The loss of the submarine "Dakar" - 31 years of searching...
On January 25, 1968, the Israeli submarine Dakar mysteriously disappeared. It wasn't until 31 years after its sinking that the submarine was found, and how it perished remains unknown to this day. Theories vary in their likelihood...
Submarine "Totem" before modernization
The Dakar, formerly known as the Totem, was a British submarine during World War II. Launched in 1943, she entered service in early 1945, so she didn't see combat. She was a T-class submarine (sometimes referred to as the Triton class), of which 53 were built in Britain. The design was approved in 1935; these were typical ocean-going submarines—displacing 1000 tons, with good habitability and a range of 8000 nautical miles, allowing them to be used anywhere in the world where Britain had interests at the time. The submarines were armed with six bow and four external torpedo tubes and a single 4-inch gun.
Since the submarines, although old, were robust, modernization began in 1948 on all hulls that had survived World War II. The "Super-T" modernization included the removal of the deck guns, replacement of the conning tower enclosure with a more streamlined one, installation of a new battery, and insertion of a new hull section containing additional electric motors and a switchgear. As a result, the submarines' length increased by 4 meters, their submerged speed increased to 15 knots, and their endurance at 3 knots to 32 hours. However, only the first three submarines underwent this conversion; the others simply had their deck guns and external torpedo tubes removed and their conning tower enclosures replaced.
Submarine "Dakar" (formerly "Totem") after modernization
Totem was lucky: it was modernized at the Chatham shipyard according to the Super-T design. So, when Royal Navy decided to get rid of the aging submarine, the State of Israel happily bought it, along with two other "sisters"—Tranchon and Tarpin. Tranchon became Dolphin, Tarpin became Leviathan, and Totem became Dakar (not the final destination of the Paris-Dakar rally, but "swordfish" in Hebrew). The command's logic fleet Israel's fleet was next: three submarines, meaning one at sea, one in base, and the third under repair (the country already had two aging British S-class submarines in its fleet, but they were of little use). The purchase was made in 1965, and in 1967, the Dakar, under the command of Captain 3rd Rank Yaakov Raanan, headed to Iceland for sea and underwater trials. At the end of the year, the submarine returned to Portsmouth and on January 9, 1968, set sail, heading for Israel.
British and Israeli officers during the transfer of the submarine
On January 15, the Dakar docked in Gibraltar for maintenance and set out for the Mediterranean the following day. The scheduled arrival in Haifa was February 2, with the captain planning to navigate the sea at a shallow depth. During the voyage, the boat averaged over 8 knots, and at the captain's request, the arrival date was rescheduled for January 29. Lieutenant Commander Raanan then contacted Haifa again, requesting permission to dock on January 28. This request was denied—guests had been invited to the welcoming ceremony.
The submarine last transmitted its coordinates (100 miles west of Cyprus) at 06:10 AM on January 24, 1968. The commander then transmitted three more control messages, none of which provided coordinates. The final transmission occurred at 00:02 AM on January 25. By January 26, it was clear the submarine was missing. On January 27, Cyprus received a distress signal on the submarine's emergency buoy frequency.
The Dakar stern buoy
An international rescue operation began immediately: despite Israeli authorities denying the Dakar's disappearance (but instructing merchant ships to search for the submarine), ships from Lebanon, the United States, Turkey, Great Britain, and Greece began searching. All countries except Israel called off the operation on January 31, while the Israelis continued searching until February 4. On April 25, 1968, Vice Admiral Avraham Botzer announced that the submarine had sunk on January 24 "due to technical problems or human error." The submarine was never seen again, until February 9 of the following year, when a fisherman found its stern distress buoy southwest of Gaza. Based on the buoy's condition, experts determined that the submarine was lying at a depth of between 150 and 326 meters.
The Dakar coat of arms
But the most interesting part began when theories for the submarine's sinking began to be put forward. While technical malfunction or "human error" are usually considered, in this case... Let me remind you that it was early 1968, just over six months after the Six-Day War had ended, and what an end it had been! Both sides had agreed to a ceasefire, but no peace treaty had been signed, and the situation sparked like a poorly insulated wire. Therefore, the possibility that the submarine had been sunk by Soviet or Egyptian ships was not ruled out.
The fact is that if Lieutenant Commander Raanan had arrived in the Eastern Mediterranean ahead of schedule and was prevented from entering Haifa, he might have decided to spend the day productively, for example, by photographing the Cairo port periscope. In this case, Soviet sailors or Arabs, having discovered the periscope of an unknown submarine, could very well have attacked it and sunk it. Furthermore, in this case, the possibility of the Dakar hitting a mine could not be ruled out. The media added fuel to the fire: on January 17, 1971, the Egyptian newspaper Al-Akhbar claimed that the submarine was sunk by the Egyptian frigate Asyut using depth charges. Of course, the Chief of Staff of the Soviet Mediterranean Squadron, Vice Admiral V.V. Platonov, claimed that nothing of the sort had happened, but the USSR had no diplomatic relations with Israel at the time. Ultimately, only the discovery of the wrecked submarine's hull could answer this question.
Natan Sharansky
Israel searched for the Dakar for 31 years. According to Natan Sharansky, an average of 10 million shekels was spent on the search each year. The Israeli Navy offered a $300 reward for any information about the submarine. Around 25 expeditions were conducted. And it wasn't until 1999 that the submarine was finally discovered!
The remotely controlled vehicle "Remora III", "Dakar" was looking for something similar
The Dakar was found by the American Nauticus Corporation, a private American company run by Thomas Kent Detweiler (the same guys who salvaged items from the Titanic). It's claimed the company used information from American intelligence agencies in its search, but what exactly they could have revealed in this case is unclear. What is certain is that the company signed a $1,5 million contract with the Israeli Navy, according to which it was to follow the submarine's route and thoroughly survey the seabed in the area from which Lieutenant Commander Raanan last communicated.
The search began in mid-April 1999, and within a few weeks, a 1,5-hectare section of the seabed was surveyed. One way or another, on May 24, 1999, a large object was discovered on the seabed between Crete and Cyprus. It lay at a depth of approximately 3 meters. On May 28, the remotely operated vehicle Remora II captured the first images, confirming it was the Dakar.
The location of the remains of the Dakar submarine on the seabed
The submarine lay on the seabed on an even keel, the conning tower railing torn off and fallen overboard, and the stern, containing the propellers and large stern horizontal rudders, had broken off just aft of the engine room and was now separated from the hull. Nauticos recovered the conning tower railing, a gyrocompass, and several small items. These findings immediately ruled out theories that the Dakar had been sunk by Soviet or Egyptian ships, or that it had been struck by a mine during World War II—no damage consistent with such causes was found on the submarine's hull. Most likely, the submarine sank due to technical issues—after all, it was already 25 years old. However, crew error cannot be ruled out—the crew on the Dakar was relatively inexperienced.
Inside the monument to the crew of the submarine "Dakar"
In 2013, a monument to the submarine's crew was erected in the Garden of the Missing on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem. It consists of a submerged concrete submarine. Visitors can descend into it and walk along a corridor lined with memorial plaques bearing the names of the 69 Dakar crew members. The raised enclosure of the submarine's conning tower can be seen at the Israel Navy Museum in Haifa.
The Dakar's wheelhouse fencing at the museum
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