|
Passenger Freighter Robert E. Lee, 1924
Passenger freighter
Robert E. Lee
in wartime colors.
Photo courtesy the
Mariners Museum, Newport News, Virginia.
On
July 30, 1942 the passenger freighter Robert E. Lee, bound from
Trinidad to New Orleans, was steaming across the Gulf of Mexico with its
naval escort, PC 566. Forty-five miles from the safety of the
Mississippi River, Robert E. Lee was struck by a single torpedo
launched from the German submarine U-166, which had been patrolling
in the area. As passengers and crew raced for the lifeboats and life rafts,
the Robert E. Lee began to sink quickly. As the freighter slipped
beneath the waves, PC-566 made contact with the U-boat and charged in
for the attack. After dropping ten depth charges in the area where contact
had been made, an oil slick was seen on the surface. No other evidence
appeared that would have indicated the U-boat had been sunk, so it was
believed that the submarine had escaped.
In January 2001, while surveying a proposed
pipeline route for BP Exploration and Shell international, C&C Technologies
located the wreck of the Robert E. Lee using the HUGIN
3000 AUV. Nearby was
another area of wreckage that C&C marine archaeologists thought might be the
long sought after U-166. Further investigations of this wreckage
with the HUGIN 3000 AUV, sponsored by BP and Shell, revealed spectacular
side scan and multibeam imagery that further supported the hypothesis that
this was U-166. On May 31, 2001 a research team comprised of
individuals from C&C, the Mineral Management Service , BP, and Shell
conducted an ROV investigation of the Robert E. Lee site and the
additional wreckage. This expedition not only documented Robert E. Lee
shipwreck, but also verified the second wreckage as that of U-166.
The discovery of U-166, 140 miles east of where it was thought to
have been lost, corrected a historical error and solved one of the
long-standing shipwreck mysteries in the Gulf of Mexico.
|
