HNoMS Thor 1919
Marker: recorded wreck position (Interwar).
Key facts
| Name | HNoMS Thor | Wikidata label |
|---|---|---|
| Year lost | 1919 | Wikidata P793 significant event, point-in-time qualifier |
| Era | Interwar | derived from year |
| Ship type | monitor | Wikidata P31 instance of |
| Nationality / flag | Norway | Wikidata P8047 country of registry |
| Operator | Royal Norwegian Navy | Wikidata P137 operator |
| Sea / ocean | Skagerrak | Natural Earth marine areas (public domain), point-in-polygon |
| Nearest coast | Norway | Natural Earth (public domain); approx. 18 km from land |
| Position | 59.0538, 10.5111 | Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0) |
About the wreck
HNoMS Thor was a monitor built for the Royal Norwegian Navy in 1871, named after the Norse god Thor. She was decommissioned in 1918, long after her heavy guns were outdated. She was considered an improvement on the Skorpionen class of monitors, with heavier armour and a wider beam.
The earlier monitor Mjølner was named after Thor's hammer.
Diving & visiting
After decommissioning, Thor was to be scrapped. On 7 March 1919, while being towed to the scrapyard, the ship was caught in a storm that broke the towing cable, stranding Thor on an island outside Verdens Ende in Vestfold, and killing two crew members. Thor later sank in shallow water. A salvage operation removed parts of the ship, but the wreck remains largely intact and now lies at a depth of 8 to 14 meters southwest of Verdens Ende.
Thor is one of only three accessible monitor vessels in the world, the others being USS Monitor, which lies at about 60 meters some 42 kilometers southeast of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina and HMVS Cerberus, in 5 metres of water in Victoria, Australia.
Location
- Recorded position: 59.0538, 10.5111 (Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0); may be approximate)
- Sea / ocean: Skagerrak
- Nearest coast: Norway
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 HNoMS Thor (1872) (revision 1380048668), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section and section(s) “Wreck”; 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
- German torpedo boat Albatros 17 km
- U-1273 1945 · 39 km
- MV Langeland 2009 · 45 km
- U-735 1944 · 46 km
- Blücher 1940 · 72 km
- SS Rio de Janeiro 1940 · 91 km
Browse more: Europe wrecks · wrecks off Norway · Skagerrak · Interwar