USS Indianapolis (CA-35)

Ordered for the US Navy in 1930, became the second and last ship in the Portland heavy cruiser series. It was originally designed to be lightweight with the designation CL-35, but on July 1, 1931, in accordance with the London Maritime Agreement, it was reclassified to heavy with the change of number to CA-35.

The entire series of eight ships was designed as light cruisers as the development of Northampton- class cruisers, but only two ships were completed (the other six, together with the developments obtained during construction, were completed as a new type of cruiser, the New Orleans ).

Laid on March 31, 1930 by New York Shipbuilding Corporation, launched on November 7, 1931 (almost six months earlier than the first ship of the series - the Portland ). Admitted to service on November 15, 1932.

During service, the cruiser received 10 combat stars for participating in the battles of the Second World War .

July 30, 1945 , shortly after the mission to deliver the critical parts of the first atomic bomb " Kid " to the US Air Force Base on Tinian Island, the ship was torpedoed by submarine I-58 of the Imperial Fleet of Japan . The ship sank after 12 minutes. Out of 1,197 people aboard, about 300 sank along with the ship. Approximately 880 people remained on the ocean surface with several lifeboats without food and water. During the 4 days spent in the water, the survivors faced dehydration , hypothermia , shark attacks and strong hallucinations . According to some estimates, about 60-80 sailors died due to shark attacks , this is considered to be one of the largest shark attacks. Help came only on August 2, when the PV-1 Ventura patrol plane noticed the floating ones. The rescuers who arrived came to lift only 321 seamen, of whom four soon died.

Before the flooding, Indianapolis sent distress signals that were received at three stations. None of them reacted to the message: the commander of the first was drunk , the commander of the second ordered his subordinates not to disturb him, and the commander of the third decided that it was a deception of the Japanese ^[1] . At the Senate hearing in 1999, the ship’s radio operator confirmed that the signal had been transmitted a few minutes before the flooding. Also, shortly after the incident, naval intelligence intercepted a message about a cruiser in the area of ​​the Indianapolis route, transmitted from I-58 to headquarters, but it was also ignored ^[2] .

Captain Charles McWay , who commanded the ship since November 1944, was one of the survivors of the ship’s death, on the day of the crash he turned 47 years old. In November 1945, he was prosecuted by the military tribunal on charges of "exposing the danger of a ship due to the failure of anti-torpedo maneuvers." On the other hand, there were facts that the command itself put the ship in a dangerous position without providing an anti-submarine escort.

Later, the captain of the attacking Japanese submarine I-58 Motitsura Hashimoto himself testified that even the execution of anti-torpedo maneuvers by the ship would not bring any result and the ship would still be torpedoed. According to him, he fired 6 torpedoes from a short distance on the cruiser, two of which hit the target.

Over time, Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz canceled McWay ’s sentence and reinstated him. McWay retired in 1949 with the rank of Rear Admiral. Many survivors from the ship claimed that the captain was not to blame for the death of the ship, while at the same time some family members of the victims thought quite the opposite. In 1968, McVay shot himself from a premium revolver.

In October 2000, the US Congress approved a resolution on the rehabilitation of McWay on charges of cruiser death, the resolution was signed by US President Bill Clinton . In July 2001, the chief secretary of the United States Naval Forces ordered that the personal file of Captain McWey be cleared of any records accusing him of killing a cruiser.

On August 18, 2017, cruiser wreckage was discovered by a research team at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean at a depth of over 5,400 meters. In this case, the exact location of the wreckage was not disclosed. ^{[3] [4]}

• In Steven Spielberg’s Jaws film, Robert Shaw’s hero, the fisherman Quint, talks about Indianapolis’s death and the hardships that awaited the surviving sailors, including shark attacks .
• September 29, 1991 in the United States held the premiere of the film " Mission of the shark ."
• August 24, 2016 in the United States held the premiere of the feature film " Cruiser " about the fate of the cruiser and the crew. In Russia, the film was released on September 22, 2016.

• List of major warships of the US Navy lost in World War II

• The cruiser "USS Indianapolis" - a tragedy at sea
• The “USS Indianapolis” cardboard model is produced by the Polish publishing company Modelik.