French submarine Minerve (S647)

Minerve was a diesel–electric submarine in the French Navy, launched in 1961. The vessel was one of 11 of the Daphné-class submarine. In January 1968, Minerve was lost with all hands in bad weather while returning to her home port of Toulon.

Minerve sank two days after the submarine INS Dakar of the Israeli Navy disappeared in the eastern Mediterranean between Crete and Cyprus. Minerve was one of four submarines lost to unknown causes in 1968 along with the SOVIET SUBMARINE K-129, the American USS Scorpion (SSN-589), and Israeli submarine INS Dakar. After more than 50 years missing, the location of the wreck was discovered in 2019, 45 km south of Toulon.

Description
The Daphné class comprised second-class submarines, intermediate between the larger, ocean-going submarines of the Narval class and the small, specialised, antisubmarine vessels of the Aréthuse-class submarine. The design was a development of the Aréthuse class, and were required to keep the low noise levels and high manoeuvrability of the smaller submarines, while also keeping a small crew and being easy to maintain.

Minerve had an overall length of 57.8 m, with a beam of 6.8 m and a draught of 5.25 m. Displacement was 869 LT surfaced and 1043 LT submerged. The submarine had diesel-electric propulsion, with two 12-cylinder SEMP Pielstick diesel engines rated at a total of 1300 bhp and one electric motor, rated at 1600 shp, which drove two propeller shafts, giving a speed of 13.5 kn on the surface and 16 kn submerged. The ship's machinery and equipment were modular to ease maintenance. Her range was 4500 nmi at 5 kn. The submarine was designed to dive to a depth of 300 m.

Minerve was fitted with 12 550 mm torpedo tubes, with eight in the bow and four in the stern. No reload torpedoes were carried. The ship had a crew of 45, composed of six officers and 39 enlisted.

Service history
Minerve was ordered under the 1957 French Naval Estimates, was laid down in May 1958 at the Chantiers Dubigeon shipyard in Nantes, and launched on 31 May 1961. After a shakedown cruise to Londonderry Port, Bergen, and Gothenburg in November 1962, the submarine sailed from Cherbourg to Toulon, arriving on 22 December 1962. She was commissioned into the 1st Submarine Squadron on 10 June 1964. Minerve operated solely in the Mediterranean Sea. She was refitted at Missiessy Quay, Toulon, in 1967.

Loss
On 27 January 1968, at 07:55 CET, Minerve was travelling just beneath the surface of the Gulf of Lion using her snorkel, roughly 25 nmi from her base in Toulon, when she advised an accompanying Bréguet Atlantic aircraft that she would be at her berth in about an hour. This proved to be the last time the boat and her crew of six officers and 46 enlistees made contact. She disappeared in waters between 1000 and 2000 m deep.

Commander Philipe Bouillot later said that Minerve's new captain, Lieutenant de vaisseau André Fauve, had spent 7,000 hours submerged over four years on submarines of the same class and never had a problem. The only factor known that could have caused her to sink was the weather, which was extremely bad at the time of her loss.

The French Navy launched a search for the missing submarine, mobilizing numerous ships, including the aircraft carrier FRENCH AIRCRAFT CARRIER Clemenceau and the submersible SP-350 Denise under the supervision of Jacques Cousteau, but found nothing, and the operation was called off on 2 February 1968. The search for Minerve, under the name Operation Reminer, continued into 1969 and used the submersible Archimède with the U.S. survey ship USNS Mizar (T-AGOR-11).

Struggle of the families for the truth
During the years that followed, the families fought to find out what could have happened. The French Navy did not release any information on the possible causes of the sinking. The file was classified as Secret Défense, which means no one could have access to it for 50 years.

After having requested access to the file many times, always refused, Christophe Agnus, son of one of the missing officers, obtained in 2007, at the invitation of Nicolas Sarkozy, an exemption to consult the archives. He discovered nothing. Other families obtained this right, and then suspected the Navy of concealing elements compromising it.

In 2018, the son of the last commander of the Minerve, Hervé Fauve, addressed the President of the French Republic, Emmanuel Macron, to request an early lifting of the defence secrecy on the Minerve file. The file has been kept in the archives since 1977, and its declassification should not take place until 50 years after the most recent piece of the file, dated 1970, i.e. in 2020. There was a risk that an automatic renewal of the file would extend this secrecy by 10 years, i.e. 2030 or more. He argued that the file is 'empty' according to those who have consulted it, that no similar submarine is still in use, that it does not contain any element contrary to the security of the state and above all that the families live in hope of this lifting.

This request was examined, and the Official Journal of 16 June 2018 announced the declassification of the archives concerning the disappearance of the Minerve.

Relaunch of the search for the wreck
On 14 October 2018, the French newspaper Var-Matin published an article in which it informed that, on the initiative of Fauve, eighteen of the families of the 52 sailors of the Minerve had sent an open letter to various elected representatives of the Toulon harbour to request the resumption of the search for the wreck of the submarine. The submarine was the only missing Western submarine that had not been found since the end of World War II.

Following this publication Fauve succeeded in mobilising all the families of the crew, active and retired sailors and the French media to support this request. On 5 February 2019, the Minister of the Armed Forces announced a resumption of the search 50 years after the last campaign.

The French government started a new search for Minerve on 4 July 2019 in deep waters about 45 km south of Toulon. The discovery of the location of the wreck was made on 21 July 2019 by the company Ocean Infinity using the search ship Seabed Constructor.

The wreck was found at a depth of 2350 m, broken into three main pieces scattered over 300 m along the seabed. Although Minerve's sail was destroyed, identifying the wreckage was possible, as the letters "MINE" and "S" (from Minerve and S647, respectively) were still readable on the hull.

Memorial
On the day of her discovery, 22 July 2019, Squadron Vice-Admiral Charles-Henri du Ché, responsible for the search, declared that the remains of the submarine would be left untouched and would become a maritime sanctuary. A ceremony is to be held in the location where Minerve vanished with the relatives of the submariners in attendance.

In December 2019, Victor Vescovo proposed to Fauve a dive on the wreck of the Minerve with his two-seat deep-submersible Limiting Factor. The Department of Underwater Archaeological Research (DRASSM), under the administration of the Ministry of Culture, which is responsible for the study and protection of France's submerged heritage, organized dives on the Minerve wreck.

On the first dive, 1 February 2020, Vescovo dived with retired French Rear Admiral Jean-Louis Barbier, who was contacted by Fauve, to gather new information on the cause of the loss. On the second dive, 2 February, Vescovo piloted while Fauve sat in the second seat. At the bottom they placed a granite memorial plaque on a section of Minerve's hull at a depth of over 2,370 m – to a recording of "La Marseillaise". Vescovo later stated, "As a former naval officer, I was very honored to partner with our French allies…"