U-boot Torpedomechaniker Rudolf Heitzhausen

Since 12-31-05

Rudi was Mechaniker Gefreiter and later Torpedomechaniker on a very unusual U-Boat.  This photo was taken in June 1944 while Rudi was training aboard the Type XXI submarine, U-3506.  The Skipper of that boat was Captain Gerd Thäter.

What makes this so unusual is that their boat, U-3506, was in Hamburg, fitting out for a war patrol, when the war ended.  They scuttled U-3506 along with U-2505 and U-3006 inside the Bunker Elbe II in Hamburg, where they lay unknown until a small group of Sharkhunters went into this ruined bunker in 1988 and actually walked on the deck of one of the boats. 

Sadly, the bunker was recently filled in with sand, the boats are actually sunken in sand, then a layer of concrete was poured over the surface and the bunker itself was demolished - so this area is now a container terminal - with three Type XXI U-Boats buried in the sands below - and Rudi was a Torpedomechaniker on one of them.

                 
Heitzhausen