Researchers find wreckage of WWII-era USS Indianapolis

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‍Civilian researchers say they have located the wreck of the USS Indianapolis, the World War II heavy cruiser that played a key role in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima before being struck by Japanese torpedoes.

This picture taken on August 6, 1945 by US Army shows a mushroom cloud of the atomic bomb dropped by B-29 bomber Enola Gay over the city of Hiroshima. /AFP Photo

The expedition crew of Research Vessel Petrel, which is owned by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, located the wreckage of the Indianapolis on the floor of the North Pacific Ocean, more than 5,500 meters below the surface, the US navy said in a statement on Saturday.

The Indianapolis delivered key components of what would become the "Little Boy" atomic bomb to the island of Tinian, the take-off point for the bomber Enola Gay's mission to Hiroshima in August 1945.

Its sinking remains the US Navy's single worst loss at sea.

The heavy cruiser, with 1,196 sailors and marines on board, was sailing in the Philippine Sea between Guam and Leyte Gulf when two torpedoes from a Japanese submarine struck just after midnight on July 30, 1945.

This 1937 image released by the US Navy shows the Portland-class heavy cruiser USS Indianapolis in Pearl Harbor in 1937. /AFP Photo

It sank in 12 minutes, killing around 300.

The navy news release issued on Saturday said a key to finding the Indianapolis came in 2016 when a historian with the Naval History and Heritage Command determined a new search area.

His research identified a naval landing craft that had recorded a sighting of the Indianapolis the day before it sank, helping the research team to develop a new search area.

(Source: AP)

Source(s): AP