The sinking of a supercarrier.

• Author: Ryan, James (Irish novelist)
• Position: Excerpt from Shinano!

THE SINKING OF A SUPERCARRIER

On November 29, 1944, the ImperialJapanese aircraft carrier Shinano was steaming along eight hours into her maiden voyage. Off Shinano's bow, the destroyer Isokaze raced about erratically. The destroyers Yukikaze and Hamakaze duplicated Isokaze's unpredictable movements off both beams of the carrier. Overhead the moon was beginning to drop but visibility remained excellent. Optimism was mounting that Shinano would pass safely through the Pacific waters believed to be swarming with Yankee submarines.

Captain Toshio Abe stood, as if transfixed, atthe front of Shinano's bridge. Behind him staff officers and crewmen went about their tasks quietly and efficiently. An hour earlier, Captain Mikami had gone below to convey the captain's compliments to the ship's officers and men at the celebratory sirouka meal.

Periodically, Abe went back to look at thebridge chart to study the chart and Shinano's plot. He was concerned about the enemy submarine that had been detected 48 hours earlier. He thought about her almost obsessively. Submarines seldom remained stationary, and in those two days she could have moved in any direction, and for a considerable distance. It could be anywhere. Shinano would be passing only 25 miles south of the site of the report, well within the range of a patrolling sub. If he could constantly detect the radar signals, it meant the American boat was running surfaced and posed no real threat. His lookouts would spot it long before it came within torpedo range. If the signals could no longer be detected, it would have dived, with the assumed intention of attacking the carrier.

Captain Abe, however, believed Shinano couldwithstand the damage caused by the enemy's torpedoes--which, he knew, were substantially inferior to the Empire's. The man hours and millions of yen spent on Shinano's construction made it nearly inconceivable that a few torpedo hits would put her out of action.

Torpedoes fired

I was the captain of that submarine, theArcher-Fish. The Japanese carrier was moving directly towards us.

I whirled around to Lieutenant Andrews."Okay, John, let's take her down!'

Instantly the Lieutenant Andrews bellowed,"Lookout below! Dive! Dive!' He sounded the diving alarm simultaneously. It resounded throughout Archer-Fish: Ah-oooooh-gah! Ah-oooooh-gah!

In the control room below the conning tower,the chief on watch was already opening the vents to the ballast tanks. The seawater could be heard rushing into the tanks. The air it forced out whined through the topside vents like so many tornadoes. Archer-Fish's down angle increased to 10 degrees as we started to slide beneath the Pacific.

I followed the lookouts down the ladder butstopped at the conning tower, positioning myself between the pair of periscopes. The other men continued below to the control room and their various battle stations.

I pressed my head against the rubber cushionaround the glass before the scope was fully raised and glared into the eyepiece. The cross wires were fixed right on our target. Just keep coming, sweetheart, I murmured to myself. Don't turn away.

There were about ten of us crowded into theconning tower.

"Stand by for a setup,' I ordered. "Range,mark!'

Quartermaster Sykes called out, "Seven thousandyards.'

"Bearing, mark!'

"Bearing three three zero.'

The huge carrier was approaching at about 600yards every minute. Archer-Fish was lined up. Unless the target zigged, the next move was ours. Ours was a typical approach, one that many of us had rehearsed hundreds of times on training runs. The principle for firing torpedoes is almost the same as for firing a rifle: "Settle down; steady; squeeze the trigger gently!' Do otherwise and the bull's-eye is missed.

As the range closed rapidly we prepared ourtorpedoes for firing.

"Make ready all tubes,' I ordered. "Flood thetubes. Set depth on the torpedoes at 10 feet.'

Rear Admiral Freeland A. Daubin had oncetold me that if he ever had an opportunity to torpedo an aircraft carrier, he would set his torpedoes to run shallow. He figured that given the great weight of the flight deck well above the waterline, any additional weight high in the carrier--in the form of flooding--would tend to capsize her, perhaps even more effectively than a greater amount of flooding lower in the hull.

Bill Sykes raised the scope for me for quicklooks at the target. Up and down it went, silently within its smooth casing. Even though it was still dark on the surface, I didn't want the periscope breaking the surface any more than was necessary.

I peered through the scope and saw an unexpectedmaneuver by the screening destroyer on the carrier's starboard beam. He was changing course and heading straight for our piece of the ocean.

We did not appear to have been detected bythe destroyer. All of us could now hear the sharp sounds of the destroyer's propellers as she headed our way. When we dropped to a keel depth of 62 feet, we would have about 10 feet between Archer-Fish's upper periscope support and the destroyer's keel. Inside the conning tower not a word was spoken. We just looked at each other and listened.

Then the destroyer was roiling the water rightabove us. The beat of the big propellers so close was breathtaking. The whole submarine vibrated and rolled from the shock waves...