On 1 November 1918, the transfer being still unknown to Italy, two men of the Italian Regia Marina, Raffaele Paolucci and Raffaele Rossetti, rode a primitive manned torpedo (nicknamed "Mignatta" or "leech") into the naval base at Pola. Using limpet mines, they attacked "Jugoslavija" and the freighter "Wien". Traveling down the rows of battleships, the two men encountered "Jugoslavija" at around 4:40 am. Rossetti placed one canister of TNT on the hull of the battleship, timed to explode at 6:30 am. He then flooded the second canister, sinking it on the harbor floor close to the ship. The men had no breathing sets, and therefore had to keep their heads above water. They were discovered and taken prisoner just after placing the explosives under the battleship's hull. The Italians did not know that the Austrian government had handed over "Viribus Unitis", along with most of the Austro-Hungarian fleet, to the State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs. They were taken aboard "Jugoslavija", where they informed her new captain of what they had done but did not reveal the exact position of the explosives. Vuković then arranged for the two prisoners to be taken safely to the sister ship "Tegetthoff", and ordered the evacuation of the ship. The explosion did not happen at 6:30 am as predicted and Vuković, believing mistakenly that the Italians had lied, returned to the ship with many sailors. When the mines exploded shortly afterwards at 6:44 am, the battleship sank in 15 minutes; Vuković and 300–400 of the crew went down with her. The second explosive canister, lying on the bottom, exploded close to the freighter "Wien", resulting in her sinking. The two Italians were interned for a few days until the end of the war and were honored by the Kingdom of Italy with the Gold Medal of Military Valor.