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CLASSIC: How a Broken Toilet Foiled a German Sub · Ridiculous History

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Welcome back to the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. We are
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: returning with another classic episode for you. Just quick peak
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: behind the curtain. My pal Nola and I made it
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: back from the High Seas while our super producer Max
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: was holding down the fort like a hero, like a
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: war hero of podcasting, and we are still kind of
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: recovering schedule wise, a couple of us caught some travel crid.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: So while we're resting up and working on new episodes
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: Ridiculous History, we wanted to share a maritime classic episode
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: that Max, I believe you are around for this one
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: right twenty nineteen.
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: No, I didn't come around until twenty twenty one. We
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: still got a while. Lash.
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: Wow, we've been at this for a while, my friend.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: All right, So here's the pitch. Folks travel back with
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: us toward the end of World War Two. Germany is
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: absolutely wrecking stuff with their submarine technology, and one of
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: their submarines is acknowledged to be by far the most
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: advanced deadliest predator on the seats. However, the same technological
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: breakthroughs that made these subs so effective also and at
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: least one case, led to their demise. And this reminds
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: us of our conversation with the world's premiere underwater explosion expert,
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: doctor Rachel big Spinach Lance. Remember when she told us that,
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: Remember when she told us that people figured out how
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: to make submarines work way before they figured out how
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: people could enter or exit submarines safely.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the Benz is terrifying. I learned that from Radiohead. Yeah.
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: I learned what the bends was from the name of
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: the Radiohead album. But yeah, no, that is that's awful.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: It's like, oh, you can go down, but you can't
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: come back up exactly.
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: So in this classic episode, we hope you join us.
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: This is from twenty nineteen, wherein we discovered the strange
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: story of the U twelve O six and the high
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: tech toilet that led to its doom. Ridiculous History is
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome to the show, Ridiculous Historians,
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: as well as fans of The Hunt for Red October
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: The Thrillers starring Sean Connery.
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: What about das Boots?
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: Boot is more of a classic, I would say, and
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: set a precedent for sure.
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Do you know? Do you know directed us Boot
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: Wolfgang Peterson, Kank.
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: Peterson's case that's our super producer, Casey Pegram.
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: He's already on the case. But we have how do
• 3:07
  Speaker 2: we do that?
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: Can we combine this Casey fairy sound effect with the dundun.
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: Well?
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: I like the way that it just rolled in with
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: the with the sound effect after you know what?
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, who cares? May we double it up? Sure?
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: I don't know, it's already happened. I'm ben, I'm knowl
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: and yeah. Wolfgang Peterson also directed a nightmare Fuel movie
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: from mine, probably many other people's childhoods, the never ending.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: Story nightmare Fuel really fine, amazing.
• 3:37
  Speaker 3: Yeah it is, but as a kid, it is a
• 3:39
  Speaker 3: very dark, depressing film, like when the horse gets sucked
• 3:43
  Speaker 3: into the swamp and like those creepy uh sphinx that
• 3:47
  Speaker 3: shoot lasers and have breasts.
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: Those were cool, though I still think of what I'm
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: trying to describe various rites of passage to people. I
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: use the metaphor of those three gates that a tray
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: who has to go through.
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: No, it's true.
• 4:00
  Speaker 3: So I think it just traumatized me a little bit
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: as a child. And that's sort of a bit of
• 4:04
  Speaker 3: an internet trope where it's a screenshot of that scene
• 4:06
  Speaker 3: where the horse is like sinking into the swamps of sadness,
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: and it's sort of like this is where it all
• 4:10
  Speaker 3: started going south for me mental health wise.
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: Speaking of fantastic segues, today's episode is not about the
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: never ending story, but it is related to maritime adventures
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: dost Boot, dust Boot, the Hunt for Red October, which
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: to me, for nostalgic reasons, is probably closer to my heart.
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: In a previous episode, we explored life on submarines because
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: of that potato war. Ah, yes, yes, very short lived
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: potato war, a potato skirmish.
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: Here you go.
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And today's episode brings us to another tale of
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: maritime mishaps. There we go, that's the way to say it.
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: We are traveling back to April fourteenth, nineteen forty five,
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: and we are aboard one of the most advanced submarines
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: at the time, a little thing called a U twelve
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: oh six.
• 5:02
  Speaker 3: Now is that not to harp on dust Boot, because
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: obviously I like to say it, But isn't that what
• 5:06
  Speaker 3: that movie was about.
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: Wasn't it about the crew of a U boat? Yes?
• 5:10
  Speaker 3: Yeah, cool, that's right, Ben. Today's episode is in fact
• 5:14
  Speaker 3: about a sort of two point zero version of one
• 5:17
  Speaker 3: of these boats because this was kind of the scourge
• 5:21
  Speaker 3: of the Nazi Party, well, their scourge on the Allies.
• 5:25
  Speaker 3: That was one of their most covert and successful ways
• 5:28
  Speaker 3: of wreaking havoc, isn't that right? That is correct.
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: U boats were quite dangerous, and one of the reasons
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: they were dangerous is because they were very difficult to detect, right,
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: and they.
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: Were very nimble.
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: Last yeah, fast, agile creatures. I believe the submarine in
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: dos Boot is based on a U ninety six. All
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: the U boats submarines were called boats at the time too.
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: All the U boats had that designation of you dash something.
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: And in the case of today's story, we're looking that
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: U twelve six. The U twelve oh six was a
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: premiere vessel. I mean, this thing was a big deal.
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: It went into service in March of nineteen forty four.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: Its emblem was a white stork on a black shield
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: with a green beak and legs. So let's get an
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: idea of the size of this thing. It was two
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: hundred and twenty feet seven inches long, or for the
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: rest of the world outside of the US, that's sixty
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: seven point two to three meters. It was about thirty
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: one feet or nine point six meters high, and it
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: was able to, despite its size, disappear under the water
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: pretty quickly. It could operate at depths of up to
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: seven hundred and fifty feet or two hundred and thirty meters.
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: It also, in addition to its heightened functional capacities, right,
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: it's a superior armament and so on, it had a
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: couple of amenities which were pretty rare for submarines at
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: the time. In particular, it had a very high tech toilet,
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: a complicated toilet.
• 7:16
  Speaker 3: Very complicated. Let's backtrack just slightly. In previous models they
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: did have toilets, but they hadn't quite cracked the code
• 7:25
  Speaker 3: yet on how to get these toilets to flush and
• 7:28
  Speaker 3: expel the waste while the boat was submerged while the
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: sub was submerged.
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: Right, there was problem operating the previous models of the
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: toilet at depth.
• 7:38
  Speaker 3: This one, however, they figured it out. Those crafty German
• 7:41
  Speaker 3: engineers figured it out. But as you said, Ben, it
• 7:45
  Speaker 3: wasn't easy. In fact, it was so complicated that they
• 7:47
  Speaker 3: had to designate a toilet specialist to be on board
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: who could assist with the flushing of this latrin. Can
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: you imagine that ben having to call in the toilet
• 7:56
  Speaker 3: specialist to flush down your business.
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, multiple specialists.
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: In fact, yeah, they had multiple specialists because someone who
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: was trained in the operation of this contraption had to
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: be present to flush it. It had a complicated system
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: of valves. That's essentially what it boils down to. You
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: couldn't just hit a handle and then call it a day.
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: This thing was complicated, but it was also poorly placed
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: in terms of the interior of the submarine. It was
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: directly over the batteries that powered the sub.
• 8:33
  Speaker 3: The power the sub when it was submerged, because the
• 8:36
  Speaker 3: engines had to be shut off at that right, right,
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: And I actually wasn't aware that battery technology was quite
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: as advanced as it clearly was in this time. They
• 8:45
  Speaker 3: were banks of batteries that would supply an ordinate amount
• 8:50
  Speaker 3: of electricity because can you imagine like how much you
• 8:52
  Speaker 3: would need to keep a boat like that moving.
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: That's right, These batteries provided five hundred in sixty kilowatts
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: of power for propulsion when there was when the sub
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: was submerged. And you're right about killing the engines as well,
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: because diesel electric submarines had a had a larger signature.
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: When they were running underwater, it was loud, it was
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: easier to detect, so ideally you want a quieter source
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: of power.
• 9:22
  Speaker 3: And Ben, I just want to point out we're getting
• 9:24
  Speaker 3: a little bit of this information from a website with
• 9:26
  Speaker 3: a delightful url.
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: It is toilet Dashguru dot com. I'm also a fan
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: of war is Boring dot com. Very very good, and
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: I've got a little spoiler alert, a surprise that I'm
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: saving for the end I think you will appreciate. But
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: for now, onward onward to this the very epitome of
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: subtechnology at the time. On April sixth, nineteen forty five,
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: this fantastic submarine with its very complicated toilet, the U
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: twelve oh six, leaves the port city of christ Jansan
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: in Nazi occupied Norway and it goes on its first
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: combat patrol. Its mission, like that of many U boats,
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: is to seek out and destroy British and US ships
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: so you can destroy like the like the Stooges was
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: a search and destroy same day. Eh, you know you're
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: looking for something and then to destroy them. Yeah, So
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: it's on patrol for about eight days. And I mentioned
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: this to underline the fact that the U twelve oh
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: six was in the service of the Nazi war effort
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: that only had three more weeks to go at best
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: before it was the end of the game for them.
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 10:48
  Speaker 3: I think at this point Hitler was already holed up
• 10:50
  Speaker 3: and what I had not heard the term for until
• 10:53
  Speaker 3: just a little while ago, his furor bunker.
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: That's true, Yeah, And I think on April thirtieth he
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: commits side in that same fieldher bunker. Seven days after that,
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: Germany completely surrenders and the war is over. But no
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: one knew that on the U twelve oh six at
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: the time. They knew they were just out to find
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: and obliterate any Allied ship they could they could get
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: in their sights or within range of their torpedoes. And
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: so they're out on the open sea and it's fairly uneventful.
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: How big was their crew again, it was around forty.
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: So these thirty to forty crew members trapped in this
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: tin can beneath the waves while they have their eyes peeled.
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: They're not running into they're not running into any action,
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: any war. But they are doing the normal things that
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: you do. They're eating, they're sleeping in shifts, they're using
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: that very, very fancy toilet. Again, this is like the
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: version of this is to sub toilets, as the Japanese
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: toto bidets are to normal commotes.
• 12:06
  Speaker 3: I think we've talked about this our sponsorship by Tushi,
• 12:10
  Speaker 3: But man, those things are high tech and incredible life changing.
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: I know, listen to US America. You've got to stop
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: pooping like barbarians.
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: Seriously so.
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: But that's that's actually a fairly accurate comparison because a
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: lot of people were confused by this. And this is
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: when we introduced Captain Carl Adolph Schlitt to the story.
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: He was twenty seven years old and in charge of
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: the sub at the time.
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's true, and it was just it was It
• 12:38
  Speaker 3: was in fact his first rodeo, and when it comes
• 12:41
  Speaker 3: to going out on a sub, he was very new
• 12:43
  Speaker 3: to the game, a little bit green.
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: And if I'm not mistaken, Ben.
• 12:47
  Speaker 3: Where our story really starts to get interesting is about
• 12:51
  Speaker 3: eight miles off of the coast of Scotland, at about
• 12:55
  Speaker 3: two hundred feet below the surface of the ocean. That's
• 12:59
  Speaker 3: when our man Schlitt had to take a Schlit. Captain Schlitt,
• 13:05
  Speaker 3: he keep the chain and command there. Yes, So he
• 13:09
  Speaker 3: decided that he wasn't going to request the assistance of
• 13:13
  Speaker 3: the toilet technician. Right, surely, I'm a captain, I'm a submarine,
• 13:19
  Speaker 3: the chief commodist. I can operate a toilet. I can
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: do this.
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: The toilet tinker was either not desired or not around,
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: and so Schlitz said, you know what, I'm I am
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: in charge of this, this entire sub I'm a captain.
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: I know how everything works. And the instruction manual is
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: right here by the toilet. Did we mention that it
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: had a comprehensive instruction manual?
• 13:40
  Speaker 3: I'm picturing a massive tome, spiral bound, hanging from a
• 13:45
  Speaker 3: chain on the wall.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: That's what I don't know. And that's just how I'm
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: looking at.
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: It, which is helpful from a design perspective when you
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: think about it, because a lot of people like to
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: read when they're using the restroom. So this is actually
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: good engineering.
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: Ye.
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: But whatever, Maybe he was in a hurry because being captain,
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: he had other things to do. Maybe he just misread it.
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: Maybe he wasn't as smart on the as quick on
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: the uptake as he thought he was, because something went
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: wrong and then he goes, you know, oh, Schlit. And
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: so he says, Okay, I know when I need to delegate.
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: Where's the toilet specialist, right, where's the the komodesman. Yeah,
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: so Schlitt asked that crew member to come help them out,
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: and then that crew member takes a stab, and maybe
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: because something was already messed up with the valves, they
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: make the problem worse.
• 14:34
  Speaker 3: I mean, we were not trying to throw this specialist
• 14:36
  Speaker 3: under the bus here, you know. I'm sure he knew
• 14:38
  Speaker 3: his craft, but I have a feeling that our boy
• 14:41
  Speaker 3: Schlitt kind of pre botched.
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: The whole works right, right, And there's the toilet, there's
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: the commode, probably still full of Schlit. And now the
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: specialist has to figure out not just how to operate
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: the toilet correctly, but how to make up for Schlit's mishap.
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: And so the specialist opens the outside valve of the commode,
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: the one that goes directly to the sea, while the
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: inside valve is still open, and this causes a deluge
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: of seawater into the sub and also probably the rest
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: of Schlitz, leaving Schlitz Schlitz.
• 15:17
  Speaker 3: Right, it's fun to say. And we talked about the
• 15:20
  Speaker 3: Bank of batteries. Did we talk about the design and
• 15:22
  Speaker 3: where they were located, or just the fact that the
• 15:24
  Speaker 3: sub operated on them?
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: The we did mention it did mention that the batteries
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: are directly under the toilet, right, it seems problematic. It's
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: tough to design this kind of stuff, you know, it's
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: tough to to put all the needed gadgetry into a
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: space with such a sharp, strong form constraint.
• 15:43
  Speaker 3: Totally, it's sort of like they keep making the iPhone
• 15:45
  Speaker 3: thinner and finish. They got to remove the headphone jack. Sure,
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: just like that. I don't buy it. I don't buy it.
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: They actually brought it back, but they made it a
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: little thicker, right. Or it's it's like looking under the
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: hood of a high end sports car, right, because so
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: much stuff is put in this weird tetris like arrangement,
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: and that's kind of what was happening in this sub.
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: I mean, clearly, it's not a good idea to have
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: the power source directly under something like the toilet, But
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: then it's a question of where else are you going
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: to put it? Right, you don't want it necessarily near
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: the torpedoes.
• 16:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah, No, it seemed like it probably seemed like a
• 16:19
  Speaker 3: good idea at the time, probably seemed very clever to
• 16:21
  Speaker 3: those crafty German engineers. Right, So, Ben, is this the
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: part where we want to get into a little chemistry.
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it is. It is so salt. The symbol
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: for that in acl right water is H two to oh.
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: And if you dissolve salt in water you get a
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: solution of various ions. And H two O on itself
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: is not conductive, doesn't conduct anything, but an ionic solution
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: certainly is conductive and insertantly does conduct stuff. So when
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: this water floods in through the valve system of this
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: complicated toilet, the water and the salt in the sea
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: water hit the sub battery, and the sub battery as
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: a result of this chemical interaction, produces lie plus hydrogen
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: gas plus most importantly chloring.
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: Gas, because the sub battery is full of acid.
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: So the problem with chloring gas is that it is
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: a deadly, deadly poison.
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 17:26
  Speaker 3: And they're in a tube, a metal tube, under the water,
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: with their pants down. Well, you presumably she lets pants
• 17:35
  Speaker 3: are up at this point.
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: I like the idea of him still having his trousers
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: around his ankles in a blind panic. That would be Yeah,
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: just kind of you know, scooting around doing the little
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: penguin run.
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: That's the one. Yeah.
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: So so we don't have pictures of it, of the
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: scene at that pictures. We have mental pictures. We have imaginings,
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: dreams of this, of this moment. But we do know
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: what happens next. The submarine is filling with chlorine gas.
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: This could be a death sentence if they don't do something.
• 18:05
  Speaker 3: Do you think they clocked instantly what was happening on
• 18:08
  Speaker 3: a chemical level, or do you think they just started
• 18:10
  Speaker 3: gagging and choking uncontrollably and new, oh, Schlitz, something's gone wrong.
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: I'm absolutely sure they knew because they were very well
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: aware of how the batteries worked. Fair if the toilet
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: was complicated, that's because it was new, but diesel electric
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: battery power would have been familiar to them.
• 18:32
  Speaker 3: So this is when our boy Schlitt has to kind
• 18:34
  Speaker 3: of jump into action, and, despite having sort of botched
• 18:39
  Speaker 3: the whole thing to begin with, had to sort of
• 18:41
  Speaker 3: exercise his thinking on his feet.
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: Muscles right, and the captain quickly realized that he had
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: no choice but to order the submarine to surface because
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: they had to vent this gas. As quickly as possible
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: and then replace it with breathable air.
• 18:59
  Speaker 3: Mind you there doing this in enemy territory off the
• 19:02
  Speaker 3: coast of Scotland.
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: About eight miles. Yeah, and so they surface within sight
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: of the Scottish coastline. In one story you will hear
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: that they surfaced almost directly beneath an Allied ship. But
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: we do know for sure they surfaced so close to
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: shuore that they were quickly spotted by Allied aircraft. They
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: were attacked and the captain to order the crew to
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: abandon ship. Three three members of the crew fell overboard
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: and drowned, and I believe one died in the malay
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: fighting that I heard.
• 19:35
  Speaker 3: So we were right at forty crew members then, because
• 19:37
  Speaker 3: thirty six survived.
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: Yeap, that is correct. So what happened? What happened during
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: this attack? The U twelve oh six was badly damaged
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: and couldn't dive. And this is when Schlitz starts ordering
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: the crew into lifeboats. And then he makes the game
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: time decision that only a captain can make abandoned.
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah right, get on, get ye a hands to a lifeboat.
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: He's done that. But now he does the very last thing.
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: He scuttles the ship.
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: What does that mean? I don't think I know that term.
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: It means to purposely sink a ship of any sort.
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: So in the rough definition, it means to cut a
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: hole through the bottom deck or side of a ship.
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: But you, you know, you destroy it. That's what he did.
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: He destroyed the submarine his own ship, and it went down,
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: and as the ship sank, he got away. By the
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: way as the ship sank. We can only imagine what
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: he thought. Maybe he thought I should have just contacted
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: the toiletsman when I was supposed.
• 20:39
  Speaker 3: To the headsman. Sure, that's that's something different. That's someone
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: that's like an executioner.
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: They canner.
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: But he also entered into history, the annals of history,
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: as the captain of the only warship in the entirety
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: of naval history to be doomed by its own malfunctioning toilet.
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: Cool. You think it's on his tombstone?
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: I think they probably He probably wanted to go with
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: something a little more prestigious, like loving father or husband
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: or something.
• 21:11
  Speaker 3: So presumably they were captured by the Allies, right, yeah.
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah. Thirty six members of the crew were rescued
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: by small boats in the area. Some people made it
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: to shore in their lifeboats and then were captured, but
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: nobody really got away, so they.
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: Would have ended up in like pow camps or something.
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, they would have ended up in pow camps,
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: and they probably would have been well. They were certainly
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: well aware of the severity of the situation on the
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: axis side. They knew was getting toward the end.
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: That's right.
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And speaking of the end, we are reaching the
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: end of our story today, but we're reaching the beginning
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: of something else. We just went off Mike for a
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: second and realized that this episode is coming out on
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: New Year's Day, so new Years don't.
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: Happy New Year's to you, Ben, Happy New Year to you, Casey,
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: thank you, Happy New Year's to everyone.
• 22:07
  Speaker 3: And to all a good night. No, it's been it's
• 22:09
  Speaker 3: been a hell of a good run. And we didn't
• 22:11
  Speaker 3: even don't think we'ven talked about this, but not too
• 22:14
  Speaker 3: long ago. I don't remember the exact day we reached
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: a solid year of doing this show, that's true.
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't think either of us realized it until
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: we were well off air.
• 22:23
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and or we were well past the time and
• 22:25
  Speaker 3: then it was just too late. So if we're talking about,
• 22:27
  Speaker 3: you know, New Year's business, I think we could recognize
• 22:31
  Speaker 3: that fact and just say how much we appreciate all
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: the folks that tune in and seem to dig the show,
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: and then allow us to kind of keep doing it.
• 22:38
  Speaker 3: I sure enjoy doing it, and I hope we can
• 22:39
  Speaker 3: keep doing it for many years to come.
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, agreed.
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: You know, if I could turn back time, the only
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: thing that would change is a little bit more energy.
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: At the opening of this episode, because we totally forgot
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: it's our first episode of twenty nineteen.
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: Oh, that's true. It's okay. We saved it for the
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: back end.
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: There we go, There we go. It's a reward for
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: everyone who's stuck around, right, So thank you so much.
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: We would like to hear. Oh oh, no, I forgot
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: the surprise. I found a lovely list of wacky submarine terms,
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: because you'll remember in our Potato episode we use some
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: terms that I think we're a little bit off because
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: neither of us have a history in the Navy, So
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: there are so many terms that people have. There's burn,
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: a flick just means watch a movie. There's bull George
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: by navy tradition. The most junior ensign is called George,
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: and the most senior is called the Bull. In the
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: Submarine Force, it takes so long for junior officers to
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: get to the boat two six months schools, a ten
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: week school, at least two moves, and oh and a
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: bunch of red tape that most arrive as lieutenant's junior grade.
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: When you only have one ensign, as many of them
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: do by tradition, he is both the Bull and the George,
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: or the bull George. And things that don't work are
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: called broke dick. Anything that doesn't work, that pump has
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: been broke dick for a week, broke dick, broke dick,
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: I like it. There are a lot of vulgar terms
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: of this thing, so we learned even more strange slang phrases,
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: many of which are not fit for air on this show.
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: But we would like to hear some of your favorite
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: military slang or naval slang phrases. Anything that made you laugh,
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: anything that made no sense, or anything with a really
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: compelling story behind it.
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: Let us know.
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: You can find us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. We'd
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: especially like to recommend you check out our Facebook community page,
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: Ridiculous Historians, where you can interact with your fellow listeners,
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: many of whom have some fascinating stories to tell. Have
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: you been checking out some of that tooth fairy stuff?
• 24:45
  Speaker 3: Love the tooth fairy stuff? That seemed to hit a nerve,
• 24:48
  Speaker 3: like in your tooth nerves nerve ending I don't know now,
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: I thought, I really enjoyed that episode a lot. I
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: want to say, I really had a good time doing it.
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: And when we listen back to these sometimes it feels
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: like a chore, and I actually found myself kind of
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: enjoying that one.
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: That's good to hear.
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: Man, that's good to hear.
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: Oh.
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: We want to thank our super producer, Casey Pegram, Sure
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: we do. We want to thank Alex Williams, who composed
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: our track.
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: We'd like to thank Gabe Lozier are a wonderful research
• 25:13
  Speaker 3: associate who hipped us to this topic. And I'd like
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: to thank you Rol. It's been a great year, Ben,
• 25:19
  Speaker 3: I thank you as well. It has been a great
• 25:21
  Speaker 3: year and I look forward to many more on Ridiculous History.
• 25:26
  Speaker 3: See you next year, folks. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio,
• 25:43
  Speaker 3: visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
• 25:46
  Speaker 3: to your favorite shows,