75 years after Pearl Harbor attack, watch a dive to see sunken Japanese subs

The sunken submarine sits at the bottom of Pearl Harbor, filled with silt and pierced by a four-inch American round. Two Japanese sailors are still inside. The public has never seen it.

Seventy-five years after a Japanese submarine tried to enter Pearl Harbor and drew the first American shots of World War II, a team of scientists and archaeologists from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration will live-stream a dive to the harbor floor.

“Things like this sub sit on the bottom, out of sight,” said Dr. James Delgado, NOAA’s Director of Maritime Heritage. “When we go to them, encounter them, when we explain with this powerful thing still sitting there on the battlefield of what happened that day, it is a touchstone that keeps that story alive.”

Okeanos Explorer, an NOAA ship, will carry the team of researchers as they remotely guide a smaller vessel to the submarine. The remotely controlled vessel will send back high-definition photos and the live video feed.

The submarine was spotted by American lookouts 90 minutes before Japanese planes began their 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. The USS Ward fired a single four-inch round, which punched through the submarine and trapped two young sailors inside. Their bodies were never recovered.

NOAA researchers have seen the submarine before. Built in three sections, it’s started to deteriorate: the tail has loosened, the stern has drooped and a piece guarding two torpedoes has started to come off. Neither torpedo was fired.

“It’s a somber place,” Delgado said. “You know for sure that inside are two boys, forever young, who were doing their job that morning.”

After 90 minutes the NOAA crew will move three miles, to another Japanese submarine that disappeared on Dec. 7, 1941. That submarine was discovered a decade later and moved to deeper water by the United States Navy.  The U.S. government controls the submarines through an agreement with the Japanese government, who Delgado expected to be involved in Wednesday’s dive.

The broadcast will begin about 9:30 a.m. MST at oceanexplorer.noaa.gov and live on azcentral.com.