Researchers descended to the wreck in underwater vehicles to collect data for 3-D models
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A photogrammetric reconstruction of the submarine USS F-1, showing the conning tower and collision damage that caused the boat to sink
Zoe Daheron / Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
On December 17, 1917, two United States Navy submarines—the USS F-1 and F-3—collided during a test run off the coast of San Diego. The damaged USS F-1 sank, and 19 of its crew members perished. Now, researchers from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) have collected close-up images of the wreck, revealing never-before-seen visuals of the lost sub in its Pacific grave.
According to a statement by the WHOI, researchers descended 1,300 feet underwater inside a vehicle dubbed Alvin, accompanied by an autonomous vehicle called Sentry, from late February to early March. They surveyed the wreck of the USS F-1 with sonar and cameras, capturing data. The research, part of a training session, was conducted in cooperation with the U.S. National Science Foundation, University-National Oceanographic Laboratory System and the U.S. Navy’s Office of Naval Research and Naval History and Heritage Command.
As the USS F-1 is the war grave of its 19 lost crew, the researchers observed but did not touch the wreck, “to preserve its condition and be respectful of its legacy,” as Bradley Krueger, an underwater archaeologist for the Naval History and Heritage Command, tells Live Science’s Tom Metcalfe.
A photogrammetric reconstruction of the submarine USS F-1 on the seafloor west of San Zoe Daheron / Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution/https://tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com/filer_public/31/ef/31ef0135-dc81-49d5-90cf-41e220c6a39a/entire_submarine_model.jpeg)
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The F-1 was built in 1909 and launched in 1911. By December 1917, the United States had been at war for seven months—fighting in Europe alongside the Allies against Germany, Austria-Hungary and Turkey—and submarines had become a fixture of World War I. Krueger says that when the 142-foot-long F-1 sank, it was conducting a 48-hour “engineering run and performance test,” cruising off the coast of La Jolla, California.
“USS F-2 and USS F-3 were alongside, performing similar testing, when all three vessels entered a fog bank,” Krueger tells Live Science. “USS F-3 collided with USS F-1, and following the collision USS F-3 remained on scene to help rescue survivors from the water.”
The F-1 went down in only ten seconds, and just five crew members survived the crash, per the Submarine Force Library and Museum. Nobody set eyes on the doomed submarine until 1972, when a Navy underwater vehicle was searching for a recently crashed fighter jet, and it spotted the USS F-1. As the pilot of that underwater vehicle said in ‘72, the F-1 “looked like a big ax had hit her.” A gaping hole marred the side of the submarine, gouged in the 1917 collision.
Today, the F-1 remains lying on the seafloor on its right side, facing northwest, and the century-old submarine is “remarkably intact,” as WHOI’s Bruce Strickrott, senior pilot of the Alvin vehicle, tells Live Science. Per the statement, the data and images collected by the research team allowed other WHOI experts to photogrammetrically reconstruct the USS F-1: They made digital 3-D models based on countless 2-D images.
A section of the wreckage of a World War II-era Avenger torpedo bomber that crashed during a training flight Anna Michel / Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution/https://tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com/filer_public/5b/1f/5b1f326f-469e-4efb-bcb4-34c29812cc70/avenger_front_right.jpeg)
During the WHOI mission to photograph the USS F-1, the researchers also surveyed another piece of military wreckage: a lost Naval aircraft called the Avenger. A torpedo bomber, the Avenger disappeared off the coast of San Diego during training exercises in 1950.
Rob Sparrock, an oceanographer from the Navy’s Office of Naval Research, was one of the researchers who descended to the wreck of the F-1 inside the Alvin vehicle. As he says in the statement, making the dive was “a solemn privilege.”
Rob Sparrock, research vessels program officer at the Office of Naval Research (left), and Bruce Strickrott / Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution/https://tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com/filer_public/79/35/79359e10-9733-4c1c-b5d2-333068bae831/img_6048_bruce-cropped.jpeg)
Bradley Krueger, senior archaeologist at the Naval History and Heritage Command, inside
Alvin
“Lasting nearly eight hours, there was time to contemplate the risks that all mariners, past and present, face,” Sparrock says. “It also reminded me of the importance of these training dives, which leverage the knowledge from past dives, lessons learned and sound engineering.”
The smaller vehicles were deployed from the larger research vessel the Atlantis, which floated above the wreck. After the research dives, the researchers held a remembrance ceremony aboard the ship, ringing a bell 19 times, once for each of the F-1’s lost service members.
“History and archaeology are all about people, and we felt it was important to read their names aloud,” Krueger says in the statement. “The Navy has a solemn responsibility to ensure the legacies of its lost Sailors are remembered.”
