CONFEDERATE SUB NEVER RELEASED EMERGENCY BLOCKS TO SURFACE
Scientists studying the world’s first submarine to sink an enemy ship say the Confederate crew never released an emergency mechanism that could have helped the vessel surface. The H.L. Hunley and its eight crew members disappeared in February 1864 in Charleston Harbor shortly after signalling it had placed explosives on the hull of a Union ship. Ever since the Hunley was raised from the ocean floor in 1995, scientists have worked to determine why the sub never returned to the surface. Their latest findings show the crew never released more than 450 kilograms of blocks typically used to keep the submarine upright but that also allowed it to surface quickly in an emergency.