Kalami beach Messerschmitt wreck

The Kalami Beach Messerschmitt wreck is a World War II German Luftwaffe single-engine fighter aircraft, positively identified by underwater researchers and aviation historians as a Messerschmitt Bf 109 E-7 (Werknummer 4173). On May 20, 1941—the opening morning of Operation Merkur (the Battle of Crete)—the fighter took off from Molaoi airfield in the Peloponnese piloted by Oberleutnant Berthold Jung to strafe Allied anti-aircraft positions and Royal Navy vessels in Souda Bay. Encountering a dense barrage of Allied naval and ground anti-aircraft fire over Chania, the aircraft was critically hit. Oberleutnant Jung executed a forced emergency ditching into Souda Bay off Kalami Beach. He survived the water impact with zero fatalities, was captured as a prisoner of war, was held in Australia until 1947, and later returned to post-war naval service, eventually rising to the rank of Rear Admiral in the German Bundesmarine. The aircraft lies upside down at 35 to 40 meters depth on a sandy slope, featuring the Daimler-Benz DB 601 inverted V12 engine, cockpit frame, bent propeller, and 20mm machine guns.