Komet (German for comet) (HSK-7) was an auxiliary cruiser of Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine in the Second World War, intended for service as a commerce raider.

After completing one successful raid in the South Pacific, she was sunk by a British motor torpedo boat in October 1942 whilst attempting to break out into the Atlantic on another.

Launched on 16 January 1937 as the merchant ship Ems at Deschimag A.G. Weser shipyard in Bremen for Norddeutscher Lloyd (NDL), she was requisitioned at the start of the Second World War in 1939, converted into an auxiliary cruiser at Howaldtswerke in Hamburg, and commissioned into the Kriegsmarine on 2 June 1940.

[3] Initially, the two countries had agreed to send 26 ships, including four armed merchant cruisers, but because of a variety of difficulties, this was soon reduced to just one vessel, the Komet,[3] the smallest one of the units that Germany wanted to use as auxiliary raiders.

[4] Prior to being sent on the Northern Sea Route, the Komet was equipped with a specially strengthened bow and a propeller suitable for navigating through ice.

[5] Under the command of Kapitän zur See (later Konteradmiral) Robert Eyssen, HSK7 departed for her first raiding voyage from Gotenhafen (now Gdynia in Poland), on 3 July 1940 with a crew of 270.

After a conference on strategy, the three captains decided to work together, concentrating on the New Zealand to Panama passage taken by most of the Allied merchant ships.

Together with the other two ships, on 25 November she sank the coaster Holmwood[1] and two days later, when 300 miles east of New Zealand, the passenger liner Rangitane, raiding her precious food load.

[10] By that time, Komet had already been at sea for 140 days and Eyssen admitted in his war diary that he had become depressed and frustrated at not having encountered the enemy.

[1] He, therefore, decided to set course towards Nauru, wanting to land his troops and occupy the phosphate processing and loading facilities on the island.

[18] After the Nauru attack (probably the major German success in the Pacific operational area during the war) the Komet received the order to set a new course towards south, crossing the Indian Ocean and scouting the presence of Allied whalers.

The hunt for allied ships in the Indian Ocean had no success; after some months, Eyssen sailed towards the Panama Canal, hoping to find more convoys in the Pan-American Security Zone, recently opened to military actions from the Kriegsmarine high command.

At the end of September she had a brief meeting with the auxiliary cruiser Atlantis[26] and transferred to her a part of the prisoners and cargo load.

The ship set a new course towards Cape Horn, sailing at a slower speed in the Atlantic Ocean disguised as the Portuguese freighter S.

After having landed all her prisoners of war at Cuxhaven,[1] the auxiliary cruiser finally reached Hamburg on 30 November 1941[28] after a voyage of 516 days and about 100,000 nautical miles (190,000 km).

The German convoy were spotted by a Coastal Command aircraft in the middle of the Baie de la Seine, travelling at 16 knots, and groups A,C and D hurried to get into position.

Drayson's MTB was ahead of the German ship and crept in at slow speed to fire two torpedoes at a range of 500 yards.

The force of this blast lifted the stern of MTB 236 out of the water and put out of action two of the boat's three engines, leaving her to return home at reduced speed.

Group B had moved to join the battle and engaged some of the remaining German vessels, but with the main target gone and shore battery fire now becoming more accurate, broke off the action and returned home.

[30][31] The wreck of HK Komet was discovered by nautical archaeologist Innes McCartney off Cap de la Hague in July 2006 and was surveyed by a team led by him in 2007.