URUGUAY: HIGH WINDS AND STRONG CURRENTS PREVENT DIVERS FROM RAISING FIRST PART OF GRAF SPEE

Record ID: 351831

  • Title: URUGUAY: HIGH WINDS AND STRONG CURRENTS PREVENT DIVERS FROM RAISING FIRST PART OF GRAF SPEE
  • Date: 10th February 2004
  • Summary: (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) WIDOW OF CREW MEMBER OF THE GRAF SPEE, EDITH CLASS, SAYING "I don't want it (to see the boat raised). For me, it should be left, left where it is. I don't know, it is my idea, my thought. It's been sixty years, more than sixty years now. No."
  • Embargoed: 25th February 2004 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: AT SEA AND MONTEVIDEO, URUGUAY
  • Country: Uruguay
  • Topics: Conflict,History,People,Transport
  • Reuters ID: LVA1ZIW17AU0DMEDOUS0PVR38SEO
  • Story Text: Divers fail to raise part of sunken Nazi war ship, due to high winds and strong currents.
    Divers on Monday (February 9) tried and failed four times to raise part of a sunken Nazi warship off the coast of Uruguay.
    The operation to raise a portion of the "Admiral Graf Spee"
    began early in the morning, but strong currents and winds impeded progress in the waters of the River Plate.
    The divers are attempting to raise the range finder, a component 34 feet (10 metres) wide and 20 feet (6 metres) tall that held the first radar antenna installed in a warship.
    According to members of the team, the cable being used to raise the 27 tonne instrument broke three times and could not be seen during the fourth time due to the lack of light.
    Once they raise the range finder, the team will study how to lighten the Graf Spee until they can raise the ship's hull, which is in two pieces, one 490 feet (149 metres) long, the other 98 feet (30 metres) long. Recovering the entire ship could take up to three years, team members said.
    Under the command of Captain Hans Langsdorff, the Graf Spee sank nine commercial vessels in the Atlantic in late 1939, but always gave the crews time to evacuate the ships.
    The British navy dispatched three ships -- HMS Exeter, HMS Achilles and HMS Ajax - to the Uruguayan coast and on December 13, 1939, they sighted and attacked the Graf Spee.
    Langsdorff took his badly damaged ship to port in Montevideo, where he was allowed to bury 36 dead sailors.
    Neutral Uruguay, under intense diplomatic pressure from Britain, then ordered the Graf Spee out to sea after 72 hours.
    Believing he would be met by a beefed-up British fleet, Langsdorff evacuated his men to ships headed to Argentina, then sank the Graf Spee with explosives to stop it from falling into enemy hands.
    Two days after scuttling his ship, Langsdorff took his own life in Buenos Aires.
    Still, some happy moments came out of the story of the Graf Spee, especially for two sisters, Edith and Elsa Class.
    After the boat sank, the two sisters went to the hospital with their families to visit the injured crew members. There, both girls met their then-19 and 20-year-old husbands-to-be.
    "One Wednesday, we went in the afternoon to see them (the injured men). We were going from bed to bed saying 'Good afternoon. How are you?' There were 36, and in Bed Number 7, there was my husband and he said, 'Miss, sit here for a while' and I was so happy to sit there and since that day I always went to see him and we never separated again," said Elsa Class, who is now now 90 years old. Her husband Gabriel Kurt has since died.
    Eighty-year-old Edith remembers her husband Rudolf Hagg with worn pictures in a photo album, and hopes the divers will not raise the Graf Spee.
    "I don't want it [to see the boat raised]. For me, it should be left, left where it is. I don't know, it is my idea, my though. It's been 60 years, more than 60 years now. No," she said.
    The Graf Spee is located four miles (seven kilometres) off the coast in waters no deeper than 36 feet (12 metres).
    Divers will attempt to raise the range finder again on Tuesday (February 10).
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