Shōkaku

Shōkaku (翔鶴, "Soaring Crane") was the lead ship of the two-ship Shōkaku class of fleet aircraft carriers built for the Imperial Japanese Navy. Laid down at Yokosuka Naval Arsenal on 12 December 1937 and launched on 1 June 1939, she was commissioned on 8 August 1941, just months before Japan entered the Second World War. Together with her sister ship Zuikaku, she was considered among the finest carrier designs afloat at the time, combining exceptional speed, aircraft capacity, and battle protection.

Shōkaku participated in the attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, contributing aircraft to both strike waves. She then joined the Indian Ocean Raid in March–April 1942 before proceeding south for the Battle of the Coral Sea in May 1942, where she sustained three bomb hits; repairs at Kure lasted until late June 1942 and kept her out of the Battle of Midway. After returning to service she took part in the Battle of the Eastern Solomons (August 1942) and the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands (October 1942), where she was again heavily damaged by bomb hits but survived.

By mid-1944 Shōkaku was the centerpiece of the First Mobile Fleet assembling for the decisive battle against the U.S. Navy. On 19 June 1944, during the opening phase of the Battle of the Philippine Sea, she was struck by three torpedoes from the U.S. submarine USS Cavalla (SS-244). The torpedo hits ruptured avgas lines, causing catastrophic and uncontrollable fires. Torpedoed at 11:22, Shōkaku sank at about 14:00, taking 1,272 men with her — ship's crew, air group personnel and civilians; 570 survivors were rescued. Her loss, along with Taiho on the same day, dealt a severe blow to Japanese naval aviation from which it never recovered.