Italian divers on Friday located in the waters off Genoa the wreck of a luxury British transatlantic liner sunk by a German submarine during the First World War when it was being used by the Royal Navy as a troop ship.
The wreck of SS Transylvania, split in two and pointing upwards, was found on the Ligurian coast at a depth of 630 metres near the island of Bergegi.
“This is an extraordinary find,” the divers said. It was located after local fishermen complained of losing hooks in the area, they said.
“A lot of the old guys round here said their hooks were being snapped off in the zone. There were also whirlpools over the wreck”. The Transylvania was sent to the bottom in 1917 while carrying some 3,000 troops to Alexandria in Egypt. More than 400 troops drowned.
The coastal city of Spotorno put up a memorial plaque to the victims eight years ago. The Transylvania was a passenger liner of the Cunard subsidiary Anchor Line. She was torpedoed and sunk on May 4, 1917 by the German U-boat U-63, despite being escorted by two Japanese destroyers, the Matsu and the Sakaki.
via ANSA.it
Graham Spicer is a writer, director and photographer in Milan, blogging (under the name ‘Gramilano’) about dance, opera, music and photography for people “who are a bit like me and like some of the things I like”. He was a regular columnist for Opera Now magazine and wrote for the BBC until transferring to Italy.
His scribblings have appeared in various publications from Woman’s Weekly to Gay Times, and he wrote the ‘Danza in Italia’ column for Dancing Times magazine.
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