Italian submarine Scirè (1938)

Italian submarine Scirè was an Adua-class submarine, built in the 1930s which served during World War II in the Regia Marina. It was named after a northern region of Ethiopia, at the time part of Italian East Africa.

Design and description
The Adua-class submarines were essentially repeats of the preceding Perla-class submarine. They displaced 680 LT surfaced and 844 LT submerged. The submarines were 60.18 m long, had a beam of 6.45 m and a draft of 4.7 m.

For surface running, the boats were powered by two 600 bhp diesel engines, each driving one propeller shaft. When submerged, each propeller was driven by a 400 hp electric motor. They could reach 14 kn on the surface and 7.5 kn underwater. On the surface, the Adua class had a range of 3180 nmi at 10.5 kn, submerged, they had a range of 74 nmi at 4 kn.

The boats were armed with six internal 53.3 cm torpedo tubes, four in the bow and two in the stern. They were also armed with one 100 mm deck gun for combat on the surface. The light anti-aircraft armament consisted of one or two pairs of 13.2 mm machine guns.

Construction and career
Scirè was launched on 6 January 1938 in OTO's shipyard in La Spezia and commissioned on 25 April 1938. At the beginning of the war, she was assigned to 15th Squadron (I Submarine Group) based at La Spezia and was under the command of Adriano Pini. On July 10, 1940, while on patrol in the western Mediterranean, French cargo ship SS Cheik (1058 GRT) was torpedoed and sunk by Scirè 54 nm from the Asmare Light, north of Sardinia.

In the summer of 1940 Scirè underwent a series of modifications allowing her to carry SLC. The size of the tower was reduced, her deck gun was removed, and 3 watertight cylinders were mounted on her deck instead to accommodate maiali. These cylinders, each weighing 2.8 tons, could hold up depths down to 90 meters. On September 24, 1940 Scirè, under command of captain Junio Valerio Borghese, sailed from La Spezia for her first special mission to be performed in Gibraltar. In the evening of September 29, upon reaching the Strait of Gibraltar, Sciré received an order from Supermarina to suspend the mission and return to the base as Force H had left the Mediterranean to operate in the Atlantic.

In 1940 Scire made its first foray into the Bay of Gibraltar with the intent of sabotaging the British ships in Gibraltar Harbour with three manned torpedoes. None of the three were successful with the most daring getting stuck 100 metres from HMS Barham (04). The crew were forced to withdraw and the explosion of the torpedo's only achievement was to tip off the defenders of Gibraltar Harbour. They organised for boats to drop small charges into the water each night that would have proved fatal to any diver in range of the shock wave.

Scirè entered the Bay of Gibraltar again in September 1941 with better results than the previous time. On September 20, 1941, three tankers were attacked and Fiona Shell (2444 GRT, 1892) was sunk whilst other two ships, RFA Denbydale (8154 GRT / 17 000 t) and MS Durham (10893 GRT) were damaged. The Italians decided to create a permanent base in Spain eventually converting a ship called ITALIAN AUXILIARY SHIP Olterra that was moored off Algeciras into a permanent base for naval sabotage.

Scirè accomplished many missions inside enemy waters. Among these, the most important was the raid on Alexandria launched on 3 December 1941. Scirè left La Spezia carrying three manned torpedoes. At the island of Leros in the Aegean Sea, it secretly loaded six crew for them: Luigi Durand de la Penne and Emilio Bianchi (maiale 221), Vincenzo Martellotta and Mario Marino (maiale 222), Antonio Marceglia and Spartaco Schergat (maiale 223). On 19 December, Scirè reached Alexandria in Egypt and its manned torpedoes entered the harbour. They sank the British battleships HMS Valiant (1914) and Queen Elizabeth in shallow water and damaged the tanker Sagona and the destroyer Jervis. All six torpedo-riders were captured and the battleships returned to service after several months of repairs.

During a mission to launch manned torpedoes, on 10 August 1942, Scirè was depth charged by the British naval trawler HMT Islay (T172) in Haifa bay, about 11 km from the harbour. Scirè surfaced briefly before sinking during which time she was also shelled by 300 Coast Battery, Royal Artillery. Islay was captained by Lieutenant Commander John Clements Ross of North Shields, Tyne and Wear who was later awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for his actions.

The wreck of Scirè, lying at a depth of 32 m, became a popular diving site and Shayetet 13 training location. In 1984 a joint Italian-Israeli Navy ceremony was performed, in which the forward section was removed from the submarine and sent to Italy to become part of a memorial. Italian Navy divers also welded the access hatches shut to prevent divers from entering the wreck.