Yorktown survivor
made positive ID
The carrier, sunk during the
By Gregg K. Kakesako
Battle of Midway, was found
three miles down
Star-BulletinIt was a survivor of the Yorktown who identified the gun emplacements of the aircraft carrier sunk during the Battle of Midway.
But it was a team from the University of Hawaii who pinpointed the exact location of the U.S. aircraft carrier, sunk in World War II and now three miles down on the Pacific floor.
"We were right on the money," said Bruce Appelgate, field director of the UH's Hawaii Mapping Research Group, after receiving confirmation from the Navy.
Appelgate's team returned to Hawaii on Friday after spending two weeks sweeping the floor of the Pacific Ocean with specially built sonar scanners mounted on its 13-foot-long torpedo-shaped submersible.
The sonar equipment, towed by a Navy chartered vessel, converted sound impulses into images that gave Appelgate a picture of the ocean floor.
Appelgate said his group was confident when they left Midway Atoll they had found several good contacts in an area north of the atoll, about 1,250 miles west-northwest of Oahu.
"We're all pretty ecstatic. It's very gratifying to have this ground truth, which is a visual confirmation . . . . This is not the type of search that we normally do, so it's very gratifying."
Headed by Robert Ballard, best known for his discovery of the Titanic in 1985, the team also included Navy deep sea specialists and a specially rigged submersible -- the Navy's advanced tethered vehicle, normally used for salvage operations.
"In 1942, America lost a great warrior, today we reclaimed her," said Ballard yesterday from the Laney Chouest, chartered by the Navy for this scientific mission.
"No one has ever gone after the USS Yorktown and the Japanese carriers lost in the Battle of Midway because of the depth where they lie. For that reason it has been especially challenging and gratifying to have found them."
Lying on the Pacific bottom at a depth of 16,650 feet, the 19,800-ton Yorktown is down nearly a mile deeper than the Titanic.
Yesterday, Ballard sought visual confirmation using remotely controlled video cameras camera.
Yorktown survivor Bill Surgi, who brought with him the khaki helmet he wore when a Japanese bomber dropped a torpedo that hit the aircraft carrier on June 4, 1942, recognized the Yorktown's gun emplacements as he monitored the video images transmitted from the submersible.
Surgi and other American and Japanese Midway survivors were part of the scientific expedition to lend their recollections for a television special that will be aired next year.
Lt. Lydia Leporte, Navy spokeswoman in San Diego, said the Laney Chouest will spend the next few days videotaping the wreck before moving nearly 200 miles westward to search for four Japanese carriers sunk during the same battle.
Ballard wants to include the wrecks of four Japanese aircraft carriers Akagi, Kaga and Soryu -- veterans of the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 -- and the Hiryu in his film.
Appelgate said Ballard also hopes to film the trail of debris surrounding the Yorktown, which should include aircraft and other items thrown off the carrier. "There also are plans to to try to find the USS Hammann," Appelgate said.
The Hammann was the U.S. destroyer sunk by the Japanese as it tried to help the Yorktown.
Other members of the UH team included: Todd Erickson, Steven Tottori, Karen Sender and Nathan Becker.
The Navy has said that it plans to leave a plaque on the Yorktown, but it won't reveal the exact location of the wreck.
The Battle of Midway was fought June 3-6, 1942, and was a key victory because the U.S. Navy crushed Japan's naval fleet.
The Japanese lost 3,500 pilots and sailors. America's losses were set at 307.
Robert Ballard
Age: 55
