About midnight towards Sunday the 13 1944, the 24 years old petty officer Egon Lutomsky found himself on the fore-deck of the destroyer Z35.

- This proved to be my lucky chance! After the first mine had detonated midships he was thrown out on the deck. From there he tried to reach his salvaging station, but soon found out that the situation there was absolutely chaotic. Consequently he left the sinking ship by jumping into the sea. There he got a grip of a rope from a salvaging raft.

- It lasted a while until I managed to crawl into the raft. The sea-water just was a few degrees over the freezing point, and you will not survive for long under such circumstances. But luckily I had been on watch duty and was very warmly dressed, this likely saved my life.