engines to stop and sent a distress signal. The 59 survivors, 9 crew members, 33 crew members, and 17 armed guards, abandoned ship in three lifeboats. They rowed out to sea anchor and waited for the rescue boats. They were picked up three and a half hours later by the US vessel Dahlgren (DD 187) and brought to Key West later that day. There were 57 survivors, two were missing.
The next day, on the evening of July 15, the captain, three officers, and the crew of the USS Willett (ARS 12) returned to the Pennsylvania Sun. They extinguished the flames and towed the vessel to Key West. There they removed the burned bodies of the two crew members and other items. The Pennsylvania Sun vessel underwent temporary repairs. The tanker sailed under her own power with her crew to Chester, Pennsylvania, where she returned to service in 1943 after permanent repairs were completed. After the war, she was sold to the German company D. Ortmann in 1955 and scrapped in February 1963.
No comments:
Post a Comment