SS Ussukuma
![]() SS Ussukuma
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History | |
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Name | Ussukuma |
Owner | ![]() |
Route | Europe-Africa |
Builder | Blohm + Voss |
Launched | 20 December 1920 |
Completed | 8 July 1921 |
Fate | Commandeered by Abwehr, scuttled 1939 |
General characteristics | |
Type | Passenger ship |
Tonnage | 9,000 GRT |
Length | 127.6 m (418 ft 8 in) |
Beam | 17.1 m (56 ft 1 in) |
Installed power | Steam turbine |
Propulsion | 2 × steam turbines SR geared to a single shaft, one screw [1] |
Speed | 14 knots (26 km/h; 16 mph) |
Capacity | 264 passengers |
Crew | 107 |
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/57/Usukuma_Ostafrika_Deutsch_Ost-Afrika_1892_Tansania.jpg/220px-Usukuma_Ostafrika_Deutsch_Ost-Afrika_1892_Tansania.jpg)
Ussukuma was a German passenger ship named after a location in the central highlands of German East Africa (now Tanzania).[2] On 6 December 1939, only a few months into the
Construction and career
Ussukuma had a crew of 107, could carry 264 passengers and was powered by steam turbine. Her building number was 389 and her home port was Hamburg. Her sister ships were the Usaramo of the Deutsche Ost-Afrika Linie and the Wangoni of the Woermann-Linie.
She was
Action in World War II
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/37/Ingeniero_White_Necochea_Argentina_Ussukuma.jpg/220px-Ingeniero_White_Necochea_Argentina_Ussukuma.jpg)
On the outbreak of war on 1 September 1939 she was lying off Lorenço Marques and was taken over by the Abwehr for service in the South Atlantic. In late September she went to South America and on 11 October reached Bahía Blanca in Argentina, where she stayed until 4 December[6][7] Her captain Karl Schulte fell ill there and was replaced by Hugo Wilmsen from the Nienburg.[3]
On 4 December 1939 the Ussukuma left Bahía Blanca in the direction of
The 107 passengers and crew members were rescued by the Ajax[4] and interned as enemy civilians. The cruiser HMS Cumberland took them first to the Falkland Islands, then in 1940 to Camp Baviaanspoort near Pretoria in South Africa,[9] from which they were released at the end of the war.[10]
The vessel's remains appeared on charts as an unnamed wreck for years and in January 2008 became "the first Nazi wreck to be identified in Argentine waters in decades."[4]
References
- ^ "SS Ussukuma [+1939]".
- ^ "Deutsches Kolonial-Lexikon". 1920. p. 595. Archived from the original on 19 July 2011. Retrieved 13 January 2011.
- ^ a b c (in German) TS Ussukuma Deutsche Ostfrika-Linie
- ^ a b c d e Wreckage of Scuttled Nazi Ship Identified Off Argentine Coast
- ^ Lage von Necochea
- ^ (in German) Location of Bahía Blanca
- ^ (in German) Sergio Gabriel Alcalá Die unglaubliche Geschichte der USSUKUMA
- ^ Position of the Admiral Graf Spee between 3 and 6 December 1939
- ^ Lage von Baviaanspoort
- ^ "Internierung in Baviaanspoort". Archived from the original on 5 March 2012. Retrieved 13 January 2011.