Japanese submarine I-52 1944
Marker: recorded wreck position (Second World War).
Key facts
| Name | Japanese submarine I-52 | Wikidata label |
|---|---|---|
| Year lost | 1944 | Wikidata P793 significant event, point-in-time qualifier |
| Era | Second World War | derived from year |
| Ship type | submarine | Wikidata P31 instance of |
| Nationality / flag | Empire of Japan | Wikidata P137 operator → P17 country |
| Operator | Imperial Japanese Navy | Wikidata P137 operator |
| Conflict | World War II, Yanagi missions | Wikidata P607 conflict |
| Sea / ocean | North Atlantic Ocean | Natural Earth marine areas (public domain), point-in-polygon |
| Position | 15.2500, -39.9167 | Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0) |
About the wreck
I-52 (伊号第五二潜水艦 (伊52), I Gō Dai Gojūni Sensuikan (I Gojūni); I-52 submarine, I-52), code-named Momi (樅; "fir tree") was a Type C2 cargo submarine of the Imperial Japanese Navy used during World War II for a secret mission to Lorient, France, then occupied by Germany, during which she was sunk.
Diving & visiting
In late 1994, a salvage operation named Project Orca was launched to try to locate the I-52 and retrieve her valuable cargo of gold. Despite the commissioning of the Russian research ship Akademik Keldysh for the project and an extensive search, by March 1995 the search had proved to be a failure (Hamilton-Paterson 1998). Very shortly afterwards, however, in the spring of 1995, Paul Tidwell, working with the ocean exploration company Meridian Sciences, Inc. (later renamed Nauticos Corp.) located the wreck 17,000 feet (5,200 metres; 3.2 miles) deep, mostly upright. The vessel was found nearly 20 miles (32 km) from the datum quoted by the U.S.
Location
- Recorded position: 15.2500, -39.9167 (Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0); may be approximate)
- Sea / ocean: North Atlantic Ocean
Wreck positions on this site are for interest only and are not for navigation. Many wrecks are war graves or legally protected: never disturb human remains or remove artefacts, and check local law before diving.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Japanese submarine I-52 (1942) (revision 1380689651), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section and section(s) “Recent salvage operations”; condensed by selecting paragraphs; citations and formatting removed. No text added. This excerpt is available under the same licence.
Wreck facts from Wikidata (CC0).
Other wrecks of the World War II
- U-983 1943
- USS Aludra 1943
- USS Beatty 1943
- USS Branch 1943
- USS Deimos 1943
- Akagi Maru 1944
- Fusō 1944
- HMS Bullen 1944
- HMS Dragon 1944
- HMS Isis 1944
All 599 wrecks of the World War II →
Browse more: Open ocean wrecks · North Atlantic Ocean · Second World War