Fuel shortages prevented major operations for the next six months, during which Scharnhorst was able to conduct only short training maneuvers. A third shell hit the deck next to turret Caesar and caused some flooding; shell splinters caused significant casualties. [30] She reached port on the afternoon of 9 June, where the repair ship Huaskaran was waiting. [25] They also sank the two destroyers. 23 January 1941: Operation Berlin.Scharnhorst and Gneisenau, under the command of Admiral Gnther Ltjens, depart Kiel for the Atlantic.. 28 January 1941: Scharnhorst and Gneisenau sight the British cruiser Naiad in the Iceland-Faroe strait and turn around. In his instructions to Bey, Dnitz advised him to break off the engagement if presented with superior forces, but to remain aggressive. The wreck of Admiral Graf von Spee's flagship - the powerful German battlecruiser SMS Scharnhorst which was sunk with the loss of all hands off the Falkland Islands on 8 December 1914 - has now been located lying on the seabed, battle scarred but largely intact. Bombs from U.S. warplanes tore apart the Kaga and set it on fire, and other Japanese warships eventually scuttled the carrier using torpedoes. [31], On 15 March, the two battleships, with the two tankers in company, encountered a dispersed convoy in the mid-Atlantic. [16] Between 18 February and 20 February, she participated in Operation Nordmark, a brief sortie into the North Sea as far as the Shetland Islands. One of the decisive factors in the identification were the distinctive asymmetrical aft gun turrets of the Karlsruhe, which can be seen on the wreck, he said. Fast forward 105 years, nearly to the day, on 4 December Mayday! [31], Ltjens then decided to move to a new area, as the surviving members of the dispersed convoy had sent distress signals. At 17:30, shells struck the forward 15cm gun turrets and destroyed them both. The entire German High Seas Fleet surrendered and was interned there after the World War I armistice in November 1918, but the warships were scuttled by their crews in June 1919, a few days before the signing of the Treaty of Versailles, which Germany's commanding admiral feared would give the ships to the British. [64], An hour after making the turn, Bey deployed his destroyers in a line screening Scharnhorst, which remained 10nmi (19km; 12mi) behind. BUY TWO IMAGES, GET THE LOWEST PRICE IMAGE HALF PRICE WITH CODE: 50%OFFNEXTIMAGE.