Copyright: Michael Bause
The submarine is expected to pass by Cologne Cathedral on May 12, here is a photo from August 12, 2022.
A submarine of the German Navy will be in front of the Cologne Cathedral in May – the U17 will be transported to the museum.
It will definitely be spectacular: soon a submarine will drive past Cologne – on the Rhine!
It’s about the discarded U17, which after 40 years of service will be transferred to the Technik Museum Sinsheim Speyer. The transport from Kiel to Baden-Württemberg is extremely complex. After all, the distance that the monster of the German Navy has to cover is 600 kilometers.
Submarine U17 on the Rhine – transport to the museum
The project is scheduled to start on April 28, 2023 in Kiel. There the submarine is hoisted onto a floating pontoon with a 900-ton crane.
Then it goes on: first through the Kiel Canal along the North Sea coast to Rotterdam. The 500-ton submarine is then brought back to Germany via the Waal.
This is followed by transport across the Rhine. The Cologne Cathedral is to be passed on May 12th and the museum reached on May 21st.
When the U17 sails past Cologne, it will certainly not be overlooked. Sufficient water depth is a prerequisite for transport.
“All the teams that are responsible for the transport are highly motivated,” said the museum’s president, Hermann Layher. Some work has to be done on the submarine in Speyer. “Our workshop team can do this better at the location there.” The boat is then to be taken to Sinsheim for its final destination.
Facts about U17: U-Boot was already in America
A few facts about the U17: It is a class 206A submarine, has a length of about 48 meters and a draft of 4.60 meters. The height is about nine meters.
Before the U17s in Eckernförde were retired in 2010, they had been in use since 1973.
Copyright: Technik Museum Sinsheim Speyer
This is how submarine transport is to be carried out on the Rhine. A graphic shows the U17 on a floating pontoon.
The submarine was mainly used in the North and Baltic Seas, later after conversion to the 206 Alpha class, and then also in the Mediterranean.
The U17 served a very special mission, being, along with U26, the first German U-boat to enter American waters after World War II and the first U-boat to call at Baltimore Harbor after the last U-boat there anchored in 1916 (U-Germany).
The “U-Boot-Freundschaft U17” consisting of former crew members will later take care of the preservation of the submarine as an exhibit. (mt)
