Not all wrecked ships end their history in the depths of the sea, the fate of some of them is more prosaic - they run aground. We will tell you about the most impressive ships that have remained forever in shallow water.

World Discoverer

1. The ship with the sonorous name World Discoverer was built in 1974. Its main task was to make cruises in the polar regions. The ship's hull was specially designed so that the ship could cope with the impact polar ice, however, this did not save him: on April 30, 2000, the World Discoverer ran into a reef that was not marked on the map, the starboard side received significant damage. In order to prevent the ship from sinking and to avoid human casualties, the captain decided to "throw" aground in Roderick Dhu Bay. Despite the fact that the ship was subsequently plundered by marauders, at the present moment it is a popular place among lovers of sea romance.

Mediterranean Sky

2. Mediterranean Sky, or, as it was called during construction, the City of York, was built in 1952 in Newcastle (England). A cruise ship departed London in November 1953 and served in this port until 1971, until she was sold and renamed Mediterranean Sky. The last voyage of the ship took place in August 1996 on the route Brindisi - Patras. Due to the financial situation of the ship-owning company, in 1997 the ship was seized. Two years later Mediterranean Sky was towed to the Gulf of Eleusis (Greece). In late 2002, the ship began to take on water and tilt. In order to prevent sinking, it was towed to shallow water, but this did not help: in January 2003, the ship nevertheless capsized to one side and remained lying in anticipation of its fate.

Captayannis

3. Captayannis was a Greek cargo ship whose main task was to transport sugar. In 1974, during a storm, the ship was seriously damaged by a collision with a tanker: the anchor chains of the latter damaged the Captayannis hull, and water began to flow inside. The captain attempted to steer the ship into shallow water, where it was successfully stuck on a sandbar. However, the next morning the ship capsized and is still lying there. Marauders took everything they could from the ship, and now it is slowly covered with vegetation and serves as a home for many birds. Locals simply call it "sugar ship" and are happy to show it to all visitors.

4. The history of "America" ​​began at the shipyard of the city of Newport News (Virginia, USA). Launching took place on August 31, 1939 in the presence of Eleanor Roosevelt herself. They tried to make the interior of the ship as cozy as possible, and ceramics and stainless steel were used in its decoration. On August 22, 1940, America set off on her maiden voyage, but already in 1941 the ship was requisitioned by the US Navy and sent back to Newport News for conversion into a warship. After the end of the war, "America" ​​went along the route New York - Le Havre - Bremehaven, and in 1964 it was sold to a Greek company and renamed "Australis". After serving with the Greeks, the ship was resold five more times. The last resale took place in 1993 to be converted into a five-star floating hotel in Thailand, this time the ship was named America's Star. In 1993, the liner left Greece in tow, but during a storm the tow rope broke. Several attempts to restore it were unsuccessful, and on January 18, 1994, the Star of America ran aground near canary islands.

Dimitrios

5. Dimitrios (old name - Kintholm) is a small (67 meters) cargo ship that was built in 1950. After three decades, on December 23, 1981, the ship ran aground off the coast of Greece. There are many rumors regarding the origin of the ship and its wreck. There is even a version that Dimitrios was used to transport smuggled cigarettes between Turkey and Italy, and the Greek authorities seized the ship and deliberately released it so that it had to go five kilometers in shallow water. According to another version, on December 4, 1980, the ship was forced to enter the Greek port due to the serious illness of the captain. After arriving at the port, due to various problems with both the crew and the ship itself, the entire crew was disbanded and the ship was left in port. There it was until June 1981, until its presence was recognized as unsafe. After that, the ship changed its location many times until it finally got stuck in the place where it is to this day. No attempt has been made to restore it.

6. Olympia was a commercial ship that was captured by pirates in 1979 en route from Cyprus to Greece. After an unsuccessful attempt to pull the ship out of the bay near the island of Amorgos, where it was driven by sea robbers, the ship has remained there until now, becoming the most remarkable object on the island.

8. The French barge BOS 400 was the largest floating crane in Africa with a length of 100 meters, and on June 26, 1994 ran aground in the bay South Africa while being towed by the Russian Tiger. The ships had to make their way from the Congo to Cape Town, but during a storm the towline was damaged and the barge ran aground at a place called Duiker Point. Despite several towing attempts, the floating crane was completely lost.

La Famille Express

9. La Famille Express was built in 1952 in Poland and served in the Soviet Navy under the name "Fort Shevchenko" until 1999, after which it was sold and received its second (and last) name. The circumstances of the shipwreck are not known for certain, except that the ship ran aground during Hurricane Francis in 2004 off the southern waters of Provo, near the Turks and Caicos Islands (Caribbean Sea). No attempt was made to tow the ship, and it was quickly plundered by marauders. But now the abandoned ship serves as an excellent attraction for all tourists who find themselves in these parts.

HMAS Protector

10. HMAS Protector was purchased by the South Australian government back in 1884 to protect coastline from possible attacks. The ship passed the first world war and almost passed the second. Ironically, the ship was lost in a collision with a tugboat in July 1943 en route to New Guinea. The rusting remains of the ship can still be seen in the same place.

Evangelia

11. Evangelia is a merchant ship that was built in the same shipyard as the Titanic. On May 28, 1942, the ship was launched under the name Empire Strength. Later it was also known as Saxon Star, Redbrook and finally Evangelia. In 1968, during a thick night fog, the ship sailed too close to the shore and ran aground near Costinesti (Romania). Some say it was done on purpose to get insurance payouts. The hypothesis is indirectly confirmed by the fact that at the time of the crash, despite dense fog, there was no storm at sea, and all equipment was working properly.

Santa Maria

12. "Santa Maria" was a Spanish bulk carrier whose main task was to transport a huge number of various kinds of gifts from the Spanish government to those who supported the country during the economic crisis. The ship was carrying sports cars, food, medicines, clothing and more. On September 1, 1968, the ship ran aground while passing through Cape Verde on its way to Brazil and Argentina. The local tug tried to save the ship, but the attempt was unsuccessful, but the valuable cargo somehow miraculously disappeared. Since then, "Santa Maria" has been one of the main attractions of Cape Verde.

13. The wreck of Maheho can rightfully be called one of the most famous shipwrecks of the 20th century. The ship was built in 1905 and was one of the first turbine steamers. Maheho operated a scheduled Sydney to Auckland service until he was called into service during the First World War. In 1935 the ship was sold to Japan. While towing it, the ships were caught in a severe storm and the towline broke. Futile attempts to secure the cable during the storm did not lead to anything, and Maheho set off for "free sailing" with eight crew members on board. Three days later, the ship was found on the coast of Fraser Island - fortunately, no one from the team was injured. After this incident, Maheho was put up for sale, but no buyers were found, and he is still in the same place. Beaten by time, rusted and not needed by anyone except tourists.

On April 16, 1945, exactly 117 years after the death of Francisco Goya, the Goya ship was sunk by a torpedo attack carried out by a Soviet submarine. This catastrophe, which claimed 7,000 lives, was the largest shipwreck in world history.

"Goya" was a Norwegian cargo ship, requisitioned by the Germans. On April 16, 1945, it did not work out in the morning. The bombardment to which the ship was subjected became a grim omen of the coming catastrophe. Despite the defense, during the fourth raid, the projectile still hit the bow of the Goya. Several people were injured, but the ship remained afloat and it was decided not to cancel the flight.

For "Goya" it was the fifth evacuation flight from the advancing units of the Red Army. During the four previous campaigns, almost 20,000 refugees, wounded and soldiers were evacuated.
In your last flight"Goya" went loaded to failure. Passengers were in the aisles, on the stairs, in the holds. Not everyone had documents, so the exact number of passengers has not yet been established, from 6,000 to 7,000. All of them believed that the war was over for them, made plans and were full of hope ...

The ships (Goya was escorted by a convoy) were already at sea when, at 22:30, surveillance noticed an unidentified silhouette on the right side of the ship. Everyone was ordered to put on rescue residents. There were only 1500 of them on board the Goya. In addition, on one of the ships of the group, the Kronenfels, there was a breakdown in the engine room. Waiting for the end of the repair work, the ships lay adrift. An hour later, the ships continued on their way.
At 23:45, the Goya shuddered from a powerful torpedo attack. The Soviet submarine L-3, following the ships, began to act.
Panic broke out on the Goya. Jochen Hannema, a German tanker who became one of the few survivors, recalled: “Water rushed out of the huge holes formed as a result of torpedo hits. The ship broke into two parts and began to sink rapidly. All that was heard was the eerie rumble of a huge mass of water.
A huge ship, devoid of partitions, sank in some 20 minutes. Only 178 people survived.

"Wilhelm Gustlow"

On January 30, 1945, at 21:15, the S-13 submarine discovered in the Baltic waters the German transport Wilhelm Gustlov, accompanied by an escort, carrying, according to modern estimates, over 10 thousand people, most of whom were refugees from East Prussia : old people, children, women. But also on the Gustlov were German submarine cadets, crew members and other military personnel.
Submarine captain Alexander Marinesko began hunting. For almost three hours, the Soviet submarine followed the giant transporter (the displacement of the Gustlov was over 25 thousand tons. For comparison: the steamer Titanic and the battleship Bismarck had a displacement of about 50 thousand tons).
Having chosen the moment, Marinesko attacked the Gustlov with three torpedoes, each of which hit the target. The fourth torpedo with the inscription "For Stalin" got stuck. The submariners miraculously managed to avoid an explosion on the boat.

Avoiding the pursuit of the German military escort, the S-13 was bombed by over 200 depth charges.

The sinking of the Wilhelm Gustlow is considered one of the largest disasters in maritime history. According to official figures, 5,348 people died in it, according to some historians, real losses could exceed 9,000.

They were called the "Ships of Hell". These were Japanese merchant ships used to transport prisoners of war and workers (in fact, slaves, who were nicknamed "romushi") to the territories occupied by the Japanese during the Second World War. The “ships of hell” were not officially part of the Japanese navy and did not have identification marks, but the allied forces drowned them no less fiercely from this. Only for war time 9 "Ships of Hell" were sunk, on which almost 25 thousand people died.

It is worth saying that the British and Americans could not have been unaware of the "cargo" that was transported on the ships, since the Japanese ciphers were deciphered.

The biggest disaster occurred on September 18, 1944. The British submarine Tradewind torpedoed the Japanese ship Junyo Maru. Of the life-saving equipment on the ship, stuffed to capacity with prisoners of war, there were two lifeboats and several rafts. On board were 4.2 thousand workers, 2.3 thousand prisoners of war Americans, Australians, British, Dutch and Indonesians.

The conditions in which the slaves had to survive on ships were simply horrendous. Many went crazy, died of exhaustion and stuffiness. When the torpedoed ship began to sink, there was no chance for the ship's prisoners to escape. The boats accompanying the "ship of hell" took only the Japanese and a small part of the prisoners on board. In total, 680 prisoners of war and 200 romushi remained alive.

This was the case when the living envied the dead. The miraculously escaped captives were sent to their destination - to the construction railway to Sumatra. The chances of surviving there were not much greater than on the ill-fated ship.

"Armenia"

The cargo-passenger ship "Armenia" was built in Leningrad and was used on the Odessa-Batumi line. During the Great Patriotic War in August 1941, "Armenia" was converted into a medical transport ship. The board and deck began to be "decorated" with large red crosses, which, in theory, were supposed to protect the ship from attacks, but ...

During the defense of Odessa, "Armenia" made 15 flights to the besieged city, from where more than 16 thousand people were taken on board. The last flight of "Armenia" was a campaign from Sevastopol to Tuapse in November 1941. On November 6, having taken on board the wounded, almost the entire medical personnel of the Black Sea Fleet and civilians, "Armenia" left Sevastopol.

At night, the ship arrived in Yalta. The captain of the "Armenia" was forbidden to make the transition to Tuapse during daylight hours, but the military situation dictated otherwise. The port of Yalta did not have cover to protect against German air raids, and German troops were already on the near approaches to the city. And there wasn't much choice...

At 8 am on November 7, "Armenia" left Yalta and headed for Tuapse. At 11:25 a.m., the ship was attacked by a German He-111 torpedo bomber and sank less than 5 minutes after the torpedo hit the bow. Between 4,000 and 7,500 people were killed along with "Armenia", and only eight managed to escape. Until now, the causes of this terrible tragedy are controversial.

"Dona Paz"

The sinking of the Doña Paz ferry is the largest shipwreck that has occurred in peacetime. This tragedy has become a cruel lesson, denouncing greed, unprofessionalism and slovenliness. The sea, as you know, does not forgive mistakes, and in the case of the Dania Paz, mistakes followed one after another.
The ferry was built in Japan in 1963. At that time it was called "Himeuri Maru". In 1975, he was sold to the Philippines for a profit. Since that time, he has been exploited even more than mercilessly. Designed to carry a maximum of 608 passengers, it was usually packed to capacity, seating between 1,500 and 4,500 people.

Ferry performed twice a week Passenger Transportation on the route Manila - Tacloban - Catbalogan - Manila - Catbalogan - Tacloban - Manila. On December 20, 1987, the Doña Paz left on her last voyage from Tacloban to Manila. This flight was filled with a maximum of passengers - the Filipinos were in a hurry to the capital for the New Year.

At ten in the evening of the same day, the ferry collided with the huge tanker "Vector". From the collision, both ships literally broke in half, thousands of tons of oil spilled into the ocean. The explosion caused a fire. The chances of salvation were reduced to almost zero. The situation was aggravated by the fact that the ocean at the site of the tragedy was teeming with sharks.

One survivor, Paquito Osabel, later recalled: " Neither the sailors nor the ship's officers reacted in any way to what was happening. Everyone demanded life jackets and a lifeboat, but there were none. The lockers where the vests were kept were locked, and the keys could not be found. The boats were thrown into the water just like that, without any preparation. Panic, chaos, chaos reigned".

The rescue operation began only eight hours after the tragedy. 26 people were caught from the sea. 24 are passengers of the Doñi Paz, two are sailors from the tanker Vektor. Official statistics, which cannot be trusted, speak of the death of 1,583 people. More objective, independent experts claim that 4,341 people died in the disaster.

"Cap Arkona"

"Cap Arkona" was one of the largest passenger ships in Germany, with a displacement of 27,561 tons. Having survived almost the entire war, Cap Arkona died after the capture of Berlin by the Allied forces, when on May 3, 1945 the liner was sunk by British bombers.

Benjamin Jacobs, one of the prisoners at Cap Arcona, wrote in his book The Dentist of Auschwitz: " Suddenly the planes appeared. We clearly saw their insignia. "It's the English! Look, we are KaTsetniki! We are prisoners of concentration camps!” we shouted and waved our hands at them. We waved our striped camp hats and pointed to our striped clothes, but there was no compassion for us. The British began to throw napalm at the shaking and burning Cap Arcona. On the next run, the planes descended, now they were at a distance of 15 m from the deck, we could clearly see the pilot's face and thought that we had nothing to be afraid of. But then bombs rained down from the belly of the plane... Some fell on the deck, others into the water... Machine guns fired at us and at those who jumped into the water. The water around the sinking bodies turned red".

On board the blazing Cap Arcona, more than 4,000 prisoners were burned to death or suffocated by the smoke. Some prisoners managed to break free and jump into the sea. Those who managed to avoid the sharks were picked up by trawlers. 350 prisoners, many of whom suffered from burns, managed to get out before the liner capsized. They swam ashore, but became victims of the SS. In total, 5594 people died on Cap Arcone.

"Lancasteria"

About the tragedy that occurred on June 17, 1940, Western historiography prefers to remain silent. Moreover, a veil of oblivion covered this terrible catastrophe on the day it happened. This is due to the fact that on the same day France surrendered to the Nazi troops, and Winston Churchill decided not to report anything about the death of the ship, as this could break the morale of the British. This is not surprising: the Lancaster disaster was the largest mass death of the British during the Second World War, the number of victims exceeded the sum of the victims of the death of the Titanic and Louisitania.

Liner "Lancastria" was built in 1920 and after the outbreak of World War II was operated as a military ship. On June 17, he evacuated troops from Norway. The German bomber Junkers 88, which noticed the ship, began bombing. The liner was hit by 10 bombs. According to official figures, there were 4,500 soldiers and 200 crew members on board. About 700 people were saved. According to unofficial data published in Brian Crabb's book on the disaster, it is said that the number of victims is deliberately underestimated.

Many mistakenly believe that the Titanic is the worst tragedy that has ever happened on the water. All this is far from true, he is not even in the top ten. So, let's begin..
1. "Goya" (Germany) - 6900 dead.
On April 4, 1945, the ship "Goya" stood in the Danzig Bay, waiting for the loading of the military and refugees. The bay was under constant shelling by Soviet artillery, one of the shells hit the Goya, lightly injuring the captain of the ship, Plünnecke.
In addition to civilians and wounded soldiers, there were 200 soldiers of the 25th tank regiment of the Wehrmacht on board.
At 19:00, the convoy, consisting of three ships: the Goya, the steamer Kronenfels (1944, built in 1944, 2834 brt.) and the sea tug Ägir (Ägir), left the Danzig Bay, accompanied by two minesweepers M- 256 and M-328 to the city of Swinemünde.

At that time, at the exit from the Danzig Bay, the Soviet submarine L-3 under the command of Vladimir Konovalov was waiting for German ships. The largest ship of the convoy was chosen for the attack. Around 23:00 the route of the convoy was changed, the convoy headed for the city of Copenhagen.
Guards submarine "L-3" ("Frunzevets")

To catch up with the Goya, the Soviet submarine had to go on the surface on diesel engines (in the underwater position, the electric motors could not develop the required speed). L-3 caught up with the Goya and at 23:52 successfully torpedoed the ship with two torpedoes. The Goya sank seven minutes after the torpedo attack, killing between 6,000 and 7,000 people, the exact number of people on board remained unknown. Escort ships managed to save 157 people, during the day other ships found another 28 people alive.
Such a rapid immersion of the ship under water is explained by the fact that the Goya ship was not a passenger ship and did not have partitions between compartments, as was prescribed for passenger ships.
On July 8, 1945, for the exemplary performance of the command’s combat missions, personal courage and heroism shown in battles with the Nazi invaders, Guard Captain 3rd Rank Vladimir Konovalov was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union with the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star medal.
Konovalov Vladimir Konstantinovich
2. Junyo-maru (Japan) - 5620 dead.

Junyo-maru is a Japanese cargo ship, one of the "ships of hell". "Ships of hell" - the name of the ships of the Japanese merchant fleet, transporting prisoners of war and workers forcibly taken from the occupied territories. "Ships of Hell" did not have any special designations. The Americans and the British drowned them on a common basis.
On March 18, 1944, the ship was attacked by the British submarine Tradewind and sank. At that moment, on board were 1377 Dutch, 64 British and Australian, 8 American prisoners of war, as well as 4200 Javanese workers (Romush) sent to build a railway in Sumatra. The disaster was the greatest for its time, claiming the lives of 5620 people. The 723 survivors were rescued only to be sent to work similar to the construction of the Death Road, where they were also likely to die.
3. Toyama-maru (Japan) - 5600 dead.

Another ship from the list of "ships of hell". The ship was sunk on 29 June 1944 by the American submarine Sturgeon.
4. "Cap Arkona" (Germany) - 5594 dead- (a terrible tragedy, almost all of them were prisoners of concentration camps).

At the end of the war, Reichsführer Himmler issued a secret order for the evacuation of the concentration camps and the destruction of all prisoners, not one of whom was to fall into the hands of the Allies alive. On May 2, 1945, on the Cap Arcona liner, the cargo ship Thielbek and the ships Athen and Deutschland, which were in the harbor of Lübeck, SS troops delivered 1000-2000 concentration camp prisoners on barges: from Stutthof near Danzig, Neuengamme near Hamburg and Mittelbau-Dora near Nordhausen. Hundreds of prisoners died along the way. The captains of the ships, however, refused to accept them, since there were already 11,000 prisoners, mostly Jews, on their ships. Therefore, early in the morning of May 3, the barges with the prisoners were ordered to return to the shore.
As the half-dead men began to come ashore, the SS, Hitler Jugend and Marines opened fire with machine guns and killed over 500. 350 survived. At the same time, British planes flew in and began bombing ships with white flags raised. "Thielbek" sank in 15-20 minutes. 50 Jews survived. The prisoners on the Athen survived because the ship was ordered to return to Neustadt to pick up additional prisoners from the Stutthof concentration camp by barge. It saved the lives of 1998 people.
The camp striped uniforms of the prisoners were clearly visible to the pilots, but English order No. 73 read: "destroy all concentrated enemy ships in the harbor of Lübeck."
“All of a sudden there were planes. We clearly saw their insignia. "It's the English! Look, we are KaTsetniki! We are prisoners of concentration camps!” we shouted and waved our hands at them. We waved our striped camp hats and pointed to our striped clothes, but there was no compassion for us. The British began to throw napalm at the shaking and burning Cap Arcona. On the next run, the planes descended, now they were at a distance of 15 m from the deck, we could clearly see the pilot's face and thought that we had nothing to be afraid of. But then bombs rained down from the belly of the plane... Some fell on the deck, others into the water... Machine guns fired at us and at those who jumped into the water. The water around the drowning bodies turned red,” wrote Benjamin Jacobs in The Dentist of Auschwitz.
Burning Cap Arcona shortly after the attack began.
The British continued to shoot at the prisoners who launched the boat or simply jumped overboard. 64 shells were fired at Cap Arcona and 15 bombs were dropped on it. It burned for a long time and the people on it burned alive. Most of those who jumped overboard drowned or were killed. 350-500 were saved. In total, 13,000 died, and 1,450 survived. The barges, the sea and the coast were littered with corpses.
The next day, May 4, the Germans surrendered to Field Marshal Montgomery.
5. "Wilhelm Gustloff" (Germany) - 5300 dead

At the beginning of 1945, a significant number of people were fleeing in panic from the advancing Red Army. Many of them followed to the ports on the coast Baltic Sea. To evacuate a huge number of refugees, on the initiative of German Admiral Karl Dönitz, a special operation "Hannibal" was carried out, which went down in history as the largest evacuation of the population by sea in history. During this operation, almost 2 million civilians were evacuated to Germany - for big courts, as "Wilhelm Gustloff", as well as on bulk carriers and tugs.
Thus, as part of Operation Hannibal, on January 22, 1945, the Wilhelm Gustloff in the port of Gdynia began to take on board refugees. At first, people were placed on special passes - first of all, several dozen submarine officers, several hundred women from the naval auxiliary division, and almost a thousand wounded soldiers. Later, when tens of thousands of people gathered in the port and the situation became more complicated, they began to let everyone in, giving preference to women and children. Since the planned number of seats was only 1,500, refugees began to be placed on decks, in passageways. Women soldiers were placed even in an empty pool. In the last stages of the evacuation, the panic intensified so much that some women in the port, in desperation, began to give their children to those who managed to board, hoping to at least save them in this way. In the end, on January 30, 1945, the officers of the ship's crew already stopped counting the refugees, whose number exceeded 10,000.
According to modern estimates, there should have been 10,582 people on board: 918 cadets of junior groups of the 2nd submarine training division, 173 crew members, 373 women from the auxiliary marine corps, 162 seriously wounded soldiers, and 8956 refugees, mostly old people, women and children. When the Wilhelm Gustloff, escorted by two escort ships, finally withdrew at 12:30, disputes arose between the four senior officers on the captain's bridge. In addition to the commander of the ship, Captain Friedrich Petersen (German Friedrich Petersen), called up from retirement, there were on board the commander of the 2nd submarine training division and two captains of the merchant fleet, and there was no agreement between them on which fairway to navigate the ship and what precautions to take take on submarines and allied aircraft. The outer fairway was chosen (German designation Zwangsweg 58). Contrary to the recommendations to zigzag to complicate the attack of submarines, it was decided to go straight ahead at a speed of 12 knots, since the corridor in the minefields was not wide enough and the captains hoped to get out to safe waters faster in this way; in addition, the ship was running out of fuel. The liner could not reach full speed due to the damage received during the bombing. In addition, the TF-19 torpedoes returned to the port of Gotenhafen, having received damage to the hull in a collision with a stone, and only one destroyer Löwe remained in guard. At 18:00, a message was received of a convoy of minesweepers that was allegedly moving towards them, and when it was already dark, they were ordered to turn on their navigation lights to prevent a collision. In reality, there were no minesweepers, and the circumstances of the appearance of this radio message have remained unclear to this day. According to other sources, the section of minesweepers was trawling towards the convoy, and appeared later than the time given in the notification.
When the commander of the Soviet submarine S-13 Alexander Marinesko saw and went nuts brightly lit, contrary to all norms of military practice, "Wilhelm Gustloff", then for two hours he followed him on the surface, choosing a position for attack. Normally, submarines of the time were unable to catch up with surface ships, but Captain Peterson was running slower than design speed given the significant overcrowding and uncertainty about the state of the ship after years of inactivity and repairs after the bombing. At 19:30, without waiting for the minesweepers, Peterson gave the command to put out the fires, but it was too late - Marinesko worked out a plan of attack.
Submarine S-13

At about nine o'clock S-13 came from the side of the coast, where they could least expect it from a distance of less than 1,000 m at 21:04 fired the first torpedo with the inscription "For the Motherland", and then two more - "For the Soviet people" and "For Leningrad. The fourth, already cocked torpedo "For Stalin", got stuck in the torpedo tube and almost exploded, but they managed to neutralize it, close the hatches of the vehicles and dive.
Captain of the third rank A. I. Marinesko
At 21:16 the first torpedo hit the bow of the ship, later the second blew up the empty pool where the women of the naval auxiliary battalion were, and the last one hit the engine room. The passengers' first thought was that they had hit a mine, but Captain Peterson realized it was a submarine and his first words were: Das war's (That's it). Those passengers who did not die from three explosions and did not drown in the cabins of the lower decks rushed to the lifeboats in a panic. At that moment, it turned out that by ordering to close, according to the instructions, the watertight compartments in lower decks, the captain accidentally blocked part of the team, which was supposed to launch the boats and evacuate passengers. Therefore, in the panic and stampede, not only many children and women died, but also many of those who got out on the upper deck. They could not lower the lifeboats, because they did not know how to do it, moreover, many of the davits were covered with ice, and the ship had already received a strong heel. With the joint efforts of the crew and passengers, some boats were launched, and yet there were many people in the icy water. From the strong roll of the ship, an anti-aircraft gun came off the deck and crushed one of the boats, already full of people. About an hour after the attack, the Wilhelm Gustloff completely sank.
Two weeks later, on February 10, 1945, the S-13 submarine under the command of Alexander Marinesko sank another large German transport, the General Steuben, more on that below.
6. "Armenia" (USSR) - approximately 5,000 dead.

Around 17:00 on November 6, 1941, "Armenia" left the port of Sevastopol, evacuating a military hospital and residents of the city. According to various estimates, there were from 4.5 to 7 thousand people on board. At 2:00 am on November 7, the ship arrived in Yalta, where it took on board several hundred more people. At 8:00 the ship left the port. At 11:25 a.m., the ship was attacked by a single German Heinkel He-111 torpedo bomber belonging to the 1st squadron of the I / KG28 air group. The aircraft approached from the shore and dropped two torpedoes from a distance of 600 m. One of them hit the bow of the ship. After 4 minutes, "Armenia" sank. Despite the fact that the transport had the hallmarks of a medical ship, "Armenia" violated this status, as it was armed with four 21-K anti-aircraft guns. In addition to the wounded and refugees, there were military personnel and NKVD officers on board. The ship was escorted by two armed boats and two I-153 fighters. In this regard, “Armenia” was a “legitimate” military target from the point of view of international law.
German medium bomber "Heinkel He-111"

Several thousand wounded soldiers and evacuated citizens were on the ship. The staff of the main hospital of the Black Sea Fleet and a number of other military and civilian hospitals (a total of 23 hospitals), the leadership of the Artek pioneer camp and part of the party leadership of the Crimea were also loaded onto the ship. The loading of the evacuees was in a hurry, their exact number is not known (just like when the Germans were evacuated from Germany at the end of the war - on the ships Wilhelm Gustloff, Goya). Officially, in Soviet times, it was believed that about 5 thousand people died, at the beginning of the 21st century, estimates were increased to 7-10 thousand people. Only eight were saved.
7. "Ryusei-maru" (Japan) - 4998 dead

The Ryusei Maru was a Japanese ship that was torpedoed by the American submarine USS Rasher on February 25, 1944, killing 4,998 people. Another ship from the list of "ships of hell".
8. "Dona Paz" (Philippines) - 4375 dead

Until the time of the collision, Dona Paz operated passenger flights twice a week along the route Manila-Tacloban-Catbalogan-Manila-Catbalogan-Tacloban-Manila. The ship left its last flight on December 20, 1987. At about 10 p.m. on the same day, the ferry collided with the tanker Vektor near Marinduke Island. This disaster is considered the largest among those that occurred in peacetime.
9. "Lancastria" (UK) - approximately 4,000 dead

Until 1932, Lancastria made regular flights from Liverpool to New York, then was used as a cruise ship that sailed along mediterranean sea and along the coast of northern Europe.
On October 10, 1932, the Lancastria rescued the crew of the Belgian ship Scheldestad, which was sinking in the Bay of Biscay.
In April 1940, it was requisitioned by the Admiralty and converted into a military transport. In a new capacity, it was first used during the evacuation of allied forces from Norway. On June 17, 1940, she was sunk by German aircraft off the coast of France, killing more than 4,000 people, which exceeded the total number of victims of the Titanic and Lusitania crashes.
10. General Steuben (Germany) - 3608 dead

During the Second World War, until 1944, the liner was used as a hotel for the senior officers of the Kriegsmarine in Kiel and Danzig, after 1944 the ship was converted into a hospital and participated in the evacuation of people (mostly wounded soldiers and refugees) from East Prussia from the advancing Red Army.
On February 9, 1945, the Steuben liner left the port of Pillau (now Baltiysk) and headed for Kiel, there were more than 4,000 people on board the liner - 2,680 wounded military personnel, 100 soldiers, about 900 refugees, 270 military medical personnel and 285 ship crew members. The vessel was escorted by the destroyer T-196 and minesweeper TF-10.
The German liner was discovered on the evening of February 9 by the Soviet submarine S-13 under the command of Alexander Marinesko. For four and a half hours, the Soviet submarine pursued the Steuben and finally on the night of February 10 at 00:55 torpedoed the liner with two torpedoes. The liner sank 15 minutes later, killing more than 3600 people (the following numbers are given: 3608 died, 659 people were rescued).
When the liner was torpedoed, the submarine commander Alexander Marinesko was convinced that it was not a passenger liner in front of him, but the Emden military cruiser.
Cruiser "Emden" for comparison.

The fact that this is not so, Marinesko learned after returning to the base in Finnish Turku from local newspapers.
Until December 1944, the Steuben made 18 flights, evacuating a total of 26,445 wounded and 6,694 refugees.
11. Tilbeck (Germany) - approximately 2800 dead

Died near Cap Arcona (see item 4)
12. "Salzburg" (Germany) - approximately 2000 dead

On September 22, 1942, the M-118 submarine (commander - lieutenant commander Sergey Stepanovich Savin) headed for position No. 42 (Cape Burnas area) from Poti. The task of the boat was to prevent enemy navigation and sink his ships.
On October 1, 1942, the Salzburg transport was part of the Yuzhny convoy, which left Ochakov for the Romanian port of Sulina. The convoy also included the Bulgarian steamship Tsar Ferdinand (which was sunk two years later, on October 2, 1944, by the French submarine FS Curie). After the convoy passed the traverse of Odessa, it was guarded by the Romanian gunboats Lokotenent-Commander Verses Eugen, Subotenent Giculescu Ion and minesweeper MR-7. Aerial surveillance of the situation was carried out by the Arado Ar 196 seaplane (some sources mention Cant-501z) of the Romanian Air Force.
The Salzburg was carrying 810 tons of scrap metal (according to other sources, it was carrying coal). In addition, from 2,000 to 2,300 Soviet prisoners of war were on board.
Due to the danger of being attacked by Soviet submarines, which were constantly on duty in this area, the convoy was moving close to the coast, and the guard ships covered it more seaward.
Submarine M-118

At 13.57, an explosion is heard at the starboard side of the second Salzburg, and a column of water rises above the superstructure and masts.
The covering ships began to search for a boat seaward from the convoy, but to no avail. At this time, the captain of the Salzburg received the command to run the ship aground. However, already 13 minutes after the explosion, the ship sits down with its hull on the ground. Only the masts and the pipe remain above the water.
"Lokotenent-commander Verses Eugen" continued to accompany the Bulgarian transport, and "Sublokotenent Giculescu Ion" and the minesweeper approached the Salzburg in distress.
At this time, the M-118, which was between the shore and the convoy during the attack, began to move, and the pilots of the patrol aircraft noticed the muddy track stirred up by the propellers. When the headquarters received a signal about the discovery of a submarine, the minesweeper was ordered to catch up with the convoy and protect it from a possible new attack, and the Giculescu Ion Sub-Cotenent headed for the place where the boat was discovered. From the air, the boat was hunted by a German seaplane BV-138 from the 3rd squadron of the 125th reconnaissance air group. After dropping a series of depth charges from a Romanian gunboat, oil stains appeared on the water and wooden debris floated up.
Seaplane BV-138

At 15.45, the commander of the convoy from the gunboat "Lokotenent-commander Poems Eugen" sent another radiogram to the headquarters, in which he reported that the "Salzburg" sank in shallow water, only masts and superstructures remained above the water, and bad weather, strong winds and rough seas, as well as a lack of rescue equipment, make it very difficult to carry out rescue operations. Only after this message, at 16.45, the German boat minesweepers "FR-1", "FR-3", "FR-9" and "FR-10" were sent from Bugaz to the place of the ship's sinking, and at 17.32 they reported that ". ..70 Russians are hanging from the masts.”
The Romanian command of the naval forces of the region turned to the help of local fishermen, who were alerted and sent to sea. Fishermen rescued 42 prisoners of war from the water.
At 20.00, the Bulgarian steamer "Tsar Ferdinand" and escort ships entered the port of Sulina, delivering part of the rescued, including 13 members of the Salzburg crew, 5 German gunners from the calculation of the anti-aircraft installation of the deceased ship, 16 guards and 133 prisoners of war.
Boat minesweepers "FR-1", "FR-3", "FR-9" and "FR-10" rescued another 75 prisoners of war.
In total, 6 Germans and 2080 Soviet prisoners of war died on the Salzburg transport.
M-118 did not go on the air anymore, did not return to the base.
13. "Titanic" (UK) - 1514 dead.
We told readers about it in detail in articles:

14. "Hood" (UK) - 1415 dead.

He died heroically in the battle in the Danish Strait - a naval battle of the Second World War between the ships of the Royal Navy of Great Britain and the Kriegsmarine (naval forces of the Third Reich). The British battleship Prince of Wales and the battlecruiser Hood tried to prevent the famous German battleship Bismarck and the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen from breaking through the Denmark Strait into the North Atlantic.
At 0535 hours on 24 May, lookouts from the Prince of Wales spotted a German squadron at a distance of 17 miles (28 km). The Germans knew of the enemy's presence from hydrophone readings and soon also noticed the masts of British ships on the horizon. Vice Admiral Holland had a choice: either continue to escort the Bismarck, waiting for the arrival of the battleships of Admiral Tovey's squadron, or attack on his own. Holland decided to attack and at 05-37 gave the order to approach the enemy. at 0552 Hood opened fire from a range of approximately 13 miles (24 km). "Hood" continued to close with the enemy at full speed, trying to reduce the time of falling under mounted fire. Meanwhile, the German ships fired on the cruiser: the first 203-mm shell from the "Prinz Eugen" hit middle part"Khuda", next to the aft 102-mm installation and caused a strong fire in the supply of shells and missiles. At 05:55, Holland ordered a 20-degree turn to port so that the aft turrets could fire on the Bismarck.
At about 06:00, before completing the turn, the cruiser was covered by a volley from the Bismarck from a distance of 8 to 9.5 miles (15 - 18 km). Almost immediately, a giant fountain of fire appeared in the area of ​​​​the mainmast, after which there was a powerful explosion that tore the cruiser in half.
German battleship Bismarck

The Hood's stern sank quickly. bow rose and swayed in the air for some time, after which she also sank (at the last moment, the doomed crew of the bow tower fired another salvo). The Prince of Wales, half a mile away, was bombarded with the wreckage of the Hood.
The cruiser sank in three minutes, taking 1,415 people with her, including Vice Admiral Holland. Only three sailors were saved, who were picked up by the destroyer HMS Electra, which approached two hours later.
15. "Lusitania" (UK) - 1198 dead

The Lusitania left Pier 54, New York, at noon on Saturday, May 1, 1915.
On May 5 and 6, the German submarine U-20 sank three ships, and the Royal Navy sent out a warning to all British ships: "Submarines active off south coast Ireland". Captain Turner received this message twice on May 6 and took all precautions: watertight doors were closed, all windows were battened down, the number of observers was doubled, all boats were uncovered and dumped overboard to speed up the evacuation of passengers in case of danger.
On Friday 7 May at 11:00 the Admiralty transmitted another message and Turner corrected course. He probably thought that the submarines should be on the open sea and would not come from the coast, and the Lusitania would be protected by proximity to land.
At 13:00, one of the sailors of the German submarine U-20 noticed a large four-tube vessel ahead. He informed Captain Walter Schwieger that he had spotted a large four-tube ship traveling at about 18 knots. The boat had little fuel and only one torpedo, the captain was about to return to base, as the boat noticed that the ship was slowly turning to starboard towards the boat.
Captain U-20 Walter Schwieger (will die in 2.5 years along with the submarine U-88 off the coast of Denmark)
The Lusitania was about 30 miles (48 km) from the Irish coast when she entered the fog and reduced her speed to 18 knots. She went to the port of Queenstown - now Cobh - in Ireland, to which there were 43 miles (70 km) of the way.
At 14:10 the lookout spotted an approaching torpedo from the starboard side. A moment later, the torpedo hit the starboard side under the bridge. The explosion sent a column of steel sheathing and water flying upwards, followed by a second, more powerful explosion that caused the Lusitania to list heavily to starboard.
The Lusitania's radio operator sent out a distress signal nonstop. Captain Turner gave the order to abandon ship. Water flooded the longitudinal compartments of the starboard side, causing a 15-degree list to starboard. The captain tried to turn the Lusitania to the Irish coast in the hope of putting it aground, but the ship did not obey the helm, as the torpedo explosion interrupted the steering steam lines. Meanwhile, the ship continued to move at a speed of 18 knots, which caused water to enter faster.
About six minutes later, the Lusitania's tank began to sink. The roll to starboard greatly complicated the descent lifeboats.
U-20 on the Danish coast in 1916. Torpedoes exploded in the bow, destroying the ship

A large number of lifeboats capsized while loading or were overturned by the movement of the ship as they touched the water. The Lusitania carried 48 lifeboats - more than enough for the entire crew and all passengers - but only six lifeboats were launched safely, all on the starboard side. Several collapsible lifeboats were washed off the deck as the liner sank into the water.
Despite the measures taken by Captain Turner, the liner did not reach the shore. Panic broke out on board. By 14:25 Captain Schwieger lowered the periscope and went to sea.
Captain Turner remained on the bridge until he was washed overboard with water. Being an excellent swimmer, he lasted three hours in the water. From the movement of the vessel, water entered the boiler rooms, some boilers exploded, including those under the third pipe, which caused it to collapse, while the rest of the pipes collapsed a little later. The ship went about two miles (3 km) from the place of the torpedo attack to the place of death, leaving a trail of debris and people behind her. At 14:28, the Lusitania capsized with her keel up and sank.
Comparison of the Lusitania and the submarine that destroyed her. Drawing from the journal Nature and People, 1915

The liner sank in 18 minutes 8 miles (13 km) from Kinsale. 1,198 people died, including almost a hundred children. The bodies of many of the victims were buried in Queenstown in Kinsale, the city near the site of the sinking of the Lusitania.
On January 11, 2011, at the age of 95, Audrey Pearle, the last surviving passenger of the liner, who was only three months old at the time of his death, died.

I stumbled across this sad thread. We all hear about the tragedy of the Titanic, but in fact this is far from the largest shipwreck.

As a rule, shipwrecks are not classified as man-made disasters, but it is this record-breaking case in terms of the number of victims that deserves a place among the most terrible man-made tragedies of mankind. The largest disasters at sea, accompanied by many thousands of victims, occurred during the Second World War (we will talk about the largest shipwreck in general in terms of the number of victims), and in peacetime there was only one shipwreck comparable in consequences, which became the largest in history - a collision Philippine ferry "Dona Paz" with a tanker. This tragedy claimed more lives than much more famous crash"Titanic".

Let's take a closer look at this...

An object: passenger ferry "Dona Paz" (MV Doña Paz). Displacement - 2062 tons, length - 93.1 m, maximum width - 13.6 m, designed to carry 1518 passengers. Built in Japan, launched on April 25, 1963, from 1975 (until 1981 - under the name MV Don Sulpicio, from 1981 - under the name MV Doña Paz) was operated by the Philippine operator Sulpicio Lines.

Crash Location: Tablas Strait, near Marinduque Island, Philippines.

Victims: in disaster 4386 people died, of which 4,317 were passengers of the Doña Paz ferry and 58 crew members, as well as 11 crew members of the Vector tanker. Only 24 ferry passengers and 2 tanker crew members were saved. This number of casualties makes this the largest peacetime crash in history.

Chronicle of events

Due to the lack of communication, the chronology of events is built from the words of rare eyewitnesses and the time of the onset of key events is determined approximately.

It is authentically known that the Dona Paz left the port of Tacloban at 6.30 in the morning and headed for Manila, and at about 22.00 — 22.30 the ship was passing through the Tablas Strait near the island of Marinduque. At this time, the weather was clear, there was little roughness at sea, so there were no threats to navigation in the area. But the ferry never arrived in Manila, having crashed somewhere in the strait.

At about 10:30 p.m., the ferry collided with the Vector tanker, which was transporting about a thousand cubic meters of gasoline and other oil products. During the collision, one or two explosions thundered, the tanker immediately began to leak, a large number of gasoline, which immediately flared up. Soon the Doña Paz was also on fire.

Panic broke out on board the ferry, the crew did not take any action to save the passengers. Many people jumped overboard, but most of them soon died from the flames. Some of the passengers did not dare to leave the burning ship, but help never came.

Approximately at midnight The Doña Paz sank, taking with her passengers and any hope of salvation. Near 2.00 the wreck of the tanker sank.

The crash became known only by six o'clock in the morning, the authorities sent rescuers to the crash site, but search and rescue operations lasted no more than one day - a total of 26 people were saved.

Within a few days after the disaster, the remains of 108 people washed ashore. All of them had burn marks, and almost all of them were eaten by sharks, which are very numerous in these seas. Thousands more people were never found, which subsequently made it difficult to accurately calculate the number of victims and find out the causes of the disaster.

The question of the number of victims and the investigation of the crash

Immediately after the shipwreck, confusion arose over the determination of the number of dead. Initially, the investigation relied on the number of officially registered passengers on the Doña Paz ferry - based on this, there were 1,525 passengers and 58 crew members on board the ship.

However, as it turned out later, the ferry was always overloaded, many tickets were sold without registration at a reduced price, and almost no one ever registered children. Therefore, experts soon began to call ever larger numbers - 2000, 3000 and even 4000 passengers. According to the stories of survivors and eyewitnesses, the last figure is most true - many passengers lived in overcrowded cabins, someone took a seat in the corridors, and many were completely located on the deck.

Only later - in 1999 - it was found that the ferry on that tragic day took on board 4341 passengers, and most of them died in the crash.

It should be noted that the relatives of the victims are still continuing litigation against the operator of Sulpicio Lines and the owner of the tanker "Vector" Cal-Tex Philippines, Inc., accusing them of criminal negligence. However, even almost thirty years after the catastrophe, no success was achieved in this matter, and no one was held responsible for the tragedy.

Causes of the disaster

Here we should talk about two groups of reasons: about the reasons for the shipwreck, and about the reasons that led to so many victims. After all, even with the crash of the more famous Titanic, there were three times fewer victims!

For a long time, the causes of the collision of ships in the Tablas Strait remained unknown and numerous discussions were held on this issue. And to this day, it is not entirely clear how the ferry and the tanker could collide in a wide strait in clear weather. But if the exact causes of the disaster are unknown, then indirect causes installed a long time ago.

In October 1988, the board assembled to investigate the disaster issued an official statement blaming the collision on the crew of the Vector tanker. During the investigation, it was found that the ship did not have a license and was actually unseaworthy. Also, the tanker did not have experienced forward looking and special navigation equipment, so the appearance of the Doña Paz ferry was a complete surprise, and the crew of the Vector could not prevent a collision.

It was assumed that part of the blame lay with the crew of the ferry, since at the time of the disaster, only one of the crew members was on the captain's bridge (and, probably, it was not the ship's captain), and the rest of the team went about their business. But later this version did not find proper confirmation, therefore, all charges were dropped from the team and the operator (Sulpicio Lines).

If we consider the reasons that led to a huge number of victims, then the same fault lies with the crews of both ships and their owners.

Firstly, there were almost three times as many passengers on the ferry as allowed (4341 against the maximum allowable 1518) - in the event of a collision and subsequent fire, panic and stampede began on the ship. The fire on the ship and the burning water closed all the ways to escape, so many passengers found their last refuge in the cabins and corridors of the ferry.

Secondly, a large number of people died in the fire both on the ferry and at sea - due to the oil spill from the Vector tanker, the water literally burned and did not give salvation. In addition, the waters in the strait are teeming with sharks, which also gave rise to fear in people and only despair forced them to leave the ship.

Thirdly, there were life jackets on the ferry, but they were all hidden under lock and key, and even if one of the crew members opened a warehouse with vests, there would hardly be enough for everyone. But the vests, like the people who need them, went to the bottom.

Fourthly, the team of the Doña Paz ferry did not make any attempts to organize the rescue of people, these people were not ready for an emergency. The professionalism of the ferry team still raises questions.

Finally, fifthly, the ferry and the tanker were not equipped with basic means of communication - even the simplest radio station! Therefore, at the time of the wreck of the ships, no one could call for help, and the Philippine authorities learned about terrible disaster only in the morning. It is clear that after such a time it was simply impossible to save someone, and this delay became fatal for many passengers of the Doña Paz.

Absolute disregard for the safety of ships and the unprofessionalism of the crews, the opportunity to get additional benefits and savings on everything - all this underlies the terrible shipwreck, which became the largest in peacetime.

In terms of the scale of maritime disasters, the Philippines has firmly taken a leading position. In 1987, as a result of a collision with a tanker, the Dona Pas passenger ferry of the Sulpicio Lines company sank. The company's administration then announced that there were 1,583 passengers and 60 crew members on the ship. Subsequently, it turns out that there were actually 4341 passengers there, of which only 24 survived. Less than a year later, the Dona Marilyn ferry dies, and with it more than three hundred passengers and sailors. Seven weeks after this tragedy, the world will learn about the death of the ferry "Rosalia" with 400 passengers, and a short time later - another ferry with its 50 victims. But no one knows how many smaller ships and boats and the people who were on them actually disappeared in the depths of the sea around the Philippines.

And more about crashes, for example, and. And here is also

Everyone knows the story of the ill-fated Titanic. But at the same time, few people even suspect that the case of the Titanic is only the third shipwreck in terms of the number of victims. History has also known much larger oceanic tragedies. This review will focus on the most terrible shipwrecks that have become a real shock to the world.

1. The greatest victims in wartime

In January 1945, this German ship, which was evacuating civilian and Nazi troops who were surrounded by the Red Army in East Prussia, sank after being hit by three torpedoes in the Baltic Sea.

After being hit by torpedoes to starboard, the ship sank in less than 45 minutes. An estimated 9,400 people lost their lives, making this the largest shipwreck in terms of loss of life in history.

2. The greatest victims in non-war time

The Philippine passenger ferry Dona Paz sank after colliding with the tanker Vector on December 20, 1987, killing 4,375 people. After a collision with a tanker carrying 1,399,088 liters of gasoline, a huge fire broke out that caused the survivors aboard the Don Paz to jump into the shark-infested waters overboard.

3. The death of 1,198 people in 18 minutes

This British ocean liner traveled between Liverpool, England and New York, USA. During World War I, the ship was hit by a German torpedo on 7 May 1915 and then sank within just 18 minutes of being hit.

The disaster killed 1,198 people out of 1,959 on board. The attack on the passenger liner turned many countries against Germany, and also contributed to the entry of the United States into the First World War.

4. The biggest losses in the British fleet

This British ocean liner was requisitioned by the government during World War II. She was sunk on 17 June 1940 with over 4,000 deaths. It is considered the worst disaster among British ships. More people died in the sinking of the Lancastria than in the sinking of the Titanic and the Lusitania combined.

5. The worst disaster in Canadian history

This Canadian ocean liner sank in the St. Lawrence River after colliding with a Norwegian coal carrier on May 29, 1914. The accident killed 1,012 people (840 passengers and 172 crew members). After the collision, the ship listed on board so quickly that it became impossible to lower the lifeboats.

6. The death of 6,000 people in 7 minutes

“A German transport ship was carrying 6,100 documented passengers on board (and possibly over a hundred undocumented) when it was torpedoed on April 16, 1945 by a Soviet submarine in the Baltic Sea during World War II.

Just seven minutes after the torpedo hit, the ship sank, killing almost all passengers and crew. This shipwreck is considered the second in the history of navigation in terms of the number of victims.

7. The highest number of victims in the US Navy

On July 30, 1945, shortly after delivering critical parts for the first atomic bomb used in combat to the US air base on Tinian Island, the ship was torpedoed by the Japanese submarine I-58 and sank in just 12 minutes.

Of the 1196 crew members on board, only 317 survived (about 300 immediately drowned with the ship, and the rest did not wait for help, which arrived only after 4 days).

8. The death of "Le Yola"

A Senegalese ferry capsized off the Gambian coast on 26 September 2002, killing at least 1,863 people. The sinking of the Le Yola ferry is considered the second largest non-military maritime disaster after the Doña Paz. The ferry was heavily overloaded, so after falling into a storm, it capsized in just 5 minutes.

9. Destroyed the city

This French cargo ship loaded with ammunition exploded in the harbor of Halifax (Canada) on December 6, 1917, killing 2,000 residents of the city and its environs. The explosion was caused by a collision with the Norwegian ship Imo.

10 Most Famous Shipwreck

This is perhaps the most famous maritime tragedy of all time. The Titanic was passenger liner, which sank in the North Atlantic Ocean on 15 April 1912 after colliding with an iceberg on its maiden voyage from Southampton, UK to New York, USA. The Titanic disaster resulted in 1,514 deaths.

And in continuation of the topic, we have collected.