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Australia finds WWII wreck of ship torpedoed by US with 1,060 aboard

Saturday, 22 April 2023 6:26 AM [ Last Update: Saturday, 22 April 2023 7:09 AM ]

The Japanese transport ship Montevideo Maru is seen at sea in 1941. (Photo by AFP)

Deep-sea explorers have discovered the wreck of a transport ship torpedoed by a US submarine during World War II, killing nearly 1,000 Australian prisoners of war aboard.

Sunk in 1942, Japan's Montevideo Maru was en route from what is now Papua New Guinea to China’s Hainan, when it was attacked by the Americans.

The US claims the crew of the submarine did not realize it carried prisoners of war.

On Saturday, the maritime archaeology group Silentworld Foundation which organized the mission said it found the ship at a depth of more than four kilometers off the Philippines.

The sinking of the Montevideo Maru was Australia's worst-ever maritime disaster, killing an estimated 979 Australian citizens including at least 850 troops.

Civilians from 13 other countries were also aboard, the foundation said, bringing the total number of prisoners killed to about 1,060.

They had been captured a few months earlier by Japanese forces in the fall of the coastal township of Rabaul in Papua New Guinea, and were being sent to the Chinese island of Hainan.

According to the Silentworld Foundation, the wreckage will remain undisturbed on the seabed where it lies out of respect for the families of those who perished. No artifacts or human remains are to be removed.

"The discovery of the Montevideo Maru closes a terrible chapter in Australian military and maritime history," said John Mullen, director of Silentworld.

Australia's chief of army, Lieutenant General Simon Stuart, said finding the wreck had ended 81 years of uncertainty for the loved ones of those lost.

Those who perished aboard the Montevideo Maru included 33 crew from the Norwegian freighter the Herstein and about 20 Japanese guards and crew.

Other countries affected by the sinking included Britain, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Solomon Islands, Sweden and the United States.

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