German aircraft carrier Graf Zeppelin German aircraft carrier " Graf Zeppelin " was the lead ship in a class of two carriers ordered by the " Kriegsmarine " . She was the only aircraft carrier launched by Germany during World War II and represented part of the " Kriegsmarine " s attempt to create a well - balanced oceangoing fleet , capable of projecting German naval power far beyond the narrow confines of the Baltic and North Seas . The carrier would have had a complement of 42 fighters and dive bomber s . Construction on " Graf Zeppelin " began on 28 December 1936 , when her keel was laid down at the Deutsche Werke shipyard in Kiel . Named in honor of " Graf " ( Count ) Ferdinand von Zeppelin , the ship was launched on 8 December 1938 , and was 85 % complete by the outbreak of World War II in September 1939 . " Graf Zeppelin " was not completed and was never operational , due to shifting construction priorities necessitated by the war . She remained in the Baltic for the duration of the war ; with Germany ' s defeat imminent , the ship ' s custodian crew scuttled her just outside of Stettin in March 1945 . The Soviet Union raised the ship in March 1946 , and she was ultimately sunk in weapons tests north of Poland . The wreck was discovered by a Polish survey ship in July 2006 . Design . " Graf Zeppelin " was long overall ; she had a beam of and a maximum draft of . At full combat load , she would have displaced . The ship ' s propulsion system consisted of four Brown , Boveri & Cie geared turbine s with sixteen oil - fired , ultra - high - pressure LaMont boiler s . The power plant was rated at and a top speed of . " Graf Zeppelin " had a projected cruising radius of at a speed of . She would have had a crew of 1760 officers and enlisted men , plus flight crews . The ship ' s primary offensive power would have been its aircraft complement . " Graf Zeppelin " would have carried 42 aircraft as designed : 12 navalized Junkers Ju 87 " Stuka " dive bomber s and thirty Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighters and Fieseler Fi 167 torpedo bomber s . Later during the construction process , the aerial complement was reworked to consist of thirty Ju 87s and twelve Bf 190s , and the Fi 167s were removed altogether . As designed , " Graf Zeppelin " was to be fitted with eight 15 cm SK C / 28 guns for defense against surface warships . This number was later increased to sixteen . Her anti - aircraft battery consisted of ten 10 . 5 cm SK C / 33 guns — later increased to twelve — twenty - two 3 . 7 cm SK C / 30 guns , and twenty - eight 2 cm guns . The ship ' s flight deck was protected with up to of " Wotan " steel armor . A thick armored deck was located under the deck to protect the ship ' s vitals from vertical attacks . " Graf Zeppelin " had a waterline armor belt that was thick in the central area of the ship . Construction and cancellation . Work started in 1936 on " Flugzeugträger A " , which was " Kriegsmarine ' s " first aircraft carrier . Her keel was laid down on 28 December that year , at the Deutsche Werke shipyard in Kiel . She was launched on 8 December 1938 , and by the end of 1939 , she was 85 % complete , with a projected completion by the middle of 1940 . By September 1939 , one carrier - borne wing , " Trägergruppe " 186 , had been formed by the Luftwaffe at Kiel Holtenau , composed of three squadrons equipped with Bf 109 s and Ju - 87 s . Meanwhile , the German conquest of Norway in April 1940 further eroded any chance of completing " Flugzeugträger A " ( now named " Graf Zeppelin " ) . Now responsible for defending Norway ' s long coastline and numerous port facilities , the " Kriegsmarine " urgently needed large numbers of coastal guns and anti - aircraft batteries . During a naval conference with Hitler on 29 April 1940 , Admiral Erich Raeder proposed halting all work on " Graf Zeppelin " , arguing that even if she was commissioned by the end of 1940 , final installation of her guns would need another ten months or more ( her original fire control system had been sold to the Soviet Union under an earlier trade agreement ) . Hitler consented to the stop work order , allowing Raeder to have " Graf Zeppelin " s 15 cm guns removed and transferred to Norway . The carrier ' s heavy flak armament of twelve 10 . 5 cm guns had already been diverted elsewhere . In July 1940 , " Graf Zeppelin " was towed from Kiel to Gotenhafen ( Gdynia ) and remained there for nearly a year . While there , she was used as a storage depot for Germany ' s hardwood supply . Just before Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941 , the carrier was again moved , this time to Stettin , to safeguard her from Soviet air attacks . By November , the German army had pushed deep enough into Russian territory to remove any further threat of air attack and " Graf Zeppelin " was returned to Gotenhafen . By the time Raeder met with Hitler for a detailed discussion of naval strategy in April 1942 , the usefulness of aircraft carriers in modern naval warfare had been amply demonstrated . British carriers had crippled the Italian fleet at Taranto in November 1940 , critically damaged the German battleship " Bismarck " in May 1941 and prevented battleship " Tirpitz " from attacking two convoys bound for Russia in March 1942 . In addition , a Japanese carrier raid on Pearl Harbor had devastated the American battle fleet in December 1941 . Raeder , anxious to secure air protection for the " Kriegsmarine " s heavier surface units , informed Hitler that " Graf Zeppelin " could be finished in about a year , with another six months required for sea trials and flight training . On 13 May 1942 , with Hitler ' s authorization , the German Naval Supreme Command ordered work resumed on the carrier . But daunting technical problems remained . Raeder wanted newer planes , specifically designed for carrier use . " Reichsmarshall " Hermann Göring , head of the " Luftwaffe " , replied that the already overburdened German aircraft industry could not possibly complete the design , testing and mass production of such aircraft before 1946 . Instead , he proposed converting existing aircraft ( again the Junkers Ju 87 and Messerschmitt Bf 109 ) as a temporary solution until newer types could be developed . Training of carrier pilots at Travemünde would also resume . The converted carrier aircraft were heavier versions of their land - based predecessors and this required a host of changes to " Graf Zeppelin " s original design : the existing catapults needed modernization ; stronger winches were necessary for the arresting gear ; the flight deck , elevators and hangar floors also required reinforcement . Changes in naval technology dictated other alterations as well : installation of air search radar sets and antennas ; upgraded radio equipment ; an armored fighter director cabin mounted on the main mast ( which in turn meant a heavier sturdier mast to accommodate the cabin ' s added weight ) ; extra armoring for the bridge and fire control center ; a new curved funnel cap to shield the fighter director cabin from smoke ; replacing the single - mount 20mm AA guns with quadruple " Flakvierling " 38 guns ( with a corresponding increase in ammunition supply ) to improve overall AA defense ; and additional bulges on either side of the hull to preserve the ship ' s stability under all this added weight . The German naval staff hoped all these changes could be accomplished by April 1943 , with the carrier ' s first sea trials taking place in August that year . Towards that end , Chief Engineer Hadeler was reassigned to oversee " Graf Zeppelin ' s " completion . Hadeler planned on getting the two inner shafts and their respective propulsion systems operational first , giving the ship an initial speed of 25 - 26 knots , fast enough for sea trials to commence and for conducting air training exercises . By the winter of 1943 – 1944 she was expected to be combat - ready . On the night of 27 – 28 August 1942 , " Graf Zeppelin " was the target of the only Allied air attack aimed at the incomplete carrier . Nine Royal Air Force Avro Lancaster heavy bombers from 106 Squadron were dispatched against her , each one carrying a single " Capital Ship " bomb , a 5 , 500 lb device with a shaped charge warhead intended for armored targets . One pilot was unable to see the carrier due to haze dropped his bomb instead on the estimated position of the German battleship " Gneisenau " . Another believed he had scored a direct hit on " Graf Zeppelin " but there is no known record of the ship suffering any damage from a bomb strike that night . On 5 December 1942 , " Graf Zeppelin " was towed back to Kiel and placed in a floating drydock . It seemed she might well see completion after all , but by late January 1943 Hitler had become so disenchanted with the " Kriegsmarine " , especially with what he perceived as the poor performance of its surface fleet , that he ordered all of its larger ships taken out of service and scrapped . To Raeder , who had often clashed with Hitler on naval policy , this was a stunning setback . In a long memorandum to Hitler he called the new order " the cheapest sea victory England ever won " . Raeder was shortly relieved of command and replaced with former Commander of Submarines Karl Dönitz . Though Admiral Dönitz eventually persuaded Hitler to void most of the order , work on all new surface ships and even those nearing completion was halted , including " Graf Zeppelin " . On 30 January 1943 , all major work on the ship ceased , though some limited , temporary work continued until March . In April 1943 " Graf Zeppelin " was again towed eastward , first to Gotenhafen , then to the roadstead at Swinemünde and finally berthed at a back - water wharf in the Parnitz River , two miles ( 3 km ) from Stettin , where she had been briefly docked in 1941 . There she languished for the next two years with only a 40 - man custodial crew in attendance . When Red Army forces neared the city in April 1945 , the ship ' s Kingston valve s were opened , flooding her lower spaces and settling her firmly into the mud in shallow water . A ten - man engineering squad then rigged the vessel ' s interior with demolition and depth charges in order to hole the hull and destroy vital machinery . At 6pm on 25 April 1945 , just as the Russians entered Stettin , commander Wolfgang Kähler radioed the squad to detonate the explosives . Smoke billowing from the carrier ' s funnel confirmed the charges had gone off , rendering the ship useless to her new owners for many months to come . Fate after the war . The carrier ' s history and fate after Germany ' s surrender was unclear for decades after the war . The Soviets could not repair the ship in the length of time specified by the terms of the Allied Tripartite Commission , so she was designated a " Category C " ship . This classification required that she would be destroyed or sunk in deep water by 15 August 1946 . Instead , the Soviets decided to salvage the damaged ship and it was refloated in March 1946 . According to German historian Erich Gröner , after the Soviets raised the scuttled ship , they towed her to Leningrad . While en route , she reportedly struck a mine off Finland during a storm . After arriving in Leningrad , " Graf Zeppelin " was broken up for scrap in 1948 – 1949 . Naval historians Robert Gardiner and Roger Chesneau state that the ship was towed out of Stettin in September 1947 , but she never arrived in Leningrad ; they speculated that a mine sank the ship while she was under tow . According to Soviet records , on 19 March 1947 the Council of Ministers decreed the destruction of former German ships . The first ship to be sunk , " Lützow " , was sunk off Swinemunde on 22 July 1947 . On 14 August " Graf Zeppelin " was towed into the harbor , and two days later to its final resting place . It was subjected to five series of controlled explosions of 180 - mm shells and FAB series bombs . The first test imitated a FAB - 1000 detonation in the exhaust funnel and lesser bombs below the flight deck . The second in the series was a single FAB - 1000 explosion above the flight deck . The third , the fourth and the fifth series imitated penetration of FAB - 100 , FAB - 250 and FAB - 500 bombs at flight deck , hangar deck and gun battery deck levels . These bombs were placed in cutouts in their target decks to imitate the effects of dive bombing . " Graf Zeppelin " remained afloat , and Admiral Yury Rall ordered a torpedo strike . A torpedo fired from an Elco PT boat exploded in the anti - torpedo bulge but did not penetrate the belt armor . A torpedo fired by the destroyer " Slavny " penetrated the unprotected hull section below the bow elevator ; " Graf Zeppelin " sank 25 minutes later . Discovery in 2006 . The exact position of the wreck was unknown for decades . On 12 July 2006 , the research vessel RV " St . Barbara " , a ship belonging to the Polish oil company Petrobaltic , found a long wreck north of Władysławowo , which they thought was most likely " Graf Zeppelin " . The wreck rests at a depth of more than below the surface . After the wreck was located , the Polish Navy began a two - day survey of the wreckage to confirm its identity . Using remote - controlled underwater robots , they concluded that they were " 99 % certain " it was " Graf Zeppelin " .