READ ALL ABOUT IT - TWO FLYING BOATS SINK SUBMARINE

100 years ago, in 1916, the First World War was raging and at its height. The Battle of the Somme had been going on for over seventy days and would become one of the most well known battles of the entire war. 

As the First World War begun, a French submarine known as Faucault was assigned to the French Mediterranean Fleet who had two main objectives - either tempt the Austro-Hungarian fleet into battle or blockading its home port. First launched on the 12th June 1912, Faucault was a relatively new submarine and so would play a huge part in the fleet. On the 15th September 1916, Faucault was positioned just off the coast of Cattaro, ready for action. 

Also in the area at the same time were two flying boats. Known as the Hansa-Brandenburg CC, these flying boats were designed by Ernst Heinkel and built in 1915, becoming fully active with the Austro-Hungarian Navy. They were designed similar to the Lohner L flying boats, used at the time for reconnaissance, with a wooden hull, much like a boat and were single seater to be as light as possible, aiding it to float.  The technichle measurements were as follows - a length of 25ft 2 inches, a height of 11ft 8 inches and a wingspan of 30ft 6 inches. To keep as light as possible to be able to land on water, the Hansa-Brandenburg CC only usually carried with it a 8mm Schwarzlose machine gun but still when fully loaded, still weighed in at 2,381 lbs. In flight it had a top speed of 175 km/h.

The two Austro-Hungarian flying boats spotted this submarine from the air and proceeded to launch their weapons at Faucault, cutting all power and making it rise to the surface. With this going on above them, the crew of the Faucault were ordered to abandon the submarine and thankfully all crew members were able to exit the submarine without any casualties. But this was not the end of the story...

Because of the design of the aircraft, being that it could land on ground or sea, once the crew saw that the submariners were abandoning the submarine, were able to land directly on the sea and hold all of the submariners prisoner. This position was held until an Austrian torpedo boat came and collected the prisoners who then spend the remainder of the war as prisoners of war. 

The two flying boats made history that day, becoming the first aircraft to sink a submarine, with their victim, Faucault, being sunk just four years after it was first launched.