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fighting ships of the world

REGIA MARINA / ITALIAN NAVY (ITALY)

SUBMARINES

FOCA large submarine minelayers (1937-1939)

Foca 1940

Name No Yard No Builder Laid down Launched Comp Fate
Atropo     Tosi, Taranto 7.1937 20.11.1938 2.1939 discarded 3.1947
Foca     Tosi, Taranto 1.1936 26.6.1937 11.1937 lost presumably 15.10.1940
Zoea     Tosi, Taranto 2.1936 5.12.1937 2.1938 discarded 3.1947
  

Displacement standard, t

1200 - 1215

Displacement normal, t

1305 / 1625

Length, m

82.9

Breadth, m

7.17

Draught, m

5.20

No of shafts

2

Machinery

2 Fiat diesels / 2 Ansaldo electric motors

Power, h. p.

2880 / 1250

Max speed, kts

16 / 8

Fuel, t

diesel oil 63 (norm.)

Endurance, nm(kts) 8500(8) / 106(4)

Armament

1 x 1 - 100/43 OTO 1927, 2 x 2 - 13.2/76, 6 - 533 TT (bow, 8), 36 mines

Electronic equipment hydrophone

Complement

60

Diving depth operational, m 100

Project history: Design was developed by builder on the basis of earlier Archimede and Pietro Micca classes. Partially double-hulled. This class minelayers are remarkable that on them two essentially various systems of minelaying, horizontal and vertical, were applied at once. In two stern horizontal tubes 8 mines were stowed and 20 more were placed in vertical trunks, as on Pietro Micca. Massive CT, carrying in the aft part 102mm/43 gun, became other prominent feature of the class, theoretically capable thanks to the high position to keep fire in fresh weather.

In 1941 on Atropo and Zoea main gun was moved on a deck fwd from CT.

Modernizations: 1941, Atropo, Zoea: - 1 x 1 - 100/43; + 1 x 1 - 100/47 OTO 1938

Naval service: Foca was lost in November, 1940 in East Mediterranean. Probably, she was mined near Haifa 15.10.1940. Zoea was sunk as a result of accident in summer 1942 at Taranto, but was quickly raised and re-commissioned.

Atropo

 

© Ivan Gogin, 2009-14