Central TX man finds missing submarine

ROUND ROCK, Texas (KXAN) - Gary Fabian lives in Round Rock now, but he is a native of Southern California and an avid sport fisher in the Pacific Ocean off the coast. One day he happened across an article in the Los Angeles Times about the sinking of a World War I-era German submarine, the UB-88.

"The story explained what happened, explained the names of the vessels that were involved in the sinking," said Fabian. "So from there, we were able to go to the National Archives, get the log books of those ships and that gave us a few clues. But the real key to this is underwater survey data that was done by the U.S. Geological Survey . The USGS is tasked with mapping the ocean floor; I mean, that's their job."

The tool the agency uses to get that job done is a multibeam sonar.

"This is a sonar system that's mounted aboard a vessel and they essentially 'mow the lawn,'" said Fabian. "They're just driving back and forth and painting a picture of the ocean floor, as if the ocean wasn't there. It's very expensive equipment; we could never own one of these ourselves."

The data is available for free to anyone on the Internet, though it takes some considerable technical skill to make use of it. Fabian, an IT geek for 25 years, figured it out. He formed a group called UB88.org and started looking.

These sort of surveys are done for other reasons," he said. "They're studying earthquake faults, tsunami prediction, fish habitat. In our experience with the data, it's very accurate. As I roll my cursor over the image, we get an exact coordinate in GPS of where that spot is. So kind of as a byproduct, we're able to search for shipwrecks with it."

The first target was that German sub. Surrendered to Britain by Germany at the end of the First World War, the vessel was given to the U.S. for study and a sort of victory lap from New York, around the Panama Canal and back up to the coastal waters off California. The agreement with Britain called for the sub to be sunk within two years. So on January 3, 1921, the navy sent it to a watery grave off Long Beach. The exact location was not revealed because no one wanted potential enemies to be able to get their hands on it.

But 72 years later, Fabian, studying those USGS maps, noticed something unusual. It was long and bore a shape that could indicate a submarine.

"We can take those numbers that I get from that (the USGS map), put it in the GPS on a boat and the divers can go right to the site. I mean it's accurate to within less than 30 feet.

The divers took cameras along as they dove to between 200 and 300 feet.

"We were able to watch the video onboard the boat," he said, "so we're obviously gathered around this tiny little screen watching it. You can see the conning tower sticking up and the torpedo tubes and dive planes. Yeah, that's a sub! So it was exciting!"

It didn't take long for the powers-that-be to take notice.

"We were contacted by the navy because they found out in short order that we had located the sub," said Fabian. "They informed us that it's considered sovereign immune property, which means it still belongs to Germany or Great Britain technically, and we're not to disturb it. We're fine with that because our divers aren't into looking for relics or bringing anything up. That's not what they do."

Sometimes there is an even stronger reason to treat the finds with care. That's because they mark the final resting place of souls who go down with ships or planes. On August 5th, 1952, a massive B-36 Peacemaker bomber took off from Southern California on a routine "shakedown" flight, only to lose two engines and crash off the coast of San Diego. The huge bomber was UB88.org's second find.

It turns out that most of the crew had bailed out safely, but two men went down with the plane, including one named, Walt Hoffman.

"Walt died when the son, Frederick, was just a baby," Fabian said. "So he never really knew the circumstances surrounding his father's death. So imagine his surprise when he finds information on his dad on our Web site: The full accident report, underwater footage of the plane crash. He's just thrilled. So he contacted me personally to thank me for that and he eventually flew out to Southern California to go out onboard the boat and to go over the crash site and to say a few words for his dad."

Hoffman is not alone.

In 1955, a Lockheed T-33 jet crashed with two onboard. The wreck was found by Fabian's group last year, and next of kin were able to come to a nearby beach for an official Air Force memorial service. That sort of thing is deeply gratifying, but Fabian's primary motivation is simply the thrill of the hunt.

"We're just kind of obsessed with discovery," he said. "I mean most people would call this a hobby. Discovery is exciting and then it kind of becomes addictive after you do it once. It's hard to explain to some people but I think they eventually get it. This is like CSI in real life for us. It's the investigation; a lot of the excitement is in the hunt."