I open my first novel, The Custom of the Trade, with a tragic submarine accident, in September 1911. The inspiration for my story came from a newspaper article of March 1911 reporting the sinking of the German submarine, U3. The submarine sank off Kiel harbour, fortunately in shallow water. The stern was completely submerged, but her bows pointed out of the water. Boats were quickly sent to the scene and the submarine crew released a telephone buoy to communicate news of t

Submarine operations have long been hazardous and remain so today. A submariner’s hope is always that the boat will surface the same number of times it dives, but sadly this has not always been the case. The last Royal Navy submarine to be lost was the Sidon in 1951, but the Russians and Americans have lost submarines since then, the latest of which was the Kursk in 2000. The first account I have been able to discover of men escaping alive from a sunken submarine was that