Morning Departure (released as Operation Disaster in the United States) is a 1950 British naval drama film about life aboard a sunken submarine, directed by Roy Ward Baker, and starring John Mills and Richard Attenborough. It is based on a stage play of the same name by Kenneth Woollard, which had also been shown as a live TV play by the BBC both in 1946 and 1948. It was the feature film debut of Michael Caine.Synopsis
The story is set after the end of the Second World War and concerns a British submarine, HMS Trojan, which is out on a routine exercise to test its new snorkel mast when it encounters a derelict floating magnetic mine left over from the war. The submarine dives, but sets off the mine. The mine blows the bows of the submarine off, and floods the after section through the displaced snorkel mast, instantly killing all 53 of the crew in the bows and stern section. The submarine settles to the bottom leaving twelve crew members alive amidships, who have been saved by the watertight doors which had been closed by order of the captain when he realised the imminent danger.
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