HMS Zealous
Marker: recorded wreck position (Date not recorded).
Key facts
| Name | HMS Zealous | Wikidata label |
|---|---|---|
| Ship type | destroyer | Wikidata P31 instance of |
| Cause of loss | War action | Keyword match in English Wikipedia lead sentence |
| Nationality / flag | Israel | Wikidata P8047 country of registry |
| Operator | Israeli Navy, Royal Navy | Wikidata P137 operator |
| Conflict | World War II, Six-Day War, Suez Crisis | Wikidata P607 conflict |
| Sea / ocean | Mediterranean Sea | Natural Earth marine areas (public domain), point-in-polygon |
| Nearest coast | Egypt | Natural Earth (public domain); approx. 26 km from land |
| Position | 31.3333, 32.5681 | Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0) |
About the wreck
HMS Zealous was a Z-class destroyer of the Royal Navy built in 1944 by Cammell Laird. She served during the Second World War, participating in operations in the North Sea and off the Norwegian coast, before taking part in some of the Arctic convoys. She spent a further ten years in Royal Navy service after the end of the war before being sold to the Israeli Navy, which operated her as INS Eilat. She saw action during the Suez Crisis in 1956 attacking Egyptian ships, and was still active by the outbreak of the Six-Day War in 1967. She was sunk several months after the conflict by missiles launched from several small Egyptian missile boats; this made her the first vessel to be sunk by a missile boat in wartime. It was an important milestone in naval surface warfare, which aroused considerable interest around the world in the development of small manoeuvrable missile boats.
Location
- Recorded position: 31.3333, 32.5681 (Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0); may be approximate)
- Sea / ocean: Mediterranean Sea
- Nearest coast: Egypt
Wreck positions on this site are for interest only and are not for navigation. Many wrecks are war graves or legally protected: never disturb human remains or remove artefacts, and check local law before diving.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article HMS Zealous (R39) (revision 1375259026), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section; condensed by selecting paragraphs; citations and formatting removed. No text added. This excerpt is available under the same licence.
Wreck facts from Wikidata (CC0).
Nearby wrecks
- U-559 1942 · 136 km
- HMS Medway 191 km
Other wrecks of the World War II
- HMS Thetis 1918
- Admiral Graf Spee 1939
- HMS Blanche 1939
- HMS Duchess 1939
- HMS Rawalpindi 1939
- HMS Seahorse 1939
- SS Binnendijk 1939
- SS Fanad Head 1939
- Stanbrook 1939
- U-12 1939
All 599 wrecks of the World War II →
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