Wrecks & Archaeology

The vessel rests at a depth of 80 meters and appears to be free of mud. According to some reports, it was carrying mixed cargo including steel products and as many as 1,000 bottles of cognac and 300 bottles of liqueur.

Raumanmeren Hylky-Team is a group of divers and wreck hunters who primarily search for shipwrecks in the Baltic sunk by German submarines during the First World War of which they have located around 20.

The divers say the vessel has remained quite intact. They will decide whether to try to raise the contents after closer examination.

U-533 was a Nazi German U-Boat (Type IXC/40) that operated during World War II between April 15, 1943 and October 16, 1943. It was first launched on September 11, 1942 with a crew of 53, under the command of Helmut Hennig.

It was sunk by a Royal Air Force Blenheim bomber while it was operating in the Gulf of Oman. Of the crew of 53, only one survived by staying afloat without a life jacket for 28 hours until he was rescued by the HMS Hiravati near Khor Fakkan.

Walter Elcock, now 89 and living in Georgia, recalls the landing and how he managed to snag a wire on the carrier with the plane's tailhook and hung from it a few seconds before the wire broke.

"I went straight underwater," Elcock recalled. He unbuckled and kicked for the surface, maybe 10 feet away, thinking that he wouldn't be able to stay afloat wearing all of his heavy flight gear. Fortunately almost immediately, a Coast Guard ship pulled him out.

"I grew up hearing the story of this crash," said Elcock's grandson, Hunter Brawley, 36, of Atlanta, Georgia.