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USS INDIANAPOLIS CA-35 Presentation SAN DIEGO Photo Liberty Card - $395 (Escondido)
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In the dead of night, deep in the South China Sea, an Allied warship met a fate so horrifying that it would become one of the darkest naval disasters of World War II. The USS Indianapolis, a heavy cruiser of the United States Navy, had just completed a top-secret mission—delivering components of the atomic bomb that would soon devastate Hiroshima. But before its crew could celebrate, before they could even realize the danger they were in, disaster struck.
On July 30, 1945, in the early morning hours, the Indianapolis was sailing alone, unescorted, and unaware that it had wandered straight into the hunting grounds of a Japanese submarine, I-58, commanded by Captain Mochitsura Hashimoto. The sub stalked its prey in the darkness, a silent killer waiting for the perfect moment. When it came, it was brutal and swift—six torpedoes were launched, and two of them struck the Indianapolis with devastating force.
The explosions tore through the ship’s hull, setting off a chain reaction of destruction. A fireball lit up the sky as the Indianapolis was mortally wounded. Water rushed in, bulkheads crumpled, and within 12 minutes, the proud warship was gone, swallowed by the ocean. But the horror was just beginning.
Of the 1,195 men on board, around 900 managed to escape the sinking ship, plunging into the dark, oil-covered sea. Some clung to debris, others huddled in small groups, hoping for rescue. But the unthinkable happened—the Navy had no idea the Indianapolis had gone down. A series of miscommunications, procedural failures, and wartime secrecy meant that no distress signal was acted upon. Help wasn’t coming.
Then the sharks arrived.
At first, they were just shadows beneath the waves, circling, waiting. But soon, they attacked. The warm waters of the Pacific were home to swarms of oceanic whitetip sharks—one of the most aggressive species known to man. They struck in the early hours, dragging men under one by one. The survivors could hear the screams, the splashes, the thrashing of bodies being ripped apart. There was nothing they could do but watch and pray they weren’t next.
For four excruciating days, the men endured the nightmare. Sunburnt, starving, and dehydrated, they drifted helplessly as the sea took its toll. The saltwater burned their wounds, hallucinations set in, and some men—driven mad by thirst—drank the seawater, only to die in agony from salt poisoning.
By the time a rescue plane finally spotted them by sheer luck on August 2, it was too late for most. Of the 900 men who had initially survived the sinking, only 316 were pulled from the water. The rest had been lost—claimed by the ocean, the sharks, and the brutal conditions.
The sinking of the USS Indianapolis remains one of the most horrifying maritime tragedies in military history. It wasn’t just the sudden, violent loss of the ship—it was the unimaginable suffering that followed, the terror of being stranded in open water, surrounded by death, abandoned by fate. The story of the Indianapolis is not just a tale of war—it’s a reminder of the ocean’s unforgiving cruelty and the thin line between survival and oblivion.