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The 235-foot-long U-111 in dry dock at the Philadelphia Naval Yard. The U.S. Navy and government contractors reverse-engineered superior German U-boat technology, which helped propel the next generation of American submarines.

ROV pilot Ross Baxter points to the U-111's stern gun mount on his monitor screen.

An image from side-scan sonar reveals a structure—U-111—on the bottom of the Atlantic in 400 feet of water.

The custom-built R/V Explorer anchored over the site of U-111 on Labor Day 2022. All of the team members are volunteers, spending money and free time in their pursuit of wreck diving.

Two sailors push a torpedo into the torpedo tube of a U-boat docked in Germany during World War I.

U-boat UB-148 at sea after surrender to the Allies. UB-148 was part of the escorted submarine convoy that travelled to the U.S while U-111 went solo.; it was sunk off Virginia in June 1921 as part of the infamous “Billy Mitchell fleet.” Mitchell, an Air Force brigadier general, wanted to demonstrate the superiority of the fledgling Air Force over the Navy by destroying a fleet of ships from the sky.

A 1915 drawing of a submerged WWI U-boat in British waters from The Illustrated War News. The number 65 is noteworthy as indicating either Germany's actual strength in submarines at the time or the strength it wished the world to believe it possessed.

Massive pontoons float U-111 in the Norfolk Navy Yard. The U-boat sank twice accidentally before the U.S. Navy could destroy it on August 31, 1922 as part of the Armistice agreement.

In one of the last-known photos of U-111 from August 16, 1922, a crew at the Norfolk, Va. Navy Yard prepare the vessel for transport out into the Atlantic, where explosive charges would send it to the bottom of the sea.