Detonators on UC-55 (Martin Mako Janeček) Antenna connection to the conning tower (Martin Mako Janeček) One of the propellers (Martin Mako Janeček) The submarine had been about to start laying mines about eight miles south-east of Lerwick, in the convoy channel between Orkney and Shetland, when a trim problem led it to dive beyond its 50m operating depth. Over six patrols, UC-55 had already been credited with sinking nine merchant ships and damaging two more, as well as the destroyer HMS Albacore, in the months before it met its end off Shetland on 29 September, 1917. Fifty metres long, it carried 27 crew and was fitted with six 39in mine-tubes with 18 mines one stern and two bow 20in torpedo-tubes with seven torpedoes and a 3.5in deck-gun. The 415-tonne UC-11-class submarine was commissioned into the German Imperial Navy in November 1916.
Rebreather divers from the Orkney-based diving liveaboard mv Valhalla became the first to visit the German mine-layer SM UC-55 on 21 July – at a maximum depth of 104m.
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