Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Day 149 January 27, 1940

Finland. At the "Motti meeting", General Hägglund orders Finnish IV Corps to attack the "Pieni-Kelivaara" and "Lemetti West" mottis to test various tactics.

U-20 destroys 4 small, empty, neutral steamers off the Orkneys. At 8 PM, Norwegian SS Faro is damaged by a torpedo explosion 20m away but does not sink. The crew of 15 takes to the lifeboats. 7 men in one boat reboard Faro at dawn and drift ashore in Taracliff Bay. The other lifeboat drifts away, coming ashore on Copinsay the following day with 1 man still alive (7 lives lost). U-20 torpedoes Danish SS Fredensborg (20 lives lost) and SS England (another 20 dead) coming to the rescue of Faro at 8.52 and 9.24.

http://www.uboat.net/allies/merchants/ships/212.html
http://www.uboat.net/allies/merchants/ships/214.html

At 11.13 PM, U-20 torpedoes Norwegian SS Hosanger (17 lives lost). The sole survivor, Magnus Sandvik, floats on a raft for 15 hours until he is rescued by HMS Northern Reward. Sandvik is too frozen to attach a line to himself, so a sailor from HMS Northern Reward jumps overboard to fasten it to him. He is transferred to HMS Maori and hospitalised at Kirkwall.

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