It was the summer of 2019 when Tim Taylor and his crew were still looking for the lost WWII submarine. Using a vehicle to continue the long search through the depths, the team got frustrated when the machine experienced a malfunction. However, he had no idea that the underwater craft was what led them to this amazing discovery!
Checking the Vehicle
Taylor brought the vehicle back to the surface. It was time to look at the data it had gathered so far. That was when he spotted two inconsistencies that had to be checked once more. The technology helped him unearth a mystery we all thought to be unsolvable.
The Missing Submarine
The missing submarine was the U.S.S. Grayback, also known as S.S.-208. Taylor and his team were working in a salvage operation called Lost 52 Project, which was trying to locate all the 52 U.S. submarines that had disappeared in the Second World War. The Grayback went missing in late March 1944…
The Final Battle
For the Grayback, it’s last battle was when it embarked from Pearl Harbor on a combat patrol. That was on January 28, 1944. On February 24, it reported to base that it had hit two Japanese freighters and sunk two others – Toshin Maru and Taikei Maru.
A Successful Mission… So Far!
One day later, on February 25, the Grayback reported another success, seriously damaging the liner Asama Maru and sinking the tanker Nanpo Maru. But then it went silent!
Back to Midway Atoll
The Grayback had only two torpedoes, so it was sailing to the North Pacific to Midway Atoll for resupply. However, the last message over the radio was the report about the damages it has caused to the liner and the tanker.
The Grayback Was Missing
The Navy commanders believed that the submarine would dock around March 7, 1944, but weeks passed and the Grayback was silent. The submarine was lost at sea, along with its 80 crew members.
80 People Were Lost at Sea
The authorities had to declare that the Grayback and its 80 crew members had been lost at sea. It was March 30 when the Grayback’s disappearance was made public. It had been her tenth and last active service mission. So what happened with the craft?
The First Clues About Grayback’s Disappearance
Decades would pass before someone found what exactly happened to the Grayback and its 80-strong crew. After disappearing, the U.S. Navy believed the submarine sank at around 100 miles to the southeast of Okinawa. But they were wrong!
An Error
Later, the Navy would realize they based their assumption on data that had a crucial error. The Navy relied on records kept by the Japanese, and the map reference was transcribed wrong. What did that mean?
One Single Digit Was At Fault
One single digit led the Navy look for its lost submarine in the wrong place. The Grayback was a lot further from the initially assumed location… Until Tim Taylor founded the Lost 52 Project and started searching for it.
Re-examining the Grayback Files
In 2018, Tim Taylor decided to solve the mystery behind the missing submarine. He founded the Lost 52 Project, a private organization where he and a team would look for the 52 submarines that had disappeared in WWII.
The Lost 52 Project
The organization founded by Taylor started after they had successfully found the U.S. submarine R-12 (SS-89), which disappeared in 1943, along with 42 of its crew. The vessel actually sank off the coast of Florida while performing a training exercise.
The first time the R-12 was launched was in 1919, so it was already in the reserve fleet in 1932. As the Second World War came, the veteran was once again in service after an overhaul. The R-12 had its fair share of patrols and missions before it became a training submarine at Key West, Florida in 1943.
It Sank In Just a Few Seconds
One month after being used as a training submarine, the R-12 simply began taking water during an exercise. In just a few seconds, it was overwhelmed and sank at a 600-feet depth! Only five of its crew were able to escape…
Thrown Overboard
The R-12 began sinking and, skipper Lieutenant Commander E. E. Shelby with four of the submarine’s crew who were above deck were thrown overboard. They were the only survivors of this tragic sinking. Seven decades later, Taylor would learn more about the accident after discovering the shipwreck.
Discovering the Remains of the R-12
Taylor and his crew sent a high-tech robot underwater and controlled it from their ship Research Vessel Tiburon. The remains of the R-12 were discovered and the wreck site was mapped. The team also managed to contact the surviving relatives of the crew that died in the accident.
A Success
Seeing that the discovery of the R-12 was a success, Taylor decided to find all the 52 submarines that were sunk during World War II and never found. In total, 3,505 submariners were sunk during the war. So this takes us back to the Grayback.
Closure
In finding the sunken subs, Taylor doesn’t just want to learn where these crafts were located, but he also wants to give the family members of the lost seamen some sort of closure. The crew working in the Lost 52 Project also wants to collect artifacts and make educational materials.
Finding The Grayback
Taylor contacted Japanese researcher Yutaka Iwasaki and asked him to look once again through the files of the Sasebo base which was used during WWII by the Japanese Imperial Navy. In those records, there were daily radio updates from Naha on Okinawa Island.
The Error
That’s when Iwasaki spotted the single-digit error. The transcribed version of a report dated from February 27, 1944 and it came from Naha. That was just two days after the Grayback’s last report to its base.
An Attack By a Nakajima B5N Bomber
The Japanese message from Naha detailed that a Nakajima B5N bomber took off from an aircraft carrier and discharge a 500-pound bomb onto a sub that traveled above the waves, hitting the sub to the rear of the conning tower.
No Survivors
After being hit, the sub blew up and sunk, leaving no apparent survivors, said the report. Iwasaki talked to The New York Times in November 2019 after making this discovery, describing what he found in those files. Here’s what he said…
The Location of the Attack
“In that radio record, there [are] a longitude and a latitude of the attack, very clearly,” explained Iwasaki. However, the coordinates were over 100 miles off from the location the U.S. Navy had known since 1949!
Taylor Began His Search
With the new coordinates, Taylor was hopeful he would finally find the Grayback. The Lost 52 Project team did discover the submarine! Decades after being sunk, the sub’s hull was almost in one single piece! But the discovery was very emotional, though…
They Found the Grayback
Discovering the Grayback felt like a win, but it brought mixed emotions to the Lost 52 Project team. The divers and researchers were elated, said Taylor in his interview with The New York Times, but agreed hat “it’s also sobering, because we just found 80 men.”
The Relatives of the Lost Submariners
Gloria Hurney was one of the relatives of the submariners who died aboard the Grayback. Her uncle Raymond Parks was an electrician’s mate. “There’s a book I read, and it says these ships are known only to God. But now we know where the Grayback is,” she told ABC News in an interview from November 2019.
Allowing The Relatives of Crew Members to Heal
“The discovery brings closure to the questions that surrounded the Grayback as far as its sinking and location. I believe it will allow healing as relatives of crew members come together to share their stories,” Hurney told CNN. She felt shock and grief when she heard the news, but later on, it brought her peace and comfort.
Uncle and Godfather
Another relative of a crew member aboard the Grayback was Kathy Taylor. Her uncle and godfather John Patrick King worked as an electrician’s mate as well.
Keeping Their Memory Alive
“I committed from the very beginning, from a little girl, that I was gonna find him or follow him or keep his memory alive – whatever I could do,” she told ABC News. The Lost 52 Project discovered two more WWII submarines.
The U.S.S. Grunion and the U.S.S. S-28
The Lost 52 Project also discovered two other submarines alongside the R-12 and the Grayback. They found the U.S.S. Grunion off the coast of Alaska and the U.S.S. S-28 in Hawaiian waters. But finding Grayback was their biggest reward so far!