On July 7, 1942, a U.S. Army Air Forces Hudson bomber spotted and successfully sank the German U-Boat 701 just 20 miles off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. While 17 German submariners managed to escape the sinking vessel using specialized rescue lungs, only 7 survived the brutal, shark-infested open sea to be captured alive two days later.
The captain of U-701, Horst Degen, was one of the lucky seven survivors pulled from the Atlantic. Years after the war, Degen actually struck up a warm, lifelong friendship with Harry Kane—the very American pilot who had dropped the depth charges that destroyed his submarine on July 7.
A German escape lung that was recovered by the U.S. Navy. Image via Wikimedia Commons, public domain
