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February 9, 1945, last months of the Second World War. The German submarine U-864 sails on the west coast of Norway.
He is in charge of supplies for the manufacture of war material. He takes lead, steel and 65 tons of mercury .
His mission, called Operation César is to arrive in Japan, allied country, and to deliver to them this raw material to reinforce their arsenal.
Inside, they travel 73 people between the crew and several scientists working for the Nazi regime, who will transfer knowledge to the Japanese.
https://youtu.be/svy0OU9HyFE [19659005] But the operation fails .
A British submarine, the HMS Venturer, manages to intercept the U-864 and hit it with a torpedo . All of its occupants are dead.
The attack remained in history as the single 19459011 war episode in which one submarine manages to destroy another while the two are submerged .
In 2003, 58 years after the attack, the Norwegian Navy recovered the remains of U-864, two nautical miles from the island of Fedje.
Its ruins lie at the bottom of the sea at 150 meters deep.
The submarine is broken into two parts, a bow and stern, and several fragments of the ship. They rest around
A mortal inheritance
Today, more than 70 years after the disaster, the submarine remains a subject of debate for the Norwegian authorities .
The discussion is about the best way to manage the risk of contamination which represents the mercury charge inside the submarine and its surroundings.
In the years following the discovery, the Norwegian authorities conducted studies in which they found mercury levels above normal near the submarine
In 2005, the Food Safety Authority had recommended to children and pregnant women not to eat seafood from this region.
A study by the National Institute of Research on Nutrition and Seafood concluded that fish exposed to sediments in the underwater area, they presented levels of mercury four times higher than those of fish from other areas.
In 2014, the Norwegian Coastal Administration concluded that the remains of the ship and the contaminated parts around it would cause the dispersion of toxic materials.
To prevent the submarine from moving during the tremors under the water, they were unloaded near ] 100.00 cubic meters of sand and rocks to fill a slope on which rests the bow.
In mid-October, the authorities decided that the coating of the submarine would be the safest and most environmentally friendly solution.
According to a recent statement from the Norwegian Ministry of Transport, a cover covering an area of 47,000 square meters will be installed below which the submarine will be located. If all goes well, the cover should be ready by 2020.
Thus, as Chernobyl under the water Norway seeks to control a threat to which a documentary director Marc Bresse is called "a deadly legacy" that could trigger "one of the worst ecological disasters of the North Sea".
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