Operation Seeschlange (ii)

sea serpent

'Seeschlange' (ii) was German naval minelaying operation in the Kara Sea by Kapitänleutnant Peter-Ottmar Grau’s U-601 (30 July/28 August 1943).

The boat deposited 24 TMB mines in Belushya Bay on Novaya Zemlya island on 21 July, and there are no indications that any of these sank a ship.

On 20 August U-601 rescued the crew of a Blohm & Voss Bv 138C-1 flying boat which had come down in the Barents Sea about 30 miles (48 km) to the north-west of Severny island, near Novaya Zemlya. The flying boat had made an emergency landing while returning from the 'Wunderland II' planned attack by the heavy cruiser (ex-pocket battleship) Lützow on the Soviets' Siberian sea route, and U-601 took the drifting boat in tow before worsening weather and the appearance of Soviet patrol aircraft forced U-601 to scuttle the aeroplane in the early hours of 21 August.