Disasters of the Deep: A History of Submarine Tragedies

When originally published in 1986 as Few Survived, this book was the first complete record of submarine accidents. Sadly, since then there have been a number of further fatal disasters which now necessitate an updated and revised edition. Disasters of the Deep is, like its predecessor, very far from being merely a list of what was lost where, when and why, for Edwyn Gray, arguably the leading authority on the subject, examines the most important incidents in considerable detail, analysing what went wrong and describing the attempts made at rescuing the crew and/or the vessel. In this way he effectively traces the development of the submarine from the earliest experimental submersibles of the late eighteenth century down to the nuclear-powered leviathans of today, describing in parallel the developments of underwater rescue operations and survival techniques.