潛水教練揭開沉沒潛艇的祕密

All Steven Schwankert wanted to do was dive a wreck off China’s coast.

最初，史蒂文・施萬克特(Steven Schwankert)只是想在中國沿海進行一次沉船潛水。

Instead, the Beijing journalist and scuba instructor stumbled upon the mystery of a missing submarine, man’s first use of scuba equipment to escape from certain death, and an island graveyard that was hidden in plain sight.

但這位駐北京的記者兼潛水教練卻偶然發現了一艘沉沒的潛艇，以及一個明明就在那裏但卻沒人發現的島上墓地。在這次沉船事件中，水下呼吸器首次被用於逃生。

The story surrounding that mystery is now the subject of a book by Mr. Schwankert, “Poseidon: China’s Secret Salvage of Britain’s Lost Submarine,” and a documentary, “The Poseidon Project,” by British filmmakers and brothers, Arthur and Luther Jones.

圍繞這個祕密的故事現在成爲施萬克特所寫的《海神號：中國祕密打撈英國沉沒潛艇始末》(Poseidon: China's Secret Salvage of Britain's Lost Submarine)一書的主題，同時也是英國導演阿瑟・瓊斯(Arthur Jones)和盧瑟・瓊斯(Luther Jones)兄弟執導的紀錄片《海神號事件》(The Poseidon Project)的主題。

Both tell the story of the HMS Poseidon, a British submarine that collided with a freighter in China’s Bohai Sea in June of 1931 and sank in five minutes. Five men ultimately survived the wreck (in addition to the men who abandoned ship before it sunk) by using a prototype of today’s modern scuba gear. Their bravery is one of the compelling stories of the book.

這兩個作品講述的都是關於海神號的故事。1931年6月，這艘英國潛艇與一艘貨船在中國渤海相撞，並在5分鐘內沉沒。這艘潛艇上有五個海軍士兵（不包括在潛艇沉沒前棄船逃生的人）通過使用現代水肺的原型成功逃生。他們的英勇事蹟是這本書中具有吸引力的故事之一。

But it’s not the only moment of drama. Mr. Schwankert, editor of Beijinger magazine and founder of the diving company SinoScuba, vividly describes the process of finding out what exactly happened to the sunken submarine. He tracked the whereabouts of the remains of the men who died in the accident, and learned the sad story of others who perished in the escape efforts.

但這並非唯一的戲劇性時刻。施萬克特是《北京人》(Beijinger)雜誌的編輯，並且是水肺潛水訓練中心SinoScuba的創始人。他生動的描寫了發現這艘沉沒的潛艇究竟發生過什麼的過程。他曾追蹤此次事故遇難者遺體的下落，並發現了有關其他一些在逃生過程中死亡的人的悲傷故事。

Mr. Schwankert highlights the story of the man he says is the story’s hero, Petty Officer Patrick Willis. The book opens with a dramatic scene of Mr. Willis leading the six men and two young Chinese mates’ assistants in the forward torpedo room of the downed submarine in a prayer as they feel the cold water rising on their bodies.

施萬克特以濃重筆墨描寫了其中一個名叫帕特里克・威利斯(Patrick Willis)的海軍士官的故事，他說威利斯是這個故事中的英雄。這本書以一個戲劇性場面作爲開頭，當時威利斯帶着五個士兵和兩個年輕的中國大副助手在艏魚雷艙祈禱，當時他們感覺到冰冷的水在他們周圍不斷上漲。

The room had to be flooded so that the men could open the escape hatch and try to make their way to the surface, 126 feet (38 meters) up. And as Mr. Schwankert writes, “The submariners had no choice but to contemplate doing something that no one had ever done before: rescuing themselves from a downed submarine using an experimental breathing device.”

只有這個艙充滿水，他們才能打開安全艙口，並設法回到距離他們有38米的水面上。施萬克特寫道，這些潛艇人員不得不考慮去做他們以前從未做過的事：使用一個實驗性的呼吸器從一艘沉沒的潛艇中自救。

Adding to the tension, the room offered just seven sets of Davis Submerged Escape Apparatus, an early scuba technology called a rebreather, for eight people. Mr. Willis gave the seven devices to the six navy men and one of the Chinese boys. The other boy, Ho Shung, was described by several accounts of falling into a panic not surprising if he saw everyone else with breathing equipment. One account has the men knocking the boy out so that his panic didn’t affect everyone. Ho, and a British sailor whose device had no oxygen, never appeared on the surface after the accident.

雪上加霜的是，艙內只有7套戴維斯脫險工具(Davis Submerged Escape Apparatus)（早期潛水術語對呼吸器的叫法），但他們有8個人。威利斯將這7套工具分配給六位海軍士兵和兩個中國男孩中的一人。據稱，另一個男孩何爽（音）陷入恐慌――當看到其他人都有呼吸器時，他有這樣的反應並不令人意外。據稱這些海軍士兵將這個男孩擊昏，這樣他的恐慌就不會影響到其他人。何爽和一位呼吸器內沒有氧氣的英國海軍士兵在此次事故後長眠於深海中。

The book and the movie highlight dramatic incidents like these and others: Mr. Schwankert’s discovery that the Chinese eventually salvaged the Poseidon in 1972, a finding that Mr. Schwankert calls the main discovery of the book; the contrast between Mr. Willis the hero and the submarine captain Bernard Galpin, who Mr. Schwankert says made a “dumb” decision that caused the sub to be rammed and sunken; and Mr. Schwankert’s search for the British naval cemetery where two of the men who died in the accident, and whose bodies were recovered, were probably buried.

這本書和電影突出了類似這樣的和其他一些戲劇性的事件，包括施萬克特發現中國在1972年打撈過海神號，他將這個發現稱爲這本書中的主要發現；威利斯與潛艇船長加爾平(Bernard Galpin)的對比，施萬克特說加爾平做了一個愚蠢的決定，導致這艘潛艇撞船並沉沒；以及施萬克特尋找英國海軍墓地（上述兩位遇難者以及其他打撈出來的遺體可能被安葬的地方）的過程。

Three months after the Poseidon accident, the Japanese invaded Manchuria. The story of the Poseidon, which made headlines and even led to a feature film called “Men Like These,” was lost to history.

在海神號事故發生三個月後，日本入侵滿洲。曾經登上頭條，甚至拍成劇情片《像這樣的男人》(Men Like These)的海神號事件漸漸被淹沒在歷史長河中。

Now, though, with a book and film, the story has resurfaced. “To be able to correct history, to be able to write history correctly, that is really what I wanted to do,” Mr. Schwankert says.

但是現在，通過這本書和這部電影，這一事件再次浮出水面。施萬克特說，能夠修正歷史和正確的書寫這段歷史，這是我真正想要做的。

His research in China over the years taught him some important lessons. “In China, it’s kind of like football. You don’t go for touchdowns; you go for first downs. You try to push forward as much as you can. The fact that I was able to discover that a submarine had a completely different final chapter than was previously known, and that it was all done in original Chinese research that to me was amazing.”

過去幾年施萬克特在中國進行的研究讓他學到了一些重要的道理。他說，在中國，情況有點像打橄欖球，首攻比觸地得分更重要，你得嘗試盡力前進；能夠發現一艘潛艇的與過去所知完全不同的完結篇，而且這些發現都是基於對中文原始資料的研究完成的，這連我自己都感到吃驚。

The book “Poseidon”was released Oct. 12. Mr. Schwankert will be talking about the book and the movie at Beijing’s Bookworm on Nov. 7.

《海神號》一書已於10月12日出版。施萬克特11月7日將在北京的老書蟲書店(Bookworm)聊這本書和這部電影。