160-555: 1941 1942 1943 1944 1942 1943 1944 1945 Operation Zarin ( English: Tsarina [ Unternehmen Zarin ]) was a German minelaying operation off the north-western coast of the islands of Novaya Zemlya in the Arctic Ocean . The operation was conducted between 24 September and 28 September 1942 by the German heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper escorted by the destroyers Z23 , Z28 , Z29 and Z30 , because
320-484: A Short Sunderland , and signal intelligence indicated enemy ships were operating nearby. In order to clarify the situation, at 17:50 Admiral Hipper launched an Arado seaplane in the direction of Trondheim. The Arado reported no activity in the approaches to Trondheim and then made an emergency landing in Eide , since the weather was too bad to land at Admiral Hipper in open sea. After trying to purchase fuel from locals,
480-566: A British destroyer, and at 09:22 Lütjens ordered the Admiral Hipper to investigate. Upon arriving on the scene, Admiral Hipper was initially misidentified by the British destroyer HMS Glowworm as a friendly vessel, which allowed the German ship to close the distance and fire first. Admiral Hipper rained fire on Glowworm , scoring several hits. Glowworm attempted to flee, but when it became apparent she could not break away from
640-474: A British force consisting of the British aircraft carrier HMS Glorious and two escorting destroyers, Ardent and Acasta . All three British ships were sunk but Scharnhorst was heavily damaged by a torpedo hit and both German battleships returned to Trondheim on 9 June as well. On 10 June, Admiral Hipper and Gneisenau left Trondheim with the four destroyers in a second attempt to attack evacuating convoys but they returned to Trondheim
800-590: A blast upon tipping. Several mine-laying ships were destroyed when their cargo exploded. Beginning around the start of the 20th century, submarine mines played a major role in the defense of U.S. harbours against enemy attacks as part of the Endicott and Taft Programs . The mines employed were controlled mines, anchored to the bottoms of the harbours, and detonated under control from large mine casemates onshore. During World War I , mines were used extensively to defend coasts, coastal shipping, ports and naval bases around
960-402: A coastal battery with bombs. The cruiser entered the harbor and anchored at 05:25 to debark the mountain troops. A German tanker which was scheduled to refuel Group 2 at Trondheim failed to show up, and the ships had to remain in harbor because of fuel shortage. On 10 April an Arado seaplane from Scharnhorst brought orders from Lütjens to attempt a breakout and return to Germany together with
1120-446: A deterrent against an Allied invasion and to attack Arctic convoys to Russia. On 19 March 1942, Admiral Hipper steamed to Trondheim, escorted by the destroyers Z24 , Z26 , and Z30 and the torpedo boats T15 , T16 , and T17 . Several British submarines were patrolling the area, but failed to intercept the German flotilla. Admiral Hipper and her escorts reached their destination on 21 March. There, they joined
1280-401: A harbour by hand. They can be inexpensive: some variants can cost as little as US $ 2,000, though more sophisticated mines can cost millions of dollars, be equipped with several kinds of sensors, and deliver a warhead by rocket or torpedo . Their flexibility and cost-effectiveness make mines attractive to the less powerful belligerent in asymmetric warfare . The cost of producing and laying
1440-444: A legal basis for German naval rearmament; the treaty specified that Germany would be able to build five 10,000- long-ton (10,160 t ) " treaty cruisers ". The Admiral Hipper s were nominally within the 10,000-ton limit, though they significantly exceeded the figure. Admiral Hipper was 202.8 meters (665 ft) long overall and had a beam of 21.3 m (70 ft) and a maximum draft of 7.2 m (24 ft). After
1600-419: A member of the crew and three of the survivors from PQ 17, wounding five more. By 10:16 p.m. the range had reduced to 2,500 yd (2,300 m) and the anti-aircraft guns of the destroyers were used to fire at the bridge of the German ship, to hit the wireless room and any fire-control apparatus. The automatic fire caused many casualties as much of the crew had gathered there, ready to abandon ship. Onslaught
1760-915: A mine is usually between 0.5% and 10% of the cost of removing it, and it can take up to 200 times as long to clear a minefield as to lay it. Parts of some World War II naval minefields still exist because they are too extensive and expensive to clear. Some 1940s-era mines may remain dangerous for many years. Mines have been employed as offensive or defensive weapons in rivers, lakes, estuaries, seas, and oceans, but they can also be used as tools of psychological warfare . Offensive mines are placed in enemy waters, outside harbours, and across important shipping routes to sink both merchant and military vessels. Defensive minefields safeguard key stretches of coast from enemy ships and submarines, forcing them into more easily defended areas, or keeping them away from sensitive ones. Shipowners are reluctant to send their ships through known minefields. Port authorities may attempt to clear
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#17328694184881920-524: A mined area, but those without effective minesweeping equipment may cease using the area. Transit of a mined area will be attempted only when strategic interests outweigh potential losses. The decision-makers' perception of the minefield is a critical factor. Minefields designed for psychological effect are usually placed on trade routes to stop ships from reaching an enemy nation. They are often spread thinly, to create an impression of minefields existing across large areas. A single mine inserted strategically on
2080-618: A position South of Jan Mayen , where she refueled several times from the tanker Adria whilst waiting for convenient bad weather to break through the Denmark Strait into the North Atlantic. During a gale on the night of 6 December, she navigated the Denmark Strait undetected. After a refueling by the tanker Friedrich Breme on 12 December, Meisel started searching for the convoy HX 94, which according to B-Dienst intelligence
2240-515: A position South of the Lofoten in the Vestfjorden to cover both landings. The British destroyer had survived long enough to send a wireless message to Royal Navy headquarters, which allowed the battlecruiser Renown time to move into position to engage Scharnhorst and Gneisenau , though the German battleships used their superior speed to break off contact. Group 2 was sighted at 14:50 by
2400-433: A powerful escort composed of the heavy cruiser Berwick and the light cruisers Bonaventure and Dunedin . The aircraft carriers Furious and Argus were part of the convoy, but not operational as they were transferring crated aircraft. When Admiral Hipper attacked in the morning, she was surprised to make contact with Berwick . A torpedo attack on Berwick failed, but with her main guns she badly damaged
2560-522: A psychological weapon and as a method to sink enemy ships. Contact mines need to be touched by the target before they detonate, limiting the damage to the direct effects of the explosion and usually affecting only the vessel that triggers them. German cruiser Admiral Hipper Admiral Hipper was the lead ship of the Admiral Hipper class of heavy cruisers which served with Nazi Germany 's Kriegsmarine during World War II . The ship
2720-520: A raid to Germany around the same time, there was concern that the two ships might hinder each other, so Admiral Hipper was given orders to make the breakthrough via the Denmark Strait before 28 March. She managed to do so on 24 March. and two days later stopped to refuel in Bergen. By 28 March, the cruiser was docked in Kiel, having made the entire journey without being detected by the British. Upon arrival,
2880-463: A resource-intensive and time-consuming minesweeping effort, accept the casualties of challenging the minefield, or use the unmined waters where the greatest concentration of enemy firepower will be encountered. Although international law requires signatory nations to declare mined areas, precise locations remain secret, and non-complying parties might not disclose minelaying. While mines threaten only those who choose to traverse waters that may be mined,
3040-684: A safe distance. The submarine H. L. Hunley used one to sink USS Housatonic on 17 February 1864. A Harvey torpedo was a type of floating mine towed alongside a ship and was briefly in service in the Royal Navy in the 1870s. Other "torpedoes" were attached to ships or propelled themselves. One such weapon called the Whitehead torpedo after its inventor, caused the word "torpedo" to apply to self-propelled underwater missiles as well as to static devices. These mobile devices were also known as "fish torpedoes". The American Civil War of 1861–1865 also saw
3200-567: A shipping route can stop maritime movements for days while the entire area is swept. A mine's capability to sink ships makes it a credible threat, but minefields work more on the mind than on ships. International law , specifically the Eighth Hague Convention of 1907 , requires nations to declare when they mine an area, to make it easier for civil shipping to avoid the mines. The warnings do not have to be specific; for example, during World War II, Britain declared simply that it had mined
3360-458: A single salvo at the cruisers before turning toward them, her escorting destroyers screening her with smoke. After emerging from the smoke screen, Admiral Hipper was again engaged by Burnett's cruisers. Owing to the uncertainty over the condition of his flagship and the ferocity of the British defense, Kummetz issued the following order at 10:37: "Break off action and retire to the west." Mistakenly identifying Sheffield as Admiral Hipper ,
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#17328694184883520-694: A sloop mined by the Peruvians. A similar fate occurred with the gunboat schooner Covadonga in front of the port of Chancay , on 13 September 1880, which having captured and checked a beautiful boat, it exploded when hoisting it on its side. During the Battle of Tamsui (1884), in the Keelung Campaign of the Sino-French War , Chinese forces in Taiwan under Liu Mingchuan took measures to reinforce Tamsui against
3680-604: A time when the Chilean squadron was blockading the Peruvian ports, formed a brigade of torpedo boats under the command of the frigate captain Leopoldo Sánchez Calderón and the Peruvian engineer Manuel Cuadros , who perfected the naval torpedo or mine system to be electrically activated when the cargo weight was lifted. This is how, on 3 July 1880, in front of the port of Callao , the gunned transport Loa flies when capturing
3840-547: A total of 1,700 Wehrmacht mountain troops , whose objective was the port of Trondheim ; the ships loaded the troops in Cuxhaven . The ships steamed to the Schillig roadstead outside Wilhelmshaven , where they joined Group 1, consisting of ten destroyers, and the battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau under the command of Vice Admiral Günther Lütjens , which were assigned to cover Groups 1 and 2. The ships steamed out of
4000-503: A variable number of ships to pass unharmed before detonating. This made them a great deal harder to sweep. Mining campaigns could have devastating consequences. The U.S. effort against Japan, for instance, closed major ports, such as Hiroshima , for days, and by the end of the Pacific War had cut the amount of freight passing through Kobe – Yokohama by 90%. When the war ended, more than 25,000 U.S.-laid mines were still in place, and
4160-682: Is just one example of a ship that was struck by a magnetic mine during this time. On 21 November 1939, a mine broke her keel, which damaged her engine and boiler rooms, as well as injuring 46 men, one later died from his injuries. She was towed to Rosyth for repairs. Incidents like this resulted in many of the boats that sailed to Dunkirk being degaussed in a marathon four-day effort by degaussing stations. The Allies and Germany deployed acoustic mines in World War II, against which even wooden- hulled ships (in particular minesweepers ) remained vulnerable. Japan developed sonic generators to sweep these;
4320-460: Is the practice of the removal of explosive naval mines, usually by a specially designed ship called a minesweeper using various measures to either capture or detonate the mines, but sometimes also with an aircraft made for that purpose. There are also mines that release a homing torpedo rather than explode themselves. Mines can be laid in many ways: by purpose-built minelayers , refitted ships, submarines, or aircraft —and even by dropping them into
4480-559: The Admiral Hipper was recommissioned in her damaged state as a training ship for cadets in Gotenhafen . During the next five months Admiral Hipper executed gunnery and sea training in the Baltic. In September she was reported conditionally operational and on 27 October the cadets graduated. In November there were plans drafted to use her for shore bombardments , but as the Soviet army pushed
4640-528: The Petropavlovsk struck them near Port Arthur , sending the holed vessel to the bottom and killing the fleet commander, Admiral Stepan Makarov , and most of his crew in the process. The toll inflicted by mines was not confined to the Russians, however. The Japanese Navy lost two battleships, four cruisers, two destroyers and a torpedo-boat to offensively laid mines during the war. Most famously, on 15 May 1904,
4800-655: The Altafjord from where they would launch their attack against the convoy. Admiral Hipper left Narvik together with the Admiral Scheer , the light cruiser Köln and the destroyers Z23 and Z27 , and arrived on 11 September in the Altafjord. Tirpitz and Lützow were under repair and remained in Narvik. On their way, the ships were first detected by the British submarine Tribune . and then unsuccessfully attacked by
4960-598: The Baltic Sea to conduct training maneuvers. The ship also made port calls to various Baltic ports, including cities in Estonia and Sweden . In August, the ship conducted live fire drills in the Baltic. At the outbreak of World War II in September 1939, the ship was still conducting gunnery trials. She was briefly used to patrol the Baltic, but she did not see combat, and was quickly returned to training exercises. In November 1939,
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5120-568: The Blohm & Voss shipyard in Hamburg . Her keel was laid on 6 July 1935, under construction number 501. The ship was launched on 6 February 1937, and was completed on 29 April 1939, the day she was commissioned into the German fleet. The Commander-in-Chief of the Kriegsmarine , Großadmiral (Grand Admiral) Erich Raeder , who had been Franz von Hipper 's chief of staff during World War I , gave
5280-525: The Gulf of Finland during the Crimean War of 1853–1856. The mining of Vulcan led to the world's first minesweeping operation. During the next 72 hours, 33 mines were swept. The Jacobi mine was designed by German-born, Russian engineer Jacobi, in 1853. The mine was tied to the sea bottom by an anchor. A cable connected it to a galvanic cell which powered it from the shore, the power of its explosive charge
5440-584: The Korean War , mines laid by North Korean forces caused 70% of the casualties suffered by U.S. naval vessels and caused 4 sinkings. During the Iran–Iraq War from 1980 to 1988, the belligerents mined several areas of the Persian Gulf and nearby waters. On 24 July 1987, the supertanker SS Bridgeton was mined by Iran near Farsi Island. On 14 April 1988, USS Samuel B. Roberts struck an Iranian mine in
5600-550: The Soviet Union , culminating in the Battle of the Barents Sea on 31 December 1942, in which she sank the destroyer Achates and the minesweeper Bramble , but was in turn damaged and forced to withdraw by the light cruisers HMS Sheffield and Jamaica . Disappointed by the failure to sink merchant ships in that battle, Adolf Hitler ordered the majority of the surface warships scrapped , though Admiral Karl Dönitz
5760-532: The battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau and the destroyers Z20 Karl Galster and Z21 Wilhelm Heidkamp in a sortie into the North Sea off Bergen , Norway. A third destroyer, Z9 Wolfgang Zenker , was forced to turn back after sustaining damage from ice. The ships operated under the command of Admiral Wilhelm Marschall . The ships attempted to locate British merchant shipping, but failed and returned to port on 20 February. Following her return from
5920-455: The 13,994 GRT transport Empire Trooper , and lightly damaged the freighter Arabistan , before spotting other ships steaming toward her. Believing these ships to be destroyers preparing for a torpedo attack, she quickly withdrew, using her main guns to keep the escorts at bay. Ten minutes later, Berwick reappeared off Admiral Hipper ' s port bow; the German cruiser fired several salvos from her rear turrets and scored hits on
6080-471: The Azores and therefore returned to Brest on 15 February. Since the bigger dry docks had to be kept free for the eventual return of Scharnhorst and Gneisenau , Admiral Hipper was docked in a smaller one, and while moving into it, damaged her starboard screw on uncharted wreckage. A spare screw had to be transported from Kiel, causing additional delay. Meanwhile, British bombers were regularly attacking
6240-661: The Azores but no ships were found. She was refueled several times by the tanker Spichern . Upon learning that the British Force H had sortied from Gibraltar deep into the Mediterranean to bombard La Spezia , Meisel understood that the convoys between the UK, Gibraltar and West Africa were left uncovered with heavy units and he decided to operate closer to Gibraltar, where U-boat and Luftwaffe units had attacked convoy HG 53 . On 11 February, Admiral Hipper encountered and sank
6400-413: The British cruiser's rear turrets, waterline, and forward superstructure . Admiral Hipper then disengaged, to prevent the 'British destroyers' from closing to launch a torpedo attack. By this time Admiral Hipper was running low on fuel, and so she put into Brest in occupied France on 27 December, escorted by the torpedo boat Jaguar . While en route, Admiral Hipper encountered and sank
6560-560: The British destroyer HMS Glowworm . In December 1940, she broke out into the Atlantic Ocean to operate against Allied merchant shipping. This operation ended without significant success, but in February 1941, Admiral Hipper sortied again, sinking several merchant vessels before eventually returning to Germany via the Denmark Strait . The ship was then transferred to northern Norway to participate in operations against convoys to
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6720-570: The British escort commander, left two destroyers to cover the convoy while he took the remaining four to pursue Admiral Hipper . Rear Admiral Robert Burnett 's Force R, centered on the cruisers Sheffield and Jamaica , standing by in distant support of the Allied convoy, raced to the scene. The cruisers engaged Admiral Hipper , which had been firing to port at the destroyer Obedient . Burnett's ships approached from Admiral Hipper ' s starboard side and achieved complete surprise. In
6880-408: The British had sunk the specialist minelayer Ulm [ de ] on 25 August. The mines laid during the operation had little effect. During Convoy PQ 17 (27 June – 10 July 1942) freighters sailed as far north as possible and used the coasts of Novaya Zemlya as cover to get to Murmansk or Arkhangelsk . In Operation Tsar ( Unternehmen Zar ) the minelayer Ulm [ de ]
7040-533: The British sank Friederich Eckoldt and damaged Admiral Hipper , and forced the Germans to abandon the attack on the convoy. In the aftermath of the failed operation, a furious Hitler proclaimed that the Kriegsmarine 's surface forces would be paid off and dismantled, and their guns used to reinforce the fortifications of the Atlantic Wall . Admiral Karl Dönitz , Raeder's successor, persuaded Hitler to retain
7200-435: The British submarine Tigris . The Norwegian submarine HNoMS Uredd and the British submarine Unshaken sighted the German fleet but were unable to attack. The destroyers Z4 Richard Beitzen , Z16 Friedrich Eckoldt , Z29 and Z30 also arrived in Altafjord on 11 September, but then the operation was once more cancelled because Hitler did not want to risk losses to the surface fleet. In Operation Zarin ,
7360-693: The British until the end of September. Enigma decrypts had not given the British warning of the sortie by Hipper and a report from agent A 2 that Admiral Hipper had sailed on 24 September was not received by the Admiralty until 27 September. No ships are known to have run into the minefield. Naval mine A naval mine is a self-contained explosive device placed in water to damage or destroy surface ships or submarines . Similar to anti-personnel and other land mines , and unlike purpose launched naval depth charges , they are deposited and left to wait until, depending on their fuzing , they are triggered by
7520-427: The British were evacuating Harstadt. Instead of raiding Harstadt, Marschall decided to operate against the evacuation convoy. While in search of the convoy, the German force first encountered the tanker Oil Pioneer at 06:45 on 8 June, which was escorted by the trawler HMT Juniper . Admiral Hipper sank Juniper with gunfire and Gneisenau sank Oil Pioneer . At 10:52, Admiral Hipper encountered and sank
7680-420: The British. In 1855, 301 more Jacobi mines were laid around Krostadt and Lisy Nos . British ships did not dare to approach them. In the 19th century, mines were called torpedoes , a name probably conferred by Robert Fulton after the torpedo fish , which gives powerful electric shocks . A spar torpedo was a mine attached to a long pole and detonated when the ship carrying it rammed another one and withdrew
7840-541: The English Channel, North Sea and French coast. Naval mines were first invented by Chinese innovators of Imperial China and were described in thorough detail by the early Ming dynasty artillery officer Jiao Yu , in his 14th-century military treatise known as the Huolongjing . Chinese records tell of naval explosives in the 16th century, used to fight against Japanese pirates ( wokou ). This kind of naval mine
8000-673: The French; they planted nine torpedo mines in the river and blocked the entrance. During the Boxer Rebellion , Imperial Chinese forces deployed a command-detonated mine field at the mouth of the Hai River before the Dagu forts , to prevent the western Allied forces from sending ships to attack. The next major use of mines was during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905. Two mines blew up when
8160-525: The Germans back on the Eastern Front, her crew was drafted into construction work on the defenses of the city, further impairing Admiral Hipper ' s ability to enter active service. The Royal Air Force also laid an extensive minefield around the port, which forced the ship to remain in the harbor. By the end of 1944, the ship was due for another overhaul; work was to have lasted for three months. The Soviet Army had advanced so far, however, that it
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#17328694184888320-484: The Germans started Operation Hoffnung on 5 November: Admiral Hipper and the 5th Destroyer Flotilla, composed of Z27 , Z30 , Z4 Richard Beitzen , and Z16 Friedrich Eckoldt , patrolled for Allied shipping in the Arctic. Vizeadmiral Oskar Kummetz commanded the squadron from Admiral Hipper . On 7 November, the cruiser's Arado floatplane located the 7,925 GRT Soviet tanker Donbass and its escort,
8480-655: The Navy proved unable to sweep them all, limiting efforts to critical areas. After sweeping for almost a year, in May 1946, the Navy abandoned the effort with 13,000 mines still unswept. Over the next thirty years, more than 500 minesweepers (of a variety of types) were damaged or sunk clearing them. The U.S. began adding delay counters to their magnetic mines in June 1945. Since World War II , mines have damaged 14 United States Navy ships, whereas air and missile attacks have damaged four. During
8640-711: The North Atlantic convoy lanes and operate on the shipping lanes between the United Kingdom and West Africa , where the B-Dienst had reported the convoys SL 58 and SLS 58. An Arado floatplane was launched to search for the convoys, but the plane went missing and nothing was found. On 23 December the Admiral Hipper operated between the Azores and Spain. At dusk on 24 December, Admiral Hipper , using her DeTe radar, detected Convoy WS 5A some 700 nautical miles (1,300 km; 810 mi) west of Cape Finisterre . She shadowed
8800-399: The North Sea sortie, Admiral Hipper was assigned to the forces tasked with the invasion of Norway, codenamed Operation Weserübung. The ship was assigned as the flagship of Group 2, along with the destroyers Z5 Paul Jakobi , Z6 Theodor Riedel , Z16 Friedrich Eckoldt , and Z8 Bruno Heinemann . KzS Heye was given command of Group 2 during the operation. The five ships carried
8960-484: The North Sea, the British East Coast, Straits of Dover, and Heligoland Bight is estimated at 190,000 and the total number during the whole of WWI was 235,000 sea mines. Clearing the barrage after the war took 82 ships and five months, working around the clock. It was also during World War I, that the British hospital ship , HMHS Britannic , became the largest vessel ever sunk by a naval mine . The Britannic
9120-464: The Norwegian coastal artillery batteries. After the ships forced the most narrow part of the fjord between 04:04 and 04:14, one Norwegian battery belatedly opened fire but to no effect. Admiral Hipper responded with two salvoes from the rear turrets. The two remaining Arado seaplanes were flown off to scout and check for suitable places for airplane and seaplane bases. One of the airplanes also attacked
9280-693: The Russian minelayer Amur planted a 50-mine minefield off Port Arthur and succeeded in sinking the Japanese battleships Hatsuse and Yashima . Following the end of the Russo-Japanese War, several nations attempted to have mines banned as weapons of war at the Hague Peace Conference (1907) . Many early mines were fragile and dangerous to handle, as they contained glass containers filled with nitroglycerin or mechanical devices that activated
9440-602: The U-boats and the Luftwaffe, which sank 21 of the 34 fleeing transports. Due to commitments in the Mediterranean with Operation Pedestal , the Royal Navy was not able to provide sufficient escorts for the next Arctic convoy and the sailing of convoy PQ-18 was delayed until September. The convoy was located on 8 September and on 10 September the Germans set Operation Doppelschlag in motion: all available surface units were ordered to
9600-467: The U.S. coast. Initially, contact mines (requiring a ship to physically strike a mine to detonate it) were employed, usually tethered at the end of a cable just below the surface of the water. Contact mines usually blew a hole in ships' hulls. By the beginning of World War II, most nations had developed mines that could be dropped from aircraft, some of which floated on the surface, making it possible to lay them in enemy harbours. The use of dredging and nets
9760-526: The aircrew were detained and handed over to the police. The Royal Norwegian Navy Air Service captured the Arado, which was painted in Norwegian colors and used by the Norwegians until 18 April when it was evacuated to Britain. When steaming at maximum speed through the long and narrow Trondheim Fjord towards Trondheim, Admiral Hipper successfully passed herself off as a British warship long enough to get past
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#17328694184889920-559: The already very low German fuel stocks. As a result, operations above destroyer level were impossible and the Admiral Hipper remained in port for the next months. In July fuel stocks were sufficient to allow operations again and the Germans intended to attack the next convoy PQ 17 with the complete surface fleet in Operation Rösselsprung . On 1 July the convoy was located by the B-Dienst and detected by U-boats. The next day,
10080-402: The approach of or contact with any vessel. Naval mines can be used offensively, to hamper enemy shipping movements or lock vessels into a harbour ; or defensively, to create "safe" zones protecting friendly sea lanes, harbours, and naval assets. Mines allow the minelaying force commander to concentrate warships or defensive assets in mine-free areas giving the adversary three choices: undertake
10240-514: The area between Spitzbergen and Tromsø ; the cruise lasted until 9 August. The Arado seaplanes could find a few ships, but these were all neutrals. No British ships were found. On 31 July one of the Arados was lost in an accident. The next day, Admiral Hipper encountered the Finnish freighter Ester Thorden , which was found to be carrying 1.75 t (1.72 long tons; 1.93 short tons) of gold. The ship
10400-477: The attacking British bombers. In order to cover the return of the damaged Scharnhorst to Germany, Admiral Hipper and Gneisenau left Trondheim on 20 June for a raid towards the Iceland-Faeroes passage, but Gneisenau was torpedoed and damaged by the submarine Clyde and both ships returned to Trondheim the same day On 25 July, Admiral Hipper steamed out on a commerce raiding patrol in
10560-594: The auxiliary warship BO-78 . Kummetz dispatched the destroyer Z27 to sink the two Soviet ships. On 9 November the ships are back in the Kaafjord . In December 1942, convoy traffic to the Soviet Union resumed. Raeder ordered a plan, Operation Regenbogen , to use the available surface units in Norway to launch an attack on the convoys. The first convoy of the month, JW 51A , passed to the Soviet Union without incident. However,
10720-481: The battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau to operate in concert with Admiral Hipper , but Gneisenau suffered storm damage in December that prevented the participation of the two ships. Repairs were effected quickly, however, and the two battleships embarked upon a second attempt at the end of January. On 1 February 1941, Admiral Hipper embarked on her second Atlantic sortie, with orders to operate on
10880-499: The central Persian Gulf shipping lane , wounding 10 sailors. In the summer of 1984, magnetic sea mines damaged at least 19 ships in the Red Sea . The U.S. concluded Libya was probably responsible for the minelaying. In response the U.S., Britain, France, and three other nations launched Operation Intense Look , a minesweeping operation in the Red Sea involving more than 46 ships. On
11040-454: The christening speech and his wife Erika Raeder performed the christening. As built, the ship had a straight stem , though after her launch this was replaced with a clipper bow. A raked funnel cap was also installed. Kapitän zur See (Captain at Sea) Hellmuth Heye was given command of the ship at her commissioning. After her commissioning in April 1939, Admiral Hipper steamed into
11200-578: The coasts of these countries. London P&I Club issued a warning to freight ships in the area, advising them to "maintain lookouts for mines and pay careful attention to local navigation warnings". Ukrainian forces have mined "from the Sea of Azov to the Black Sea which banks the critical city of Odesa." Naval mines may be classified into three major groups; contact, remote and influence mines. The earliest mines were usually of this type. They are still used today, as they are extremely low cost compared to any other anti-ship weapon and are effective, both as
11360-406: The commander of HMS Onslaught to detach from Tuscaloosa with Marne and Martin and steer south-east of Bear Island , later altered to south towards the North Cape. Selby was told that light warships were thought to be in the area. At 9:55 p.m. a ship was sighted and the destroyers accelerated to 25 kn (46 km/h; 29 mph), the ship turned to port until sailing away from
11520-401: The convoy during the night with her radar with the intention of attacking at dawn. During the night a large escort was visually detected and unsuccessfully attacked with three torpedoes. Convoy WS 5A was not a regular merchant convoy, but rather a heavily guarded troopship convoy consisting of twenty ships. Five of the twenty ships were allocated to Operation Excess . The convoy was protected by
11680-481: The convoy lanes between the United Kingdom and West-Africa. The ship was allowed to operate against both lightly escorted convoys and independent sailing vessels, with the hope that her appearance in these waters would draw away British forces guarding the Denmark Strait, thus making it easier for Scharnhorst and Gneisenau to break out into the Atlantic . Between 4 and 10 February Admiral Hipper patrolled off
11840-511: The crew. In the night of 9 April the RAF attacked the port with 591 heavy bombers. The bombers hit several ships in the harbor: Admiral Scheer capsized, the light cruiser Emden was hit, and Admiral Hipper was severely damaged by three bomb hits. Munitions for her heavy artillery were brought aboard with the idea to operate her as a floating battery, but her crew scuttled the wrecked ship at her moorings at 04:25 on 3 May. In July 1945, after
12000-447: The cruiser laid a minefield on 24–28 September off the north-west coast of Novaya Zemlya , escorted by the destroyers Z23 , Z28 , Z29 , and Z30 The goal of the operation was to funnel merchant traffic further south, closer to the reach of German naval units in Norway. After her return to port, Admiral Hipper was transferred to Bogen Bay near Narvik for repairs to her propulsion system. On 28–29 October, Admiral Hipper and
12160-533: The cruiser made ready to participate in Operation Sea Lion , the planned invasion of the United Kingdom. Admiral Hipper ' s role would have been a diversionary foray into the North Sea, Operation Herbstreise or "Autumn Journey", with the aim of luring the British Home Fleet away from the intended invasion routes in the English Channel. Following the postponement of that operation, on 24 September
12320-565: The cruisers Lützow and Admiral Scheer and the destroyers Z24 , Z27 , Z28 , Z29 , Z30 and Z4 Richard Beitzen coming from Narvik in order to avoid British reconnaissance, the German fleet did not steer into open waters but remained close to the coast. In fog Lützow ran aground in the narrow Tjeldsundet , and the destroyers Z6 Theodor Riedel , Z10 Hans Lody and Z20 Karl Galster struck uncharted rocks at Grimsöy in Vestfjorden and all these ships fell out for
12480-633: The decade following 1868, Major Henry Larcom Abbot carried out a lengthy set of experiments to design and test moored mines that could be exploded on contact or be detonated at will as enemy shipping passed near them. This initial development of mines in the United States took place under the purview of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers , which trained officers and men in their use at the Engineer School of Application at Willets Point, New York (later named Fort Totten ). In 1901 underwater minefields became
12640-556: The destroyer Friederich Eckoldt approached too closely and was sunk. Meanwhile, Lützow closed to within 3 nmi (5.6 km; 3.5 mi) of the convoy, but due to poor visibility, she held her fire. She then received Kummetz's order, and turned west to rendezvous with Admiral Hipper . Lützow inadvertently came alongside Sheffield and Jamaica , and after identifying them as hostile, engaged them. The British cruisers turned toward Lützow and came under fire from both German cruisers. Admiral Hipper ' s firing
12800-534: The destroyers Friedrich Eckoldt and Richard Beitzen were transferred further north from Narvik to the Altafjord. Because the Allies could not provide sufficient escorts for the next Arctic convoy PQ-19, they decided to cancel the convoy and instead on 29 October thirteen freighters sailed independently from Iceland to the USSR. From the USSR 23 empty ships also tried to return independently to Iceland. Against this traffic
12960-401: The destroyers; six minutes afterwards, Onslaught began to fire at 9,000 yd (5.1 mi; 8.2 km), Marne following suit. Ulm turned west, then to the south-west, beginning to zigzag. Kapitänleutnant der Reserve Ernst Biet, the German captain, ordered fire to be opened with the 105 mm gun. Marne and Martin straddled Ulm with shells and Ulm hit Marne on Y gun, killing
13120-589: The disadvantage of "sweeping" only a small strip. A better solution was found in the "Double-L Sweep" using electrical cables dragged behind ships that passed large pulses of current through the seawater. This created a large magnetic field and swept the entire area between the two ships. The older methods continued to be used in smaller areas. The Suez Canal continued to be swept by aircraft, for instance. While these methods were useful for clearing mines from local ports, they were of little or no use for enemy-controlled areas. These were typically visited by warships, and
13280-402: The empty troopship Orama. Despite launching their Ar 196 reconnaissance planes, the German ships failed to find the convoy, and at 13:00, Admiral Hipper and the four destroyers returned to Trondheim to cover and protect the German forces there, whilst the battleships refueled from Dithmarschen and continued the operation. Towards the evening Scharnhorst and Gneisenau found
13440-470: The explosion. Ships that had successfully run the gantlet of the Atlantic crossing were sometimes destroyed entering freshly cleared British harbours. More shipping was being lost than could be replaced, and Churchill ordered the intact recovery of one of these new mines to be of the highest priority. The British experienced a stroke of luck in November 1939, when a German mine was dropped from an aircraft onto
13600-557: The failed "floating petard". Weapons of this type were apparently tried by the English at the Siege of La Rochelle in 1627. American David Bushnell developed the first American naval mine, for use against the British in the American War of Independence . It was a watertight keg filled with gunpowder that was floated toward the enemy, detonated by a sparking mechanism if it struck a ship. It
13760-527: The fight and depart before British forces closed in. The British reported only seven ships lost, totaling 32,806 GRT along with damage to two more. The Germans claimed Admiral Hipper had sunk thirteen of the nineteen freighters totalling 79,000 GRT, while some survivors reported fourteen ships of the convoy had been sunk. Following the attack on convoy SLS 64, Admiral Hipper ' s fuel stocks were running low. Meisel feared that approaching British forces would cut him off from tankers waiting in
13920-401: The first stage of Operation Rösselsprung was set in motion when German forces concentrated in Altafjord from where they could sortie against the convoy. On 2 July, Admiral Hipper , Tirpitz , the destroyers Z6 Theodor Riedel , Z10 Hans Lody , Z14 Friedrich Ihn and Z20 Karl Galster , and the torpedo boats T7 and T15 left Trondheim for Altafjord, followed on 3 July by
14080-502: The first to be so fitted were the carrier HMS Ark Royal and the liners RMS Queen Mary and RMS Queen Elizabeth . It was a photo of one of these liners in New York harbour, showing the degaussing coil, which revealed to German Naval Intelligence the fact that the British were using degaussing methods to combat their magnetic mines. This was felt to be impractical for smaller warships and merchant vessels, mainly because
14240-537: The force were several fireships , carrying 40 barrels of gunpowder and rigged to explode by a clockwork mechanism. In 1812, Russian engineer Pavel Shilling exploded an underwater mine using an electrical circuit . In 1842 Samuel Colt used an electric detonator to destroy a moving vessel to demonstrate an underwater mine of his own design to the United States Navy and President John Tyler . However, opposition from former president John Quincy Adams , scuttled
14400-535: The fuze of the naval mine. Although this is the rotating steel wheel's first use in naval mines, Jiao Yu described their use for land mines in the 14th century. The first plan for a sea mine in the West was by Ralph Rabbards, who presented his design to Queen Elizabeth I of England in 1574. The Dutch inventor Cornelius Drebbel was employed in the Office of Ordnance by King Charles I of England to make weapons, including
14560-475: The gear was not ready by war's end. The primary method Japan used was small air-delivered bombs. This was profligate and ineffectual; used against acoustic mines at Penang , 200 bombs were needed to detonate just 13 mines. The Germans developed a pressure-activated mine and planned to deploy it as well, but they saved it for later use when it became clear the British had defeated the magnetic system. The U.S. also deployed these, adding "counters" which would allow
14720-669: The globe. The Germans laid mines in shipping lanes to sink merchant and naval vessels serving Britain. The Allies targeted the German U-boats in the Strait of Dover and the Hebrides. In an attempt to seal up the northern exits of the North Sea, the Allies developed the North Sea Mine Barrage . During a period of five months from June 1918, almost 70,000 mines were laid spanning the North Sea's northern exits. The total number of mines laid in
14880-472: The heavy cruisers Admiral Scheer and Prinz Eugen , though the latter had been torpedoed by the British submarine Trident on 23 February and returned to Germany for repairs on 16 May. At the same time the heavy cruiser Lützow transferred from Germany to Norway. In begin March, the battleship Tirpitz had been operating against the Arctic convoy PQ 12 during Operation Sportpalast and had depleted
15040-576: The independent sailing 6,078 GRT passenger ship Jumna on 25 December. Another round of routine maintenance work was effected while the ship was in Brest, readying her for another sortie into the Atlantic shipping lanes. On 4 January Admiral Hipper was detected by British air reconnaissance in Brest. The same night a major air raid was mounted with 53 Vickers Wellington , Armstrong Whitworth Whitley and Handley Page Hampden bombers, but due to cloud cover and heavy Flak these were unsuccessful. On
15200-445: The initial series of salvos from the British cruisers, Admiral Hipper was hit three times. One of the hits damaged the ship's propulsion system; the No. 3 boiler filled with a mix of oil and water, which forced the crew to turn off the starboard turbine engine. This reduced her speed to 23 knots (43 km/h; 26 mph). The other two hits started a fire in her aircraft hangar. She fired
15360-500: The insistence of Admiral Fyodor Litke . The Nobel mines were bought from Swedish industrialist Immanuel Nobel who had entered into collusion with the Russian head of navy Alexander Sergeyevich Menshikov . Despite their high cost (100 Russian rubles ) the Nobel mines proved to be faulty, exploding while being laid, failing to explode or detaching from their wires, and drifting uncontrollably, at least 70 of them were subsequently disarmed by
15520-446: The installation of a clipper bow during fitting out, her overall length increased to 205.9 meters (676 ft). The ship had a design displacement of 16,170 t (15,910 long tons; 17,820 short tons) and a full load displacement of 18,200 long tons (18,500 t). Admiral Hipper was powered by three sets of geared steam turbines , which were supplied with steam by twelve ultra-high pressure oil-fired boilers . The ship's top speed
15680-406: The large hangar for two floatplanes with folding wings had proven difficult to handle in operations, and was replaced by a smaller hangar for just one floatplane, the spare room being taken up by refueling gear and extra food storage. After completion of the refit, Admiral Hipper conducted sea trials in the Baltic before putting into Gotenhafen on 21 December for some minor work. In January 1942,
15840-467: The main deck next to the four range finders for the anti-aircraft guns. Admiral Hipper ' s armored belt was 70 to 80 mm (2.8 to 3.1 in) thick; her upper deck was 12 to 30 mm (0.47 to 1.18 in) thick while the main armored deck was 20 to 50 mm (0.79 to 1.97 in) thick. The main battery turrets had 105 mm (4.1 in) thick faces and 70 mm thick sides. The heaviest armor with 150 mm (5.9 in) thickness
16000-404: The majority of the fleet then underwent a massive degaussing process, where their hulls had a slight "south" bias induced into them which offset the concentration-effect almost to zero. Initially, major warships and large troopships had a copper degaussing coil fitted around the perimeter of the hull, energized by the ship's electrical system whenever in suspected magnetic-mined waters. Some of
16160-401: The middle pair of 10.5 cm guns from the superstructure deck to the upper deck, which restricted their arc of fire towards the rear. The ship was equipped with three Arado Ar 196 seaplanes and one catapult . In 1941 the aircraft hangar was reduced with place for just one Arado and in total only two Arado floatplanes were carried. Admiral Hipper was ordered by the Kriegsmarine from
16320-454: The mine and rushed it to the labs at HMS Vernon, where scientists discovered that the mine had a magnetic arming mechanism. A large ferrous object passing through the Earth's magnetic field will concentrate the field through it, due to its magnetic permeability; the mine's detector was designed to trigger as a ship passed over when the Earth's magnetic field was concentrated in the ship and away from
16480-494: The mine. The mine detected this loss of the magnetic field which caused it to detonate. The mechanism had an adjustable sensitivity, calibrated in milligauss . From this data, known methods were used to clear these mines. Early methods included the use of large electromagnets dragged behind ships or below low-flying aircraft (a number of older bombers like the Vickers Wellington were used for this). Both of these methods had
16640-491: The mudflats off Shoeburyness during low tide. Additionally, the land belonged to the army and a base with men and workshops was at hand. Experts were dispatched from HMS Vernon to investigate the mine. The Royal Navy knew that mines could use magnetic sensors, Britain having developed magnetic mines in World War I, so everyone removed all metal, including their buttons, and made tools of non-magnetic brass . They disarmed
16800-447: The next day, having failed to locate any British vessels. On 13 June, fifteen Blackburn Skuas from 800 Naval Air Squadron and 803 Naval Air Squadron took off from the British aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal to attack the German ships at Trondheim. The bombers hit Scharnhorst with a dud bomb and lost eight of their number to fighters and anti-aircraft guns. The anti-aircraft gunners of Admiral Hipper shot down one of
16960-534: The next stage of operation Rösselsprung, the actual attack on the convoy, as long as the aircraft carrier was not disabled by the Luftwaffe. Swedish intelligence had meanwhile reported the German departures to the British Admiralty , which ordered the convoy to disperse in the evening of 4 July. In the morning of 5 July the Germans became aware that the escorts were withdrawing and the merchants were continuing independently. The second stage of Operation Rösselsprung
17120-434: The night of 10 January there was a smaller attack with twelve Whitleys, followed two nights later by an attack with 26 Wellingtons and Hampdens, but none of these caused any serious damage. The British failed to detect the departure of Admiral Hipper from Brest on 1 February and continued the attacks. On 4 February a Wellington wrongly claimed a hit on a cruiser in Brest. The Kriegsmarine had initially sought to send
17280-406: The operation to avoid action with a force equal in strength to his own, poor visibility, and the damage to his flagship, Kummetz decided to abort the attack. In the course of the battle, the British destroyer Achates was sunk by the damage inflicted by Admiral Hipper . The Germans also sank the minesweeper Bramble and damaged the destroyers Onslow , Obedient , and Obdurate . In return,
17440-465: The operation. The destroyers Z15 Erich Steinbrinck and Z16 Friedrich Eckoldt arrived also on 3 July in Altafjord. Escorting the convoy were the battleships HMS Duke of York and USS Washington and the aircraft carrier HMS Victorious . Since aircraft from the Victorious had nearly torpedoed Tirpitz during Operation Sportpalast, Hitler explicitly forbade to launch
17600-519: The operation. The ships departed from Kiel on 4 June. Three days later, Admiral Hipper and the four destroyers refueled from the supply ship Dithmarschen . The plan was to attack the British base at Harstadt in the morning of 9 June, but shortly after midnight of 8 June the plan was changed: a reconnaissance plane reported no ships in Harstadt and since the German ships also detected highly increased convoy radio transmissions, Marschall deduced that
17760-710: The orders of the Reagan administration , the CIA mined Nicaragua 's Sandino port in 1984 in support of the Contras . A Soviet tanker was among the ships damaged by these mines. In 1986, in the case of Nicaragua v. United States , the International Court of Justice ruled that this mining was a violation of international law. During the Gulf War , Iraqi naval mines severely damaged USS Princeton and USS Tripoli . When
17920-463: The other five destroyers escorting the convoy rushed to join the fight, while Achates laid a smoke screen to cover the convoy. Admiral Hipper fired several salvos at Achates , raining shell splinters on the destroyer that severed steam lines and reduced her speed to 15 knots (28 km/h; 17 mph). Kummetz then turned back north to draw the destroyers away. Captain Robert Sherbrooke ,
18080-408: The port, and the Kriegsmarine therefore decided that Admiral Hipper should return to Germany, where she could be better protected. On 15 March, the ship slipped out of Brest, unobserved, and steered to a rendezvous point South of Greenland with the tanker Thorn . The refueling was delayed to 21 March because of bad weather. Since the heavy cruiser Admiral Scheer was also returning from
18240-711: The possibility of activating a mine is a powerful disincentive to shipping. In the absence of effective measures to limit each mine's lifespan, the hazard to shipping can remain long after the war in which the mines were laid is over. Unless detonated by a parallel time fuze at the end of their useful life, naval mines need to be found and dismantled after the end of hostilities; an often prolonged, costly, and hazardous task. Modern mines containing high explosives detonated by complex electronic fuze mechanisms are much more effective than early gunpowder mines requiring physical ignition. Mines may be placed by aircraft, ships, submarines, or individual swimmers and boatmen. Minesweeping
18400-639: The presence of German aircraft; 132 men were killed. The loss of Ulm greatly diminished the German ability to lay large quantities of mines in the Arctic. The sinking of Ulm forced the Germans to improvise by using the heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper as a substitute, to lay the minefield off the islands of Novaya Zemlya in Unternehmen Zarin ( Operation Tsarina ). The operation was commanded by Vice Admiral Oskar Kummetz and due to commence on 23 September. Admiral Hipper ( Konteradmiral [Rear-Admiral] Wilhelm Meisel ), with 96 naval mines on deck,
18560-677: The project as "not fair and honest warfare". In 1854, during the unsuccessful attempt of the Anglo-French (101 warships) fleet to seize the Kronstadt fortress, British steamships HMS Merlin (9 June 1855, the first successful mining in Western history), HMS Vulture and HMS Firefly suffered damage due to the underwater explosions of Russian naval mines. Russian naval specialists set more than 1,500 naval mines, or infernal machines , designed by Moritz von Jacobi and by Immanuel Nobel , in
18720-403: The pursuing cruiser, she turned toward Admiral Hipper and fired a spread of torpedoes, all of which missed. The British destroyer scored one hit on Admiral Hipper ' s starboard bow before a rudder malfunction set the ship on a collision course with the German cruiser. The collision with Glowworm tore off a 40-meter (130 ft) section of Admiral Hipper ' s armored belt on
18880-637: The range of the German bomber aircraft stationed in Norway. The sortie by Ulm was uncovered by the British Enigma machine code-breakers of the Government Code and Cypher School on 25 August. Mines were to be laid by U-boats as part of Unternehmen Zar off the narrow Matochkin Strait between Severny Island and Yuzhny Island of Novaya Zemlya in Operation Peter ( Unternehmen Peter ) by U-589 . In Operation Paul ( Unternehmen Paul ) U-591
19040-854: The responsibility of the US Army's Artillery Corps, and in 1907 this was a founding responsibility of the United States Army Coast Artillery Corps . The Imperial Russian Navy , a pioneer in mine warfare, successfully deployed mines against the Ottoman Navy during both the Crimean War and the Russo-Turkish War (1877-1878) . During the War of the Pacific (1879-1883), the Peruvian Navy , at
19200-548: The roadstead at midnight on the night of 6–7 April, 1940. Between 14:25 and 14:48 on 7 April, the ships were unsuccessfully attacked West of the Skagerrak by twelve bombers. By evening the weather had deteriorated and several of the destroyers were unable to maintain the high ( 27 knots ) speed and remained behind the main force. On 8 April at 09:15 one of the trailing destroyers, the Z11 Bernd von Arnim , signaled that it had engaged
19360-504: The second, convoy JW 51B , was spotted by the submarine U-354 south of Bear Island . Raeder ordered the forces assigned to Operation Regenbogen into action. Admiral Hipper , again served as Kummetz's flagship; the squadron comprised Lützow and the destroyers Friederich Eckoldt , Richard Beitzen , Theodor Riedel , Z29 , Z30 , and Z31 . The force left Altafjord at 18:00 on 30 December, under orders to avoid confrontation with even an equal opponent. Kummetz's plan
19520-494: The ship had her steam turbines overhauled at the Blohm & Voss shipyard; a degaussing coil was fitted to the ship's hull during this overhaul. By March, the ship was again fully operational. By then, however, the strategic situation had altered completely: due to British air reconnaissance and developments in radar it was no longer viable to execute raids in the North Atlantic. Instead the German surface fleet concentrated in Norway as
19680-461: The ship left Wilhelmshaven on a mission to break out into the Atlantic Ocean to raid merchant traffic. The engine oil feed system caught fire and was severely damaged. The fire forced the crew to shut down the ship's propulsion system until the blaze could be brought under control; this rendered Admiral Hipper motionless for several hours on the open sea. British reconnaissance failed to locate
19840-579: The ship returned to the Blohm & Voss dockyard for modifications; these included the replacement of the straight stem with a clipper bow and the installation of the funnel cap. Sea trials in the Baltic resumed in January 1940, but severe ice restrained the ship to port. On 17 February, the Kriegsmarine pronounced the ship fully operational, and on the following day, Admiral Hipper began her first major wartime patrol during Operation Nordmark . She joined
20000-455: The ship went into the Deutsche Werke shipyard for an extensive overhaul, which lasted seven months. Raeder intended to continue to send the Admiral Hipper on North Atlantic raids, and as her operations so far had been dominated by the constant need to refuel, it was decided to increase her fuel capacity from 3050 to 3700 cubic meters. The aircraft hangar was also adapted at this time;
20160-453: The ship, and after the fire was extinguished, she returned to Hamburg's Blohm & Voss shipyard, where repairs lasted slightly over a week. The ship made a second attempt to break out into the Atlantic, designated Operation Nordseetour . On 30 November Admiral Hipper , escorted by five torpedo boats , left Germany for Bergen in Norway, where she refueled from the tanker Wollin on 1 December. The German cruiser then proceeded towards
20320-440: The ships lacked the generating capacity to energise such a coil. It was found that "wiping" a current-carrying cable up and down a ship's hull temporarily canceled the ships' magnetic signature sufficiently to nullify the threat. This started in late 1939, and by 1940 merchant vessels and the smaller British warships were largely immune for a few months at a time until they once again built up a field. The cruiser HMS Belfast
20480-399: The ships, but once ammunition began running low he gave the order to close in, in order to fire more accurately. After ships were hit with cannon fire and stopped, they were finished off with torpedoes. Admiral Hipper fired all of her twelve torpedoes and claimed all torpedoes had hit. At 07:18 only six ships were still in sight, of which only two were steaming. Meisel decided to break off
20640-526: The starboard side, as well as the ship's starboard torpedo launcher. Minor flooding caused a four degree list to starboard, though the ship was able to continue with the mission. Glowworm ' s boilers exploded shortly after the collision, causing her to sink quickly. Forty survivors were picked up by the German ship. At 11:14 Admiral Hipper broke off the rescue operation and set course toward Trondheim with her four destroyers, whilst Group 1 set course for Narvik. Scharnhorst and Gneisenau took
20800-428: The straggling 1,236 GRT English ship Iceland. That evening around midnight, Admiral Hipper's radar picked up the unescorted convoy SLS 64, which contained nineteen merchant ships. The following morning, posing as a British cruiser, she approached the convoy to close distance before opening fire at 06:19. The surprised ships dispersed at once. At the start of the fight Meisel remained three to five km distant from
20960-462: The successful use of mines. The first ship sunk by a mine, USS Cairo , foundered in 1862 in the Yazoo River . Rear Admiral David Farragut 's famous/apocryphal command during the Battle of Mobile Bay in 1864, " Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead! " refers to a minefield laid at Mobile , Alabama. After 1865 the United States adopted the mine as its primary weapon for coastal defense . In
21120-463: The surface fleet, however. After returning to Altafjord, emergency repairs to Admiral Hipper were effected, which allowed her to return to Bogen Bay on 23 January 1943. That day, Admiral Hipper , Köln , and the destroyer Richard Beitzen left the Altafjord to return to Germany. The three ships stopped in Narvik on 25 January, and in Trondheim from 30 January to 2 February. After resuming
21280-459: The threat of the submarine that sank Wilhelm Gustloff ; it would instead become one of the worst maritime disasters in history. Admiral Hipper arrived in Kiel on 2 February and entered the Germaniawerft shipyard for refitting. On 3 April, RAF bombers attacked the harbor and hit the Admiral Hipper with one bomb which failed to penetrate the armor deck but caused six deaths amongst
21440-633: The two battleships on the following night. Admiral Hipper left Trondheim at 21:30, escorted by Friedrich Eckoldt . The two ships first steamed Northwest to clear the Norwegian coast. On 11 April, at 02:50, Friedrich Eckoldt returned to Trondheim due to bad weather and lack of fuel. This same bad weather allowed Admiral Hipper to take a short, direct route to Germany. The ship joined Scharnhorst and Gneisenau at 08:00 on 12 April, and they reached Wilhelmshaven at 22:00, Admiral Hipper with only 125 out of 3005 cubic meters of fuel remaining. Admiral Hipper went into drydock where it
21600-461: The voyage south, the ships searched for Norwegian blockade runners in the Skagerrak on 6 February before putting into port at Kiel on 8 February. On 28 February, the ship was decommissioned in accordance with Hitler's decree. Admiral Hipper received only basic repairs so that in April the ship could be towed to Pillau in the Baltic, to put her out of the reach of Allied bombers. On 1 March 1944
21760-604: The war concluded, eight countries conducted clearance operations. Houthi forces in the Yemeni Civil War have made frequent use of naval mines, laying over 150 in the Red Sea throughout the conflict. In the first month of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine , Ukraine accused Russia of deliberately employing drifting mines in the Black Sea area. Around the same time, Turkish and Romanian military diving teams were involved in defusing operations, when stray mines were spotted near
21920-674: Was the sister ship of the RMS Titanic , and the RMS ; Olympic . During World War II , the U-boat fleet, which dominated much of the battle of the Atlantic, was small at the beginning of the war and much of the early action by German forces involved mining convoy routes and ports around Britain. German submarines also operated in the Mediterranean Sea , in the Caribbean Sea , and along
22080-585: Was 32 knots (59 km/h; 37 mph), at 132,000 shaft horsepower (98,000 kW). Her standard complement consisted of 42 officers and 1,340 enlisted men. Admiral Hipper ' s primary armament was eight 20.3 cm (8 in) SK L/60 guns mounted in four twin gun turrets , placed in superfiring pairs forward and aft. Her anti-aircraft battery consisted of twelve 10.5 cm (4.1 in) L/65 guns, twelve 3.7 cm (1.5 in) guns, and eight 2 cm (0.79 in) guns. She had four triple 53.3 cm (21.0 in) torpedo launchers, all on
22240-516: Was able to persuade Hitler to retain the surface fleet. As a result, Admiral Hipper was returned to Germany and decommissioned for repairs. The ship was never restored to operational status, however, and on 3 May 1945, Royal Air Force bombers severely damaged her while she was in Kiel , Germany. Her crew scuttled the ship at her moorings , and in July 1945, she was raised and towed to Heikendorfer Bay . She
22400-416: Was applied to the vertical surfaces of the conning tower, while the horizontal surfaces were limited to 50 mm (2.0 in). The initial design of Admiral Hipper included an aircraft hangar for one aircraft. During building, the requirements were changed and an aircraft hangar was constructed for two floatplanes that could be stored side by side. The wider aircraft hangar forced the rearrangement of
22560-540: Was armed with a main battery of eight 20.3 cm (8 in) guns and, although nominally under the 10,000-long-ton (10,160 t) limit set by the Anglo-German Naval Agreement , actually displaced over 16,000 long tons (16,260 t). Admiral Hipper saw a significant amount of action during the war, notably in the Battle of the Atlantic . She also led the assault on Trondheim during Operation Weserübung ; while en route to her objective, she sank
22720-545: Was discovered the ship had been damaged more severely by the collision with Glowworm than had previously been thought. Nevertheless, repairs were completed in the span of two weeks. Marschall organized a mission to seize Harstad in Northern Norway in early June 1940; Admiral Hipper , the battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau , and the four destroyers Z7 Hermann Schoemann , Z10 Hans Lody , Z15 Erich Steinbrinck and Z20 Karl Galster were tasked with
22880-402: Was effective against this type of mine, but this consumed valuable time and resources and required harbours to be closed. Later, some ships survived mine blasts, limping into port with buckled plates and broken backs. This appeared to be due to a new type of mine, detecting ships by their proximity to the mine (an influence mine) and detonating at a distance, causing damage with the shock wave of
23040-421: Was endangered by the fall of shot from Marne and increased speed to 30 kn (35 mph; 56 km/h) to get out of the way. Onslaught missed with two torpedoes but hit Ulm near the foremast at 10:31 p.m. setting off a big explosion and detonating ammunition, breaking Ulm in two, the halves sinking quickly at 10:35 p.m. Marne rescued 54 survivors but abandoned 30 to 40 men to die, apparently due to
23200-690: Was equal to 14 kg (31 lb) of black powder . In the summer of 1853, the production of the mine was approved by the Committee for Mines of the Ministry of War of the Russian Empire . In 1854, 60 Jacobi mines were laid in the vicinity of the Forts Pavel and Alexander ( Kronstadt ), to deter the British Baltic Fleet from attacking them. It gradually phased out its direct competitor the Nobel mine on
23360-459: Was further disguised by wearing dark clothes and a black cap. His task was to approach the French ship, hook the torpedo to the anchor cable and, having activated the device by removing a pin, remove the paddles and escape before the torpedo detonated. Also to be deployed were large numbers of casks filled with gunpowder, ballast and combustible balls. They would float in on the tide and on washing up against an enemy's hull, explode. Also included in
23520-459: Was initiated at 11:37 and Admiral Hipper left Altafjord together with the German fleet. During the evening it became clear that they had been detected and reported by the British submarine HMS Unshaken and a Consolidated PBY Catalina from No. 201 Squadron RAF , although an attack by the Soviet submarine K-21 went unnoticed. The Germans aborted the operation and left the merchants over to
23680-468: Was laid down at the Blohm & Voss shipyard in Hamburg in July 1935 and launched in February 1937; Admiral Hipper entered service shortly before the outbreak of war, in April 1939. The ship was named after Admiral Franz von Hipper , commander of the German battlecruiser squadron during the Battle of Jutland in 1916 and later commander-in-chief of the German High Seas Fleet . She
23840-468: Was loaded in a wooden box, sealed with putty . General Qi Jiguang made several timed, drifting explosives, to harass Japanese pirate ships. The Tiangong Kaiwu ( The Exploitation of the Works of Nature ) treatise, written by Song Yingxing in 1637, describes naval mines with a ripcord pulled by hidden ambushers located on the nearby shore who rotated a steel wheel flint mechanism to produce sparks and ignite
24000-403: Was more accurate and quickly straddled Sheffield , though the British cruiser escaped unscathed. Burnett quickly decided to withdraw in the face of superior German firepower; his ships were armed with 6 in (150 mm) guns, while Admiral Hipper and Lützow carried 20.3 cm (8.0 in) and 28 cm (11 in) guns, respectively. Based on the order issued at the outset of
24160-864: Was more prudent and returned to the destroyers. The flotilla arrived back at Kaafjord on 28 September. A Swedish source, known as agent A 2, who worked for the British Naval Attaché in Stockholm and Enigma decrypts warned the Admiralty that another operation against an Arctic convoy by U-boats, ships and aircraft was being prepared. On 5 August, due to a false alarm from a U-boat, the cruiser Köln had been sent north from Trondheim to join Tirpitz , Admiral Scheer , and Admiral Hipper around Narvik. The Luftwaffe in Northern Norway had been reinforced by about thirty Ju 88 torpedo-bombers. The threat of another operation against an Allied convoy had been considered serious by
24320-500: Was nearby. Admiral Hipper encountered a few independent sailing vessels but as his orders were to attack only convoys, Meisel did not attack and remained undetected. In deteriorating weather, the convoy was not found. Between refueling twice from the Friedrich Breme on 16 and 20 December, Admiral Hipper searched for the convoys SC 15 and HX 95 but again nothing was found because of bad weather. Finally Meisel decided to leave
24480-443: Was necessary to move the ship farther away from the front, despite the fact that she had only one working turbine. On 29 January 1945, the ship left Gotenhafen with 1,377 refugees embarked, escorted by the torpedo boat T36 . On the evening of the 30th, Admiral Hipper received a distress call from the sinking transport Wilhelm Gustloff , which was also carrying refugees. The cruiser did not stop to pick up survivors due to
24640-463: Was seized and sent to occupied Norway with a prize crew. On 5 August Admiral Hipper received orders to return immediately to Germany. The cruiser first replenished from Dithmarschen before heading for the Norwegian coast. On 10 August Admiral Hipper arrived in Wilhelmshaven. The overhaul in Wilhelmshaven was completed on 9 September and with a new commanding officer, Wilhelm Meisel ,
24800-418: Was sent from Kiel to Narvik escorted by the destroyer Z23 and the torpedo boats T9 and T12 from 15 to 19 August. Ulm was to lay a minefield off Cape Zhelaniya , the most northerly point of Novaya Zemlya, after the completion of Operation Wonderland ( Unternehmen Wunderland 16 August – 5 October 1942). The minefield would force Allied ships to steer more to the south and bring them into
24960-410: Was to divide his force in half; he would take Admiral Hipper and three destroyers north of the convoy to attack it and draw away the escorts. Lützow and the remaining three destroyers would then attack the undefended convoy from the south. At 09:15 on the 31st, the British destroyer Obdurate spotted the three destroyers screening for Admiral Hipper ; the Germans opened fire first. Four of
25120-620: Was to mine the Yugorsky Strait , the sound between the Kara Sea and the Pechora Sea . The US heavy cruiser USS Tuscaloosa , with two US and three British destroyer escorts, had delivered the ground crews and equipment for Operation Orator , then sailed from the Soviet Union on 24 August and after picking up survivors from Convoy PQ 17 were in the Barents Sea . The Admiralty ordered
25280-399: Was to sail from Altafjord escorted by the destroyers Z23 , Z28 , Z29 and Z30 . On 24 September, Admiral Hipper sailed with its four destroyer escorts, present until the morning of 26 September. In the evening the minefield was laid on the north-west coast of Novaya Zemlya. Admiral Hipper picked up radio traffic from ships nearby and Meisel wanted to investigate but Kummetz
25440-670: Was ultimately broken up for scrap in 1948–1952; her bell is currently on display at the Laboe Naval Memorial near Kiel. The Admiral Hipper class of heavy cruisers was ordered in the context of German naval rearmament after the Nazi Party came to power in 1933 and repudiated the disarmament clauses of the Treaty of Versailles . In 1935, Germany signed the Anglo–German Naval Agreement with Great Britain, which provided
25600-462: Was used on the Delaware River as a drift mine, destroying a small boat near its intended target, a British warship. The 1804 Raid on Boulogne made extensive use of explosive devices designed by inventor Robert Fulton . The 'torpedo-catamaran' was a coffer-like device balanced on two wooden floats and steered by a man with a paddle. Weighted with lead so as to ride low in the water, the operator
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