Unterseeboot 346

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U-346
Type		VIIC
Launch Date		May 24, 1943
Commission Date		July 7, 1943
Construction yard		Nordse Werk, Emden
Patrols
Start Date	End Date	Assigned Unit
No Patrols		8th Flotilla
Commanders
June, 1943	September, 1943	Kptlt. Arno Leisten
Successes
Type of Ship Sunk	Number of Ships Sunk	Gross Registered Tonnage
Commercial Vessels	None	0
Military Vessels	None	0

Unterseeboot 346 or U-346 was an German submarine or U-boat, which was the victim of a tragic accident before it ever went to sea. The ship was a Type VIIC U-boat which was built in 1943 for operations during the Second Battle of the Atlantic during the Second World War.

On the 20 September 1943, as the boat was undergoing diving trials in Danzig Bay in the Baltic Sea, an unknown mechanical fault occurred, sending the boat into a crash dive from which it never recovered, descending to the bottom of the bay, where it and its crew remain to this day. 37 people died on the U-346, but unfortunately for the Kriegsmarine, the personnel aboard the boat were not regular U-boat crew, but a combination of the ship's officers (who were all killed), and dockyard experts on submarine operating systems (six of whom escaped the wreck), whose loss was far more severe than the loss of the boat or of its crew, had they been aboard.