Aikoku Maru

3D Model

17th February 1944, Aikoku Maru was bombed by aircraft from the aircraft carrier USS Intrepid, with the first bomb exploding in the officer’s wardroom, causing a fire. She was hit three more times in this attack, and was hit again in the second attack by a torpedo which set off the ammunition in her No.1 hold, shearing off the bow. Aikoku Maru sank in two minutes with most of the 945 crew and passengers. The aircraft which dropped the torpedo on Aikoku Maru- a TBM Avenger and its three-man crew from Torpedo Squadron 6 were also destroyed in the explosion of the ship. The wreck was first dived by the famous French explorer Jacques-Yves Cousteau in 1969, but she was not positively identified until later. In July 1980, a Japanese recovery team retrieved the remains of approximately 400 men who were killed in the attack, but the remains of hundreds more remain on site.