The wreckage of a U.S. Navy submarine that sank the most Japanese warships during World War II has been found 3,000 feet below the South China Sea − about 80 years after its last patrol.
The Navy’s History and Heritage Command, in a news release Thursday, said that the department’s Underwater Archaeology Branch confirmed that the wreck site discovered off the northern Philippine island of Luzon at a depth of 3,000 feet was the “final resting place of USS Harder (SS 257).”
The submarine was found sitting “upright on her keel relatively intact except for the depth-charge damage aft of the conning tower.”
“Submarines by their very design can be a challenge to identify, but the excellent state of preservation of the site and the quality of the data collected by Lost 52 allowed for NHHC to confirm the identity of the wreck as Harder,” the NHHC said. Headed by Tim Taylor, the “Lost 52 Project” works to locate and preserve the 52 submarines lost during World War II. They have previously located at least six WWII subs, as per NHHC.
