Aberlady Submarine

Back to the daily walking, with a weather forecast for 18degreesC, today's destination was Aberlady Bay, where it appeared we had the entire bay to ourselves.

The tide happened to be in our favour so we trekked the mile to see the wrecks of the two Royal Naval X-craft midget submarines (lots of detail in this link), which at today's very low tide were 300 yards from the sea. They appear to have run aground but that is not the case.

Early in May 1946 trials were carried out to ascertain the effect of 20mm canon shells on the hulls of X-craft. Thus two training versions (X-T craft), of the type that attacked the German battleship Tirpitz in Kaafjord, were moored to a large concrete block, which served as a target indicator, in a position where they could be examined at low tide, and were subsequently attacked by Seafire and Mosquito aircraft, using various types of ammunition. The submarines were badly damaged and, the effect of the strikes having been noted, they were left where they were and remain a curiosity on the beach.

To give a sense of scale Mr Flum climbed in the hatch, however during manoevres the vessel would have carried a crew of four in what was a very confined space. (More detail in large)