USS Indianapolis Found 3 Miles Down, 72 Years Later

In July 1945 the heavy cruiser USS Indianapolis raced from San Francisco to Tinian with parts of the first atomic bomb. Days later, just after midnight on July 30, the Japanese submarine I-58 under Mochitsura Hashimoto sank her in about 12 minutes. Hundreds of men went into the sea, and because no one reported the ship missing, they drifted for four to five days. On August 2, Lt. Wilbur Gwinn spotted them by chance; Lt. Adrian Marks landed his PBY in the open sea and pulled 56 men aboard, and USS Cecil J. Doyle and other ships picked up the rest. By the Navy's count, 316 survived. Then the Navy court-martialed Capt. Charles Butler McVay III, with Hashimoto called to testify. We follow the decades-long fight to clear him: the survivors, a Florida sixth grader named Hunter Scott, the 2000 act of Congress, the 2001 entry in McVay's record, and the 2017 discovery of the wreck by Paul Allen's team. A note on the numbers: sources disagree on several counts, including 316 or 317 survivors, a crew of 1,195 or 1,196, and how long the men were in the water (about 70 hours to five days). We give the Navy's figures and say on air where the record splits. Which part of this story stays with you most? Tell me in the comments, and subscribe for more true WWII stories told from the angle you haven't heard. Sources: Naval History and Heritage Command (loss summary, casualty lists, McVay's action report, court of inquiry, Nimitz's review, rescue reports, Hashimoto's court-martial testimony, Secretary Gordon R. England's memo of July 11, 2001); Public Law 106-398, Sec. 545 (Oct. 30, 2000); Congressional Record, Oct. 10, 1998 (H. Res. 590); Richard A. Hulver (2017); Thomas Wildenberg (2025); Ben Werner (Aug. 19, 2017); U.S. Navy feature (2015); Richard Goldstein (1998); Atomic Heritage Foundation; National Archives; National WWII Museum; National Naval Aviation Museum; National Park Service (Blair Atcheson and Richard Hulver). Chapters: 0:00 Twelve minutes 0:16 Intro 0:27 The whole story 1:58 The secret cargo 3:52 Tinian 4:53 A myth 5:39 Toward Leyte, alone 7:02 The last ship to see her 8:03 I-58 9:13 Abandon ship 11:05 In the water 13:16 Why no one came 14:53 A pilot on Peleliu 15:52 Found by accident 16:54 The landing 18:44 The rescue 19:45 The news 20:22 The count 21:17 The court martial 23:12 Remembering McVay 24:47 Hunter Scott 26:20 Congress acts 27:42 Marks remembers 28:03 The wreck