Rare German Light Schnellboot Discovered, 96m under the Ionian Sea
While the big S-boots (E boats in Allied parlance) were a crown jewel of the Kriegsmarine during WWII (and with other countries well after), a class that sort of slipped through the historical cracks was the Leichte Schnellboote (LS) boats.
Designed to be carried by cruisers abroad and auxiliary cruisers (HSK), the LS boats were just 41 feet long and made of aluminum and composites. Light enough (11.5 tons) to be winched up and down via davits, they could make 38 knots on two Daimler-Benz MB 507 diesels, and carried a stinger of two rear-dropped 21-inch torpedoes and an MG151 15mm machine cannon.
“LS-Boat” Sideview and Ground Plan Version Torpedo-Boat – Picture from Fock: Schnellboote Bd. 2, via S-boot.net
Just 12 were built, with four (LS 3 to LS 6) intended to be fast stern-launched minelayers rather than TBs. Two of the latter, LS 5 and LS 6, were soon converted to sub chasers with JuMo 205 engines with side-launched depth charge equipment for use on the Black Sea but instead only got as far as Greece, where they worked as “V boat” fast transports moving troops around the coastline of the Aegean and Ionian Seas.
“LS 5” and “LS 6” in the Aegean Sea – Picture from Fock: Schnellboote Vol. 2 via S-boot.net
“LS 5” and “LS 6” in the Aegean Sea – Picture from Fock: Schnellboote Vol. 2 via S-boot.net
There, on 29 September 1943, LS 6 was hit by bombs dropped from a British fighter-bomber during an air raid on Igoumenitsa and sunk while being towed between Lefkada and Preveza for repairs. Two weeks later, her sister LS 5 was grounded off the island of Kos after a similar hit and was written off.
Five other LS boats were lost during the war, with the remainder either being scrapped or kept as trophies post-war. The French finished LS 13 through LS 18 in 1946 for their own use.
Now, the only relic of the design, the long-lost LS 6, has been discovered on the seabed off Preveza in western Greece by the AegeanTec diving team after years of historical research, archival investigations and technical diving expeditions.
And she doesn’t look half bad.
German Leichte Schnellboote LS 6 at Lefkada Island, Greece, where she has been since September 1943.