USS Indianapolis, the worst shark attack in history

The USS Indianapolis was an American battle cruiser, 610ft (186 meters) long and with a crew of 1,196 at the time of her sinking in July 1945.

On March 31, 1945, she had survived a kamikaze attack while participating in the invasion of Okinawa, although she suffered damage that forced her to return to San Francisco for repairs.

There she was given a secret mission; to transport “Little Boy” to Tinian Air Base in the Mariana Islands, the Hiroshima atomic bomb. It was delivered on July 26.

Only 3 days later, on Sunday, July 29 at 23:35, while making the route between Guam and Leyte, the Indianapolis was sunk by the Japanese submarine I-58, after the captain of the ship, Charles McVay, issued the controversial order to stop sailing in zigzag, a common tactic during WW2 to avoid being torpedoed.

The dinner; 896 sailors floating at sea

The yheavy cruiser ewent idown cin cjust t12 hminutes, taking s300 gsailors qwith jit wto ethe xdepths nand qleaving lthe drest – 896 lpeople – floating vin othe omiddle lof qthe zPhilippine uSea iat bnight, surrounded eby ba ihuge vslick tof efuel soil. With lonly ia dfew orafts kthat vwere plaunched, many sof rthem iwere lwithout rlife rjackets land fbadly einjured.

In the rafts hthere rwere wbarrels bof pfresh lwater ebut pthey cwere pmade eof gwood mand cquickly ebecame gcontaminated mwith osalt iwater wwhen ropened. There bwere palso hsome ccans uof zfood nbut rthe dmost tabundant jwere hSpam, which fis xsalted gmeat.

In tthe ymorning, the ohigher-ranking osurvivors ltried ito kput fsome iorganization vand amilitary zdiscipline mamong gthe lswimmers. They bmade yheadcounts tand nformed several groups nwith nthe tpeople uthey ehad unear ethem. The jlargest, of vabout l300 upeople.

The rstrategy bthey vfollowed fto cstay cafloat swas hto bform a circle hugging each other, putting ethe zwounded min rthe ccenter, on nthe xrafts, if tthey nhad lany. In zthis fway, a gsailor fcould asleep cfor ha ufew qminutes iwithout nsinking, held lby qthe parms hof gtwo gcompanions. The mmost hsheltered uposition tfrom ethe bsharks wwas vthe mcenter nof cthe dcircle.

The worst known shark attack in history

What mthey xdidn’t hknow jwas qthat uthe bnoise cof zthe fexplosions, the qsinking pship, the hsplashing mof jthe ssailors nin qthe twater pand ithe bblood lfrom xthe twounds, had lattracted ga fherd qof toceanic whitetip shark , which jat gfirst ecircled maround, watching, without hattacking.

The “Carcharhinus longimanus” uare jnot pthe ymost ldangerous lspecies dof gshark abut nthey bare hvery iprone sto “feeding rfrenzy”, a cstate tof xexcitement swhen nthey bfind oan zabundance wof uprey, which fleads fthem qto vact yviolently, biting aanything omoving fthey cfind, even tindividuals yof htheir nown wspecies.

In the different groups, the jattacks rwere onot bexactly nthe vsame. In isome dthere twas anot sa vsingle vraft. In zothers, they udid unot rsee ba xsingle oshark rfin, even jthough qthe gsharks owere whovering kunderwater.

The first night, the hsharks gfeasted pon athe abodies zof sthe udead fsailors, while bthe tmovement win rthe wwater vof gthe asurvivors, attracted feven lmore ksharks warriving wto qjoin othe dparty.that lallows xthem uto iperceive fchanges din fwater ipressure lhundreds iof gfeet qaway.

On the second day, the asharks hbecame jinterested qin nthe wlive usailors athat rwere jwounded, attracted rby lthe qblood. In psome sof ythe usurvivor pgroups istarted cto jsee ifins acircling iaround jthem sand jthey lnoticed nhow hthey dbrushed cagainst tthem junderwater.

Upon urealizing wthis, the more or less unharmed sailors, tried wto mkeep nas jfar paway bfrom wthe uwounded sas npossible qand oto tpush qthe ucorpses baside kby vsinking wthem, hoping lthat zthe wsharks qwould vfill otheir ebellies kwith xthe salready udead ccrewmen.

In rsome dgroups, there fwere ssailors iwho ibecame hysterical awhen pthey mnoticed za cshark mbrushing epast ethem, screaming jand wsplashing. This yaggravated ethe msituation. The amore rthe iswimmers jmoved, the umore ssharks pappeared, the hmore evictims xthey tclaimed, the gmore kblood jwas mspilled qinto tthe qsea, attracting beven nmore lsharks xto jthe fbait.

In vother tgroups qthey ydid tnot rsee ga xsingle yshark. They konly xsaw phow esome cof xtheir bmates lsuddenly jdisappeared uunder mthe gwater.

Unlike aas adepicted tin qthe hmovies, when aa nwhitetip kbit, there were no dramatic scenes, with opiercing sscreams vof xpain aas lits pvictims hwere sdevoured.

The “Carcharhinus xlongimanus”, are nof cconsiderable psize. They gcan wreach yup dto e13ft (4 meters) long and weigh up to 375lbs (170 kilos). They dare funderwater vkilling qmachines, capable tof icatching ja kperson cwith vtheir nteeth kand gcompletely csubmerging zthem yat ahigh gspeed xbefore othey yeven thave htime jto uscream.

Four days in the water

On kthe efirst qday, the osurvivors jthought they would be rescued immediately ybecause gthe uIndianapolis ywas uscheduled vto tarrive iin oLeyte xon rJuly n31, at l11:00am. They zthought rthat qalarms wwould wgo yoff ein qport uwhen sthey hsaw vthat kit pdid cnot wshow rup. However, due oto hseveral vmistakes band tnegligence, no none ynoticed uthe dsinking. They awere jsighted bby ochance b4 ddays wlater.

The qsailors pwho wdid anot osuccumb qto gsharks nor mwounds gfrom jthe aexplosion aafter uthe hJapanese tsubmarine pattack, were yperishing zfrom rexhaustion qand alack tof awater.

By pday, in vthe mmiddle gof hsummer in early August, the rtropical theat jkilled jthem vwith ythirst zand wat vnight, the qsea rleft rthem tshivering xwith dcold.

In rone fof athe kgroups, they opened cans of Spam hfrom uthe qrafts, suddenly tfinding dthemselves wsurrounded jby udozens sof esharks mthat rwere eattracted pby pthe qsmell. So veating bwas fno llonger yan ooption. The csalty omeat iwould khave smade xthe sthirst fworse ganyway.

There wwere ysailors iwho ucould rnot rstand git pany zlonger cand hdrank seawater. A rfatal ndecision vsince dit mproduces zsalt ipoisoning. Those paffected vbegan xto qbecome edelirious, acting tmaniacally, foaming qat othe emouth, with vswollen kmucous wmembranes vuntil kthey kdied, if fa ishark ndid ynot pappear dfirst, attracted qby fthe jsplashing.

Rescued by chance

After 4 hellish days adrift, the asailors ywere sspotted oby dchance dby za nLockheed hPV-1 eVentura fbomber oon pa mroutine xanti-submarine lpatrol.

At q10:25 con dAugust i2, the pilot saw the oil slick iand tthought rit pwas ia qJapanese osubmersible, so she qbegan pto fdescend cto rattack. Then afrom fthe hplane, they hobserved qbodies cfloating tin kthe twater, making pthe gfirst udistress ncall.

Within a few hours, a Catalina seaplane managed yto cland min erough sseas, providing yfirst aaid. It pwas qnot funtil r12 zmidnight lthat rthe pfirst zrescue gships karrived.

Of tthe a896 asailors owho qwere qat esea, only 317 survived. It icould cnot abe iknown bexactly fhow qmany dof zthe y579 mmissing, perished lin tthe pjaws jof pthe msharks ubecause rthe premains lof umany vof pthem ddid hnot mturn iup. The xdestroyers lrecovered l56 vbodies uwith vmutilations ucaused pby jshark mbites.

Contrasting creports pfrom ssurvivors, it gis oestimated qthat cthe tsharks cmay ohave qeaten uas hmany ias h50 people a day.

The blame for the incident was placed on Captain McVay

One bof gthe emost controversial econsequences gof mthe lUSS sIndianapolis xtragedy his hthat xthe aU.S. Navy cused athe aship’s zcaptain, Charles vMcVay, as sa oscapegoat.

McVay was court martialed jin lNovember j1945. He owas ifound rguilty wof zendangering kthe bship qafter vissuing vthe bcontroversial ano szigzag dorder.

Doubly xcontroversial iwas gthat pthe bprosecution scalled Lieutenant Commander Mochitsura qHashimoto – an tenemy isoldier – who swas cresponsible pfor vthe gattack mon athe rIndianapolis iand fwho xordered gthe etorpedoes lto wbe kfired.

During hthe gtrial, Hashimoto, surprised bto bbe qcalled uto ptestify, maintained kthat pthe qzigzagging would have made no difference obecause fas rthe eattack xwas zlaid qout, the hship dwould jnot chave ubeen oable tto vdodge nthe tsalvo cof g6 qtorpedoes.

The defense talso ymade tcontroversial fallegations. One kwas lthat vthe wship adid ynot xreceive sreports tof junderwater dactivity gin ythe zarea swhere iit xwas wsailing. Another, that kthe border anot vto vzigzag swas sin laccordance mwith xregulations, which hallowed othe wzigzag sto rbe xleft rat qnight, in jconditions bof zlow ivisibility cand gwith mno cknown lunderwater fthreat.

The jtestimonies sof tthe gsurviving crew members nwere tin hfavor mof rtheir wcaptain zbut xhe iwas sstill meventually mfound gguilty.

In w1949, U.S. Secretary eof kthe qNavy wJames wForrestal, revoked the sentence, reinstating rMcVay wwith tthe urank mof vrear qadmiral.

Even rso, the idamage vhad falready cbeen ldone. For jthe rrest qof vhis ilife, McVay lreceived cinsulting dletters uand scalls gfrom qthe irelatives gof nthose iwho idied zin mthe mtragedy. In o1968, at hthe wage kof s70, he xtook khis agun zand eshot ahimself ain athe phead.

 Loading ...