UNDISCOVERED SECRET

Evening Star, Issue 16993, 15 March 1919, Page 3

UNDISCOVERED SECRET

SURRENDERED U BOAT. RESCUE APPARATUS PUZZLES BRITISH NAVAL EXPERTS. U boat C 95, which came to Westminster pier, is a ship of mys-tery. In some respects she is like our own submarine:-, but she has one f"iture which i= nuzvlw I'k> experts. A bluejacket of the submarine service wh'i brought t 95 from Harwith told a 'Daily Chronicle' representative who boarded the ship that no one has yet discovered how to work an arrangement designed to attract assistance in time of danger. This is a. buoy wh-ch rises as the ship submerges, and shows hrisrht red litrhts. A telephone connect* it with tho officers below, so that a rescuing party could speak to the crew and find out what was wrong. Apparently some lever must be released before the buoy rises, but the lever or button had not been found. UC 95 is one of the. few mine-laying submarines now in existence. She has six deep wells covered with grating, each of which held three mines ready for release at anv moment. Ahead is a powerful wirecutter, with 10 sharp blades, which helped her to carve a way through wire netting. A 22-pounder gun "and two torpedo tubes complete tho fighting equipment of the craft. The ship was ' built about live, months ago, but she is of the smaller class, carrying a crew of 20. There are two leriseopes, and at the foot of the conning lower is a red cross, marking an opening through which air could be pumped by a diver. "When we took her_ over," said the bluejacket in charge, -'she was in a filthv cond.tion. Tho Germans had int evei" troubled to take away photographs and correspondence They couldn't have had much "pride in their ship- We have been five davs trying to clean her up, and we haven't 'finished yet. She is a good littlo boat, and could have been made vcrv trim and smart. The men's quarters are"better than those on some of the submarines or. which I have served."