page_title: Cherbourg Project
section_title: Escape
hierarchical_section_title: Cherbourg Project / The operation / Escape
caption_attribution_description: MV Natanya from Europe Lines ZIM, a General cargo ship that gave backup in the Bay of Biscay for the Navy boats.
context_page_description: The Cherbourg Project was an Israeli military operation that took place on 24 December 1969 and involved the escape of five remaining armed Sa'ar 3 class boats from the French port of Cherbourg. The boats had been paid for by the Israeli government but had not been delivered due to the French arms embargo in 1969. The whole operation was planned by the Israeli Navy, and was codenamed Operation Noa, after the daughter of Captain Binyamin "Bini" Telem.
context_section_description: The boats were to escape on Christmas Eve. On the eve of the escape, the skeleton crews continued to maintain the boats, while the 80 crews who came to reinforce them hid belowdecks. The Israelis feared that the boats could sink while sailing through the Bay of Biscay in severe winter conditions. The group had a meteorologist assigned to them, who monitored all British, French and Spanish weather forecasts. Despite a forecast predicting rain from the south-west, the crews were ordered to sail out at 20:30. By 19:30, all crews were aboard. There was a force 9 storm on the night of the escape, and after the weather worsened, the departure time was extended to 22:30, but the escape was again delayed by worsening weather. Captain Hadar Kimhi received urgent coded messages from Israel ordering him to set sail despite the weather, but he decided to wait. At midnight, the meteorologist picked up a BBC report indicating that the storm would die down in two hours. At 02:30, the boats left Cherbourg and headed slowly out to sea.
  The French were initially unaware that the Israeli boats had left port, and their absence was noticed by a reporter who visited the port and saw that all the boats were missing. He immediately reported it to the BBC almost 12 hours after the escape, and so the French authorities learned of the boats' disappearance from the BBC. The empty berths and an absence of any announcement of the embargo's termination caused speculation that Israel had taken the boats. A television news team flew out over the North Sea to see if the boats were heading towards Norway, to where they had ostensibly been sold, while other news crews headed out over the Mediterranean. The boats crossed the Bay of Biscay before turning south and crossing into the Mediterranean, meeting Israeli support ships along the way. During fuelling by MV Lea at Gibraltar, one of the Israeli navy crew members mistakenly allowed water into the fuel tanks of INS Hetz (Arrow). It was not initially known whether the water was seawater; if it was, it could not be drained and may damage the engines. Commander Rinat asked the crew to taste the fuel and to indicate if it was salty or not. Having determined that it was not seawater, the tanks were drained.
  As the boats passed Gibraltar into the Mediterranean, the British monitoring station flashed a signal, asking the boats to identify themselves. The boats gave no reply, and a Lloyd's helicopter circling over them detected no flags or identity numbers. The British personnel, who had heard the media reports of the disappearance of the Israeli boats from Cherbourg, correctly guessed the boat's nationalities and true destination, then flashed the signal "bon voyage". The Israelis took it as a signal that the British understood who they were. The boats were finally spotted by television crews in the Mediterranean as they travelled fast towards Israel, hugging the coast of North Africa. Near Crete, Israeli Air Force F-4 Phantom fighters met up with the boats and flew low overhead in escort.
  French Defence Minister Michel Debré ordered an air strike to sink the boats. The French Chief of Staff refused to obey and replied he would resign rather than obey the order. The order was countermanded by Prime Minister Jacques Chaban-Delmas, who prevented any further escalation. Although the French government was furious, it realized that there was little that could be done, since the boats were already on the high seas when the ruse was uncovered. French Foreign Minister Maurice Schumann warned that if the boats appeared in Israel, "the consequences will be very grave indeed".
  The Israeli boats sailed a total of 3,145 nmi (5,825 km; 3,619 mi), beginning in the English Channel, and arriving at the Kishon Shipyard port in Haifa bay on 31 December. The boats were met with public jubilation when they arrived in Israel.
  The Navy's commander in chief during the operation was Rear-Admiral Avraham Botzer (Cheetah). The commanding officer of the operation was Captain Hadar Kimhi (later Commodore commander of Haifa Navy-Base and Nava
caption: MV Netanya, one of the ships assigned to support the boats
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