NOAA To Survey Wreck of the Diamond Shoals Lighthship (No. 71)

In a recent press release, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced:

“On Sunday, August 30, teams from NOAA’s Monitor National Marine Sanctuary, in partnership with the U.S. Coast Guard and the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, began a survey of the historic wreck of Diamond Shoal Lightship No. 71, the only American lightship to be sunk by enemy action during World War I.”

The Lightship was sunk because her radioman warned other ships in the area that a German submarine had sunk the merchant ship SS Merak. Having intercepted that warning, the submarine U-140 then found and sank the Lightship N0. 71. After the submarine’s first deck gun shots struck the radio shack, the Mate-in-Charge had her crew to muster in their lifeboats and row to shore.

You can read more about this event in “A Coast Guardsman’s History of the U.S. Coast Guard,” written by Dr. Doug Kroll, a member of the Foundation Coast Guard History’s Board of Regents.

(Photo: NOAA/Monitor National Marine Sanctuary)