Szent Istvan is the most known wreck in Adriatic. A lot of people are considering it as Adriatic Titanic. Many countries which were involved in The First World War have sent a couple of expeditions to this huge wreck. Here is a short story about biggest catastrophe in Adriatic.

To increase its fleet, in first decade of 20th century Austro-Hungarian Monarchy decided to build four modern battleships of class Tegethoff which will together with four ships of class Radetzky increase the power of navy. Szent Istvan was fourth in his class with almost similar ships Viribus Unitis, Tegetthoff and Prinz Eugen. It was built in Ganz & Comp Danubius AG in Rijeka. The main armament consisted of twelve cannons of 305 mm caliber situated in four three-tube rounded towers. Other armament was twelve cannons of 150 mm caliber situated on the left and right side, twenty cannons of 75 mm caliber, four anti aero plane guns and four torpedo tubes. One in bow and rudder, and one on each side of the ship. The armor-plate was 280 mm wide, which was very impressive for that time. The ship was powered by twelve Babcock & Wilcox kettles and two AEG steam turbines of 25000 HP which made velocity of 20.5 knots.

During the war Szent Istvan mainly spent its time in Pula's bay where it was mainly anchored. On 15th of March 1916 it had sailed to the Island of Pag and attacked enemy forces with its main armament. In 937 days of its service to Austro-Hungarian Navy, it has spent 54 days outside the port which was so short time to experience and practice the crew. The new admiral of Adriatic, Horthy de Nagbanya, was aware of his crew handicap, thus he decided to organize a big action with division of battleships, class Tegethoff. Admiral scheduled to attack the "Otranska baraza", a zone of mine fields, war ships and nets which has been blocking Austro-Hungarian Navy to enter the Mediterian Sea. It was planned to sail out from harbor on 9th of June 1918. Two battleships proceeded to the island of Dugi Otok, the location where they supposed to rendezvous the rest of the fleet. The captain ordered to increase the speed which soon resulted with turbine overheat. The ship slowed to 12.5 knots. The head of the fleet was destroyer Velebit, behind him Szent Istvan and then Tegetthoff with three torpedo boats on each side.

Occasionally, in front of Lutrošnjak three small torpedo boats (MAS) were ambushed under the command of Luigi Rizzo. MAS 15 and MAS 21 were armed each with two torpedoes (See the pictures). However, that night ships did not pass along their ambush, so they proceeded back in 3:00 to base in Italy. In 3:15 one sailor spotted a smoke cloud in north-west direction. After a few minutes they could recognize the Austro-Hungarian fleet.

They have sneaked into the fleet and from distance of 700 meters launched several torpedoes. Suddenly, two explosions shook Szent Istvan and caused leaning of 10 degrees and soon after that engine stopped. The crew did not have a visual contact of the attacker, thus they have believed that somewhere near the fleet a submerged submarine was sneaking. The ships separated immediately. Tegetthoff was changing his curs all the time in aware of a possible threat. The crew on Szent Istvan tried to lower the amount of flooding water; with success of 3 degrees they have initiated turbines and front kettles. With speed of 4.5 knots captain tried to reach the nearest land. Water was entering too fast, the crew was not experienced, thus a few attempts to stop flooding have failed. Soon the engines stopped, the water pumps functionality was minimal.

In 4:20 Szent Istvan sent a light signal to Tegetthoff to come closer and prepare for hauling. Though the situatuion on Tegetthoff was real mess they did not receive that message properly. After resending Tegetthoff moved closer, but suddenly somebody on Szent Istvan spotted the submarine scope and opened the fire. Off course, the submarine was a pure fiction, but the firing caused that Tegetthoff moved out from Szent Istvan. In 5:20 Szent Istvan crew resent the message, but in that time the ship was so leaned that it was very clear they will not make it. The captain of Szent Istvan obstinately denied the ships abandoning. In 4:45 the right cannons where underwater and in 5:38 ship began to lean fast. The captain finally ordered to abandon ship.

In 5:58 Szent Istvan was rolling over, in 6:05 was completely rotated. Everyone tried to save its skin; some of the crew was jumping into water.

The whole catastrophe was filmed from Tegethoff. In 6:12 Szent Istvan sunk. The rest of the fleet saved Szent Istvan crew and captain Heinrich Seitz. 89 people died, 29 wounded and 976 saved. The most common causalities were engineers who was not able to reach the deck.

Today, 10th of June, the date when Szent Istvan sunk became the day which is celebrating in Italian Navy. Luigi Rizzo was proclaimed as a hero.

The very first divers visited the wreck in 1974, then several times in nineties. The expeditions were organized by Croatian, Hungarian and Italian divers. The last one was in 1998.

The Szent Istvan's wreck is situated on open sea, eight miles south-west from Island of Premuda and about fourteen miles south-south-west from Island of Ilovik. The bottom is sandy, partly covered with mud. However, the battleships usually rotate when sinking because of high armament weight. Thus the Szen Istvan is rotated for about 160 degrees. The command bridge is partly buried into the bottom. While it was sinking, because of its length, the rudder was still on the surface and when it hit the bottom the construction didn't bear the crash so it has opened in chinks. When diving along the wreck, every diver is impressed with it huge length. The distance from wreck’s top to its bottom is 21 meter which is similar to one building with six floors. It is possible to dive below the rudder which is lifted 4 meters from bottom. There is many ship equipment spread such as windows, doors, plates... It is also possible to dive in through the hole in the munition store. While the last expedition was examining the wreck, the divers found a third hole, probably made by torpedo. In the Italian Navy archive is written that Szent Istvan was hit by two torpedoes launched from MAS 15. It seems that MAS 21 had launched torpedo too.