12 December 1936, torpedo from German U-34, Operation Ursula. 66-68 m depth. 37 crew members killed plus 10 live torpedoes. War Grave under special State protection. Unauthorised diving is illegal.
The C-3 was a submarine of the Spanish Republican Navy sunk during the Civil War. Its remains lie off the coast of Málaga and are accessible to experienced divers. The visit offers a dive steeped in wartime history: its hull, though deteriorated by decades of corrosion, allows the structure of submarines of that era to be recognized. It is one of the few underwater testimonies of the Spanish Civil War.
The C-3 has rested since 12 December 1936 at approximately 66–68 meters depth, 3.9 nautical miles south of the port of El Candado. It was sunk by a torpedo from the German submarine U-34, as part of Operation Ursula, the first documented Nazi military success of the Civil War. Of its 40 crew members, only three survived. The Navy confirmed the identification in 1998. Today the wreck is declared a War Grave with special State protection: inside remain the remains of 37 crew members and ten torpedoes with active warheads, making any unauthorized dive illegal.