The Wrecks of Midway - Diving on IJN Kaga and USS Yorktown (Sept 2023)

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Today we enlist the help of Jon Parshall to take a look at what's left of the carriers Kaga and Yorktown!
00:00:00 - Intro
00:02:00 - Kaga Wreck
00:26:36 - Yorktown
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[@kkupsky6321]

I just applaud you guys for holding your breathe so long so deep under. That’s impressive. Bravo. And you’re talking so clearly. It doesn’t even sound like your under water.

[@gmanbo]

👏👏👏👏👏👏👏😅

[@clairekholin6935]

I think he is using AI audio enhancements to remove the bubble sounds

[@cpt_nordbart]

Lovely comic floating effect. Going up and down....

[@thecursed01]

Because they are actually in space, not underwater. The pacific part of ww2 was a decoy to get ships to fight 👽 :)

[@nathanworthington4451]

Dumb

[@SonOfAB_tch2ndClass]

Yorktown: Pristine for a sunken wreck Akagi: A little beat up but still in good shape and recognizable Kaga: Burned back into a Battleship

[@hourlardnsaver362]

And yet, Kaga will probably end up being in far better shape than whatever is left of Soryu.

[@thomasbaker6563]

As it should be, BBS are more aesthetic than carrier trash.

[@hourlardnsaver362]

@@thomasbaker6563You take that back!

[@thomasbaker6563]

Carriers are dull characterless flat tops, their planes can however be pretty.

[@llanitedave]

​@@thomasbaker6563Only if you make a herculean effort to keep your perspective as superficial as possible.

[@Jopsyduck]

When you mentioned Yorktown was the most intact of her class I almost started crying.

[@jefferyindorf699]

You're not the only one. 😪

[@TheSpaceEnthusiast-vl6wx]

...

[@marckyle5895]

it's true, shame on us for not saving Enterprise.

[@Jopsyduck]

Shame on the navy, it was their idea to make the American people buy enterprise off them.

[@cameronrichards59]

Ah people after my own heart I agree a crime and damned Shame they scrapped her

[@benjaminfunk168]

I'm sure I'm not the only one, but I shed a lot of tears for the fate of the Enterprise. If any WWII US ship deserved to be a museum ship, it was her.

[@Exilninja]

Out of any of the WW2 ships that survived the war to preserve instead of scrap/expend, she's definitely in my top 3 alongside Warspite and probably Nagato.

[@TheSpaceEnthusiast-vl6wx]

@@Exilninja Very true!

[@Spindrift_87]

Sometimes I dream that she survived. Then I awake and my disappointment is immeasurable.

[@91Redmist]

Oh, you got that right!!!

[@dimitrijensk2845]

Hopefully some companies restore her in digital form. Companies similar to Titanic Honor and Glory.

[@dogsbd]

35:00 There was a small ROV that explored internal sections of Titanic, much tighter quarters than Yorktowns hanger deck. So it could be done.

[@KPen3750]

The giant foghorn in yorktown kind of makes me smile because theres the 5 year old in me that goes “I WANNA HEAR THE MASSIVE HORN!”

[@jacobdill4499]

Same

[@rhbrandon1]

Were the Japanese carriers just not that robustly built above the main deck?

[@Engine33Truck]

@@rhbrandon1no. Yorktown was a purpose built aircraft carrier. Her - and her sisters Enterprise and Hornet - were designed and built in the late 1920s-1930s once the USN had worked out a lot of the kinks in their carrier design with experience on Lexington, Saratoga, and Ranger. Akagi and Kaga, however, were converts. Akagi was originally laid down as a battlecruiser, Kaga as a battleship, then both were converted into aircraft carriers according to the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty. When that happened, the IJN (and the rest of the major navies) were in an experimental stage with aircraft carriers. Akagi and Kaga initially had multiple levels of hangar decks and flying off platforms which were later removed/enclosed in the 1930s. A lot of the material used in the conversions of those two was just simple sheet metal as opposed to anything with splinter protection or armor.

[@verro9153]

@@rhbrandon1I also think Kaga burned for multiple hours before sinking

[@markbrandt3728]

@@verro9153 Yes, and suffered massive induced explosions. Jon Parshall talks about the fuel air explosion and the explosions of the torpedo warheads and bombs. Yorktown did not have much in the way of ordnance in the hanger deck or on the flight deck, and had drained the avgas lines before either of the strikes that damaged her. So, some of the difference is better damage control, and some is just due to circumstances. Kaga was originally intended to be a battleship, so its lower hull survived pretty well. On the other hand, the Yorktown class were very tough ships.

[@mellusk9194]

I want to thank both Jon and Drach for showing us this footage. It's very fascinating, and yet sobering.

[@bizjetfixr8352]

This was the commentary that SHOULD have been done, instead of what we actually got.

[@kitkun7669]

@@bizjetfixr8352 ?

[@markbrandt3728]

@@bizjetfixr8352 Well, we got it, just not in the live stream. Which means that they could do a little editing, which only improved the experience.

[@oneofspades]

Crying shame what happened to Prince of Wales. That is not just a wreck. Men sacrificed their lives there. They deserve the honor of having that place a sacred resting place.

[@hudsonball4702]

Communist Chinese don't care. They even salvage parts of their own past and their own sunken warships from the past for their own greedy gain. They have no honor.

[@austinblack7991]

Which is why the royal navy should be patrolling the area were she sank

[@oceanhome2023]

Too shallow and easy for pirates to get to !

[@USSEnterpriseA1701]

When it comes to Kaga's wreck, I can't help but remember the heated argument I got into on the old world of warships forum when they first found her and we got those first few pictures of the wreck. One person there was absolutely convinced that Kaga was almost completely intact, while I, being quite good at analyzing 3D objects and recognizing shapes, took a screenshot of the in-game model of the ship and drew a red line along her hull in paint and tried my best to explain how everything above that line was very clearly gone. Somehow the message still didn't get through, but then again, he also thought that one of the few remaining gun sponson supports was the bow of the ship sitting well above the mud, and I knew there was no way that was the case, let alone the shape being completely wrong. Just from the written descriptions of the last hours of the ship, it was blatantly obvious to me that almost everything that was the aircraft carrier Kaga was already gone and the old battleship Kaga was all that remained.

[@bagoquarks]

*THANK YOU* from a guy who bought Gordon Prange's 'Miracle at Midway' in 1982 and is the son of a destroyer man graduate of USNA, 1943. This video tour is close to completing the circle for me. I am just beginning 'Shattered Sword' which was my wife's gift for my 73rd birthday. Gentlemen, please keep doing your great work.

[@dclark142002]

Enjoy the book! It was a very good read for me.

[@spudskie3907]

Yorktown forever keeping watch on the Kido Butai.

[@loonowolf2160]

And indeed ty to her the battle was won, she went down mostly intact so yeah she's great guardian

[@robcanisto8635]

Grampa was a naval aviator flying Dauntless off of Yorktown until the Midway action, when his squadron was shifted to big E. cool stuff!

[@corneliuscrewe8165]

How did your Grandpa manage to get around with balls that huge? 👍

[@hudsonball4702]

It's just horrific to see just how little of Kaga is left. She really suffered a lot before she went down. It's amazing that her original Battleship hull helped her stay afloat for as long at it did after all these massive secondary explosions.

[@raygronberg6619]

Hey guys, thanks for doing this, a pleasure to hear a couple guys who know what they're talking about go over this footage. The livestream excepts we saw from Nautilus ground my gears because they had people on who didn't know what they were talking about, e.g. the conflation of Yorktown's attack damage with that of Hornet's (at one point someone the fire damage to the stack was because the island got hit by a suicide attack, which we know didn't happen to Yorktown). I got a kick out of Drach's comment that Yorktown's paint is in better shape than a modern ship's after six months' deployment - we laugh because it's funny and laugh because it's true. And as for the AA mounts, Yorktown's gunnery officer was a guy named Ernie Davis who was a big believer in dakka. When they upgraded mounts (at either Norfolk or Pearl) he was supposed to give back a bunch of supplanted 50-cals, and he didn't. They instead got stuck in a bunch of places along the sides of the flight deck using improvised mounts involving the rail supports and broomsticks.

[@davidrosing5788]

09:11, perhaps when the casemate fell off as the ship rolled, the upper (purple section) was still attached to the casemate, so as it fell off it straightened out the other panels, then broke away and left the once 3D panels co-planar as we see them now?

[@SgtBeltfed]

Maybe, Kaga's and Akagi's casemates were more like turrets with stalks than traditional casemates. The lower roller path under the stalk is still attached to the armored deck, the upper roller path would have been attached to the next deck up (that we can see the underside of as the purple section). The only thing that went through the lower roller path would have been the ammo hoists into the handling room. That is a pretty heavy duty piece of deck and hull side that's been peeled over, considering what was attached to it.

[@gurk_the_magnificent9008]

One of these days I have to finish the model of _Kaga_ to go alongside _Yorktown_ and _Akagi_

[@craigfazekas3923]

Funny thing- I built Flyhawk's 1:700 scale KÖNIGSBERG kit as a waterline. I thought of modeling a before & after dockside scene, with the leftover bottom hull turned upside down at quayside in Norway.... Do-able too, given the photos that are available.... I'm currently building AKA Model's Chinese light cruiser NING HAI, 1937 in 1:700 scale. Beautiful little kit, but a bit fiddley- Mainly a photo etch kit with resin hull, funnel & a part of the superstructure, turrets & boats. Lotta photo etch, but very well engineered to fit.... 🚬😎👍

[@badbug72]

I may be completely wrong, but I believe the sponge-like growths on the gun mounts are a reaction between aluminum or some other light metal and salt water. Some of the WWII wrecks I've seen, like the Indy, shows a ton of it coming out of their gun directors and turrets because most of the metal up there was different from the metal that made up the hull and superstructure. Perhaps a metallurgist can help me out.

[@v.mwilliams1101]

Interesting... I too would like to hear what a metallurgist would have to say. Great show. Thank you for sharing.

[@sirboomsalot4902]

I think some of the marine biologists on the livestream were talking about them, but unfortunately I don’t remember what they said

[@stink7073]

Holy I did not know the damage to kaga was that bad

[@williamswenson5315]

Kaga; reverse origami brought to you by high explosives...

[@ph89787]

Sponsored by USS Enterprise.

[@Killerean]

The rolled open deck is actually pretty good guess. You can see the internal supports just sitting on that flattened piece of metal right next to what used to be the turret.

[@hypernovamkvi715]

it is so cool to see these ships being found and explored

[@christophermancini7380]

What a joy to watch this, thank you Drach and Jon! Hard to believe we're looking back over 80 years ago, especially with that fresh looking blue gray paint on Yorktown. Her paint looks just as good (or unfortunately in some cases better) than on US Navy ships still presently commissioned.

[@bizjetfixr8352]

I was looking for undisturbed paint on Akagi and Kaga's hulls. For modeling them, it would be nice to get the color right

[@swordweaver9696]

I've been told that the reason old ships' paint stayed on better was that it was lead-based, and modern navies don't want that hazard

[@sealpiercing8476]

@@swordweaver9696 My guess would be it has more to do with how many labor hours are available for the paint. Modern warships have less crew to begin with, and these days the peacetime USN works its at-sea crews like dogs with training and the deployment tempo is brutal. Back then everything was more labor intensive, labor was cheaper relative to steel, and the peacetime USN didn't have the money to train so hard nor did they police fisheries in the South China Sea. The wartime USN had a higher tempo of operations but also even more bodies to throw at problems.

[@fafner1]

I think that it was after Midway that the Navy stripped all the paint off internal walls to avoid it catching fire after a bomb hit. I read an autobiography of a navy pilot who commented the air conditioning was typically not run to save fuel, and the resultant wet rusty walls made for a tough place to live and work.

[@8088bit]

it deeply saddens me the after all these years yorktown is still mostly intact down there, but enterprise is no more

[@Fred_Bender]

In the 1970's-80's I worked with an ex-sailor who was on the Yorktown when it went down . After they pulled him out of the ocean he was assigned to the Aleutian Islands area .What he remembered most about the Aleutians was the frozen bodies thawing .It was eerie listening to so many bodies farting as the sun came up .

[@Caktusdud.]

Enterprise what did you do?

[@SonOfAB_tch2ndClass]

Enterprise: What haven’t I done?

[@themecoptera9258]

Those flight decks are no longer alright decks

[@cartmann94]

Enterprise: scratching some flat tops

[@patrickcannady2066]

@@cartmann94 Enterprise was quite good at that…

[@mikeynth7919]

Enterprise: Avenging.

[@scottroche9996]

Of all the history channels that I like to watch yours is by far the best and informative

[@kamakazi339]

It amazes me that y'all can place where any pieces of that mangled wreck belong

[@Klyis]

My guess is that the mystery tanks on Yorktown are CO2 canisters that fed the fire suppression system. Also amazing that in the footage of Kaga's stern you can see where hull plating has completely ripped away but the glass in the half attached porthole beside it is still intact.

[@fafner1]

The gas lines were not only drained, but back filled with CO2. This becasme standard procedure after the loss of the Lexington.

[@mjbull5156]

I imagine the sea sponges Drach asks about during the Yorktown segment having an affinity for gun mounts is because the guns have a lot of irregular shaped bits that are easier for the sponges to latch onto relative to the smooth hull and decking.

[@alexanderleach3365]

It is always awesome to see these legendary WW2 ships.

[@kemarisite]

32:15 "My friend Seth", is that Seth Paradin of the Mississippi Armed Forces Museum and Unauthorized History of the Pacific War podcast? Those 20 mm mounts with poor sky arcs, if they are on the bow (because of the port list/cant to right on the screen) might have been placed there specifocally for torpedo bomber attacks. Sky arcs don't matter much with torpedo bombers down at just a few hundred feet, and the standard torpedo bomber tactoc was to have a group on each side of the bow. That way, turning into one group exposes the side of the ship to the other group.

[@EricDKaufman]

About the 'yellow sea sponge' stuff.... yes. The grease is a carbon source. So bacteria probably set up shop munching on that. Biofilms create microenvironemnts and certainly other life can then settle down mutualisitcally or predatory. I do know specifics but there would be several PhDs in there to figure it all out.

[@neohhorkee454]

Kaga was shown blowing up real bad in the 2019 movie Midway, maybe that's how that stray chunk was separated so far away from the wreck

[@Hey_MikeZeroEcho22P]

After I built the IJN Kaga in 1/700 scale, then seeing this video image of IJN Kaga Burnt to its casemates....Really brought up the notion, how many IJN sailors died = >800 IJN sailors......... From a USN Veteran of 20+ years........ " I " Salute your Honor and Ultimate Sacrifice, because it could have been my one of my Uncles, a YORKTOWN Veteran and survivor, a GM3 at the time of Battle, made it to GM2 onboard YORKTOWN CV-10 and was there for the Iwo Jima Ops as well as Okinawa Operations.....saying he shot down a plane then and there, so He says..... Thanks, Uncle Mario, for YOUR (short) Service of four (4) years.

[@alexwilliamson1486]

New to this channel, but I have to say, and I’ve never seen the like anywhere else, the brilliant way you show the wrecks in comparison to what the ship would’ve looked afloat, the exact part outlined? I wish more channels would do this? Fantastic!!🙏🏻

[@nunyabidness674]

RE: Getting ahold of paint developers from the 40's In the US at least, the EPA is the reason that paints don't have anywhere near the durability. Many of the hardeners for oil based paints are now banned, and synthetics are used for stabilizing the newer formulas. Latex will not adhere as well, and it'll still stay soft and flexible, but as far as just exposure to the elements it'll likely outlast oil based products.

[@MsZeeZed]

Which is why they are banned. Once formulated into paint and applied they just don’t degrade transformed. For a bridge you want to keep in a place for 400 years that’s kinda ok, but for a warship not meant to outlive her makers that’s a problem.

[@nunyabidness674]

@@MsZeeZedabove and beyond the lasting presence in the environment of the finished product, the process for making the chemical additives in the first place was... well... unhealthy. Realize that DDT was indeed a great pesticide and manufactured around the same time. There are reasons we don't use that anymore as well...

[@JagerEinheit]

Thank you John and Drach for the wonderful breakdown of the wrecks. It is so valuable to have a guided tour with extra photos and diagrams to explain details I would have missed outright. It is also humbling to in effect do the same job my grandfather in ww2 did, which was to photograph and review footage for the military (abet his was in Europe as part of Overlord). I remember as a child getting the Titanic, and Bismark books that were put out with giant full color photos of the wreck and rendering etc. and reading in wonder as I began the journey into loving learning about historical events. This again feels just like that time, but I can show my sons the same type of experience. Thank you both for reviving a chunk of my past, and Drach, thank you for again, using your knowledge and connections to bring me (a half a world away) into your proverbial room to once again understand and relive important historical events I could only dream of as a child. every week is another hour ish I can set aside at least 2 days a week to enjoy expanding my knowledge base.

[@cheesenoodles8316]

As a kid, reading all I could find on the battle of Midway, it was the 70s. Now just a wee bit older, even more interested. The book and other contributions of your guest (and you) have kept my interest burning brighter than ever.

[@OtakuLoki]

I know that those circles cut from the metal did save weight, but isn't there also a aspect of strengthening the section of metal? What I think I recall is that such annual voids, circular to keep from allowing high stress sections of corner, are stronger and less prone to bending than a similarly thick piece of metal that's intact - even though the intact piece is heavier.

[@cpt_nordbart]

That boat looked like Godzilla took a bite out of it.

[@BattleshipOrion]

I'd love for more documentation of these wrecks on your channel.

[@yamato-zi7yk]

Great pair of videos. Kaga is about what I always suspected just from the witness testimony I've read. Akagi was always a bit of a question mark, but I was fearful more of her would have been torn off on the way down since the hangers and flight deck weren't part of the main hull. I was a bit shocked, but pleasantly surprised that part of the bridge was still there.

[@sirboomsalot4902]

I’m kinda sad you guys also didn’t get to see the aircraft wing against the hanger wall at 39:41. You can only see the outline here, but in some clearer footage from different angles you can clearly see the roundel on it. Common consensus seems to think it’s a TBD wing

[@nowhereman1046]

Around 8:55 through 9:03. The flattening of the sides of the once vertical structures is something we've seen before on other wrecks. Off the cuff example being the sides of the forward well deck on Titanic's bow section and parts of the wing bridge. It's also quite possible that the impact force with the bottom caused the badly weakened by the fires and descent through the water caused the bulkheads to just splay out.

[@Patrick_Cooper]

As I sit and watch this, I find myself filling in the wreckage from the many other video's about Mid Way. This one really brings it all home...

[@exsoda345128]

Very interesting to see the difference between a ship sunk by fire and explosions being completely destroyed vs. a ship sunk by underwater damage, looking like it doesn't belong on the ocean floor

[@michael-6988]

Thank you for this second video. Just as stirring as Akagi.

[@robertdickson9319]

Another great video - thanks to both Drach & Mr. Parshall for making this video. I can only hope that at one point a more comprehensive "view" of the Japanese wrecks can be delivered by video or artist rendering in order to get a better "big" picture of what they look like.

[@richardhall7094]

Two professionals and a ton of quality information! Thank you to both of you.

[@petethebastard]

"Don't bust my chops" !! ...I've not heard that phrase since the Ramones did a song by the same title.... in 1989!!

[@seanquigley3605]

Be kind of awesome, if they make the footage available to everyone. Can't see how the wreck footage itself could give away a location. Maybe an online Midway museum?

[@TheSchultinator]

Thing I noticed with the footage of the 8" turret ring: on the "vertical" plate, right where it would've hinged, there are 90° angle pieces, like small reinforcements where a deck and wall (bulkhead? hull?) meet. So I think Dr. Parshall is correct, but it's scary, either how much fire had weakened the metal or how hard Kaga hit bottom.

[@patrickforni6788]

Two of my favorite historians in a video, what a great day

[@jivebomber4536]

Inre the gun platforms on Yorktown's bow. From 2009-2012, I conducted a series of interviews with one of the ship's gunnery officers, Harvey Lasell, who was aboard 1939 to Midway and thus helped oversee the vessel's transition from prewar to wartime armament. He stated that while 20mm guns were the original plan for the bow positions in question, they instead opted for watercooled .50 cal. The reasons for this decision were based on the large amount of modifications that would be required to "afford suitable space for adequate gun direction", and "access to ammunition resupply". Therefore, the.50 cals became, as he described them, "a better than nothing" option. Mr. Lasell bolstered his primary source evidence by pointing to photos of sister ship Enterprise: although she had guns galore installed around her bow during the war, they never installed 20mm guns in the positions in question. Mr. Lasell was in charge of the aft gun director during Coral Sea and Midway. He passed on in 2017, age 101.

[@SynchroScore]

38:40 If I were to guess, those are hydraulic accumulators. They function like springs, but in a hydraulic system. For instance, the ends of arrestor cables could be anchored to hydraulic pistons. Drawing out the cables compresses the pistons, which forces hydraulic fluid into the accumulator, where it compresses a gas (usually nitrogen or carbon dioxide), absorbing kinetic energy. When the load is removed from the piston, the compressed gas pushes it back to its fully-extended position. Accumulators are also connected to pistons used as counter-balances or shock-absorbers, and are used to reduce the effect of water-hammer when a hydraulic valve is quickly closed.

[@donaldcarey114]

When I was in the Navy one never referred to stairs on a ship, they were ALWAYS called ladders.

[@yurilytviak9066]

Any reason for that?

[@donaldcarey114]

@@yurilytviak9066 Tradition, the early ships had rope ladders going up into the rigging and didn't have multiple decks, so no stairs. Anyway, I was taught to call stairs ladders in boot camp (Great Lakes).

[@shopdog831]

I belive those cylinders on the sides of the hanger deck are the bottles for the hanger fire suppression system

[@fafner1]

Maybe not necessarily a whole scale suppression system, but a quickly added system to back fill the fuel lines with CO2.

[@Jarlerus]

At about 39:32 , you can see a wing, with the US wing-emblem (circle, star, dot in the middle) in the far side of the hangar, standing up (leaning?) against the wall. ( It can be better seen in the original video - on the EVNautilus channel)

[@davidc8903]

God the Yorktown is in such good condition it makes me wish we had the technology to raise her!

[@marckyle5895]

Time for Clive Cussler to write a sequel! There might even be a preserved TBD from Torpedo 3.

[@grahamstrouse1165]

If only we had Wave Motion technology….

[@merafirewing6591]

​@@marckyle5895 he passed away unfortunately.

[@travnickis1]

Drach, you and John complement each other well.

[@KJAkk]

Looking at the curve of that mount on the corner of Yorktown's flight deck it looks like a water cooled .50 cal to me.

[@marekkula2510]

Thank You Gentlemen! Seeing what's left of Akaki and Kaga hurts a lot, I love those ships and their one off looks since I first found pictures of them ( after refit ) in a book. I was eight or maybe ten years old back then. I know some called them floating ugly skyscrapers (some people are just not a friend materiel) and yes there where better carries, better warships etc. In my case You can call Hood a boomer and say Bismarck was as fat as someone mama, I don't care, hell call Yamato useless I will give the high five. Just don't say Akaki is ugly OK? Beauty is in the eye of observer. :)

[@merafirewing6591]

I've met people that think all Japanese ships in general are ugly.

[@fouraces9137]

Enjoyed it bunches, thanks to you both.

[@Sophocles13]

Thank you for making my afternoon that much better Drach! Always excited when I see new uploads :)

[@gordonbutler5142]

Tremendous content, wonderfully done.

[@WallStreet06]

Like ships. Love diving. So excited for this. Truk 2025! K. I see now. But I’m going down, not that deep.

[@Sherwoody]

I’d love to dive Truk or Bikini. As it is, I’ll have to settle for the Great Lakes.

[@Weatherman_Ace]

Great grandfather served on Enterprise as an AA gunner and I remember him telling me how sad and angry he was that they scrapped her. Although the other ship he was on is still around as a Museum ship aka Midway. I miss him very much and I barely remember some of his stories due to me being very young at that time before he passed away.

[@williammitchell4417]

Let History never forget the name... Enterprise!!

[@patricknix5975]

Nice job, both of you!

[@sergueikaniovski2738]

Awesome! Thank y'all

[@jeffholloway3882]

Been eagerly awaiting this.

[@crownic]

Thank you for another one of these. Great video. Love Jon as a guest

[@frankbodenschatz173]

John and Alex, just great detail and commentary. Thanks!

[@OneHitWonder383]

It sounds as if the destroyers used the bridge as the aiming point for the torpedoes, _because that was all that was left of Kaga to see._ Just a thought.

[@user-hw1qo2mu9e]

Thanks Drach and Jon.

[@michaelinsc9724]

ABSOLUTELY FANTASTIC VIDEO!!!!! Definitely interested in more like this.

[@paulamos8970]

Incredibly interesting series of video's, really looking forward to the live and future discoveries of those wrecks yet to be found. BZ Drach.

[@bizjetfixr8352]

They touch on an interesting question: Current government regs notwithstanding, I think an effort should be made to recover the TBDs (and possibly the F4F with the "kill" flags) from the debris field of the Lexington. These would be Exhibit "A" for making an exception to the rules in certain cases.

[@andrewmacdonald4833]

Absolutely fascinating. Loved watching this.

[@Kim-the-Dane-1952]

Thank you. That was an excellent follow-up to the first video

[@andrewcipriano2890]

Ive seen some footage of what i think was yorktown, in the video you can just barely see what i think is the wing or fuselage of a devastator

[@Coffee_Charly]

relly enjoyed this, love to see more like this

[@jeffersonmanchild9271]

I use to ponder often the carrier wrecks at midway and if they will be found. Glad to get to see most of them

[@larsrons7937]

Diving on the wrecks of Midway must be the ultimate diving experience. I hope to get the chance some day. [Edit] OK, then it's one of the other great naval battles instead which I must have confused with Midway. Really, it's 19 years ago since I took those divers' licences but never got the chance to use them since I was never issued my papers. The documents from my examinations were at the post office at the beach when some stupid tsunami hit and ruined my diving prospects.

[@Sherwoody]

Since the Kaga is a tad deeper than Titanic, good luck with diving on her or any of the other wrecks. It would require a really good submersible.

[@NK-qn6pq]

@Sherwoody preferably one that is not controlled via an Xbox controller and also does not implode.

[@liamhickey359]

@@NK-qn6pq the " Open Gate " wreck diving company.

Very interesting footage.

[@Riccardo_Silva]

I almost forgot: thank you Drach and Professor Parshall for this incredibly interesting and fascinating video!🙏

[@timandellenmoran1213]

Thank you

[@GreggGermain-lk8if]

Has any of these wreck discoveries - the exact location - altered the accepted timeline/history of events of the battles?

[@ryder6070]

Turns out this was a midnight booze cruise gone terribly wrong..

[@TrickiVicBB71]

Was listening to Vinyl Cafe and got notification for new YT video. So happy to see it is you and Jon again

[@salvagedb2470]

Imagine the force an pressure to Flatten that Turret structure , I never knew the Kaga was that bad , But a fuel fire thats the Worst ..

[@johnmoore8599]

It was probably a lead based paint which is why the guns and hull (and anything else they painted ) has stayed so pristine. I agree that it was a crime to turn the last remaining Yorktown class carrier into razor blades. It's nice that USS Yorktown is now a war grave and is pretty preserved for some time. Speaking of crimes, Paul Allen's death pretty much killed a lot of underwater WW II archeology for some time. That was a shame. It's good that NOAA is still looking. Too bad the Navy doesn't have a budget for discovering USN wrecks.

[@KenR1800]

I figure that whatever is in that paint that has lasted 80 years in salt water probably doesn't meet with the approval of the EPA...

[@alganhar1]

The conditions down there are probably more at play to be perfectly honest. Most people are unaware of the conditions that deep. The main thing I will point it is the seabed at that depth is extremely oxygen poor, something most people are unaware of. No plants that deep, so nothing producing oxygen. What little oxygen there is comes principally from melted ice. Anything, and I mean anything that permanently lives there has evolved to a VERY oxygen poor environment. That low oxygen explains the good condition of much of the paint and exposed steel work. There just is not enough oxygen down there to form the extensive rust accretions you see on wrecks in shallower, oxygen rich waters.

[@johnmoore8599]

@@alganhar1 There are bacteria tearing up Titanic that oxidize iron as a form of anaerobic respiration. We aren't seeing that kind of damage yet on USS Yorktown, though we see some of it on IJN Kaga. Kaga's paint was burned off. Iron is a fertilizer since the ocean is iron poor. The condition of USS Yorktown could be due to a number of factors, but lack of oxygen won't prevent bacteria from munching on it, turning it into rust since there is plenty of oxygen in the form of water. Whatever is in the paint is preventing the formation of rust and may be a biocide.

[@moo5289]

I think the formulas for the paint are still known. The problem is, they are lead based and no longer allowed. In the world of unintended consequences, I wonder if we are doing more harm by repainting ships every couple of years.

[@tylermcneill]

Great job 👏

[@Archie2c]

The art work for the cover oh my

[@PhantomP63]

The round containers outside of the hangar deck on Yorktown might be firefighting foam tanks.

[@everettbruckerhoff6029]

with how far up the mudline is, I think part of that is because the old battlewagon hull of Kaga is actually of very little freeboard. As far as I can tell, the mudline isn't actually that far above the old waterline.

[@rashkavar]

Interesting note: I've heard on a couple of occasions that the Battle of Midway goes so well in part because of superb damage control work on the part of the Americans and substandard damage control on the part of the Japanese. While the fact that Yorktown manages to recover from hits that the Japanese report as being fatal does testify to the former, the damage to Kaga shown here testifies somewhat against the latter. If Japan had done to Yorktown what the US did to Kaga in that first supposed kill shot, it would have been a kill shot...there is a point at which "damage control" is more about keeping trained sailors and pilots alive than it is about keeping a pile of steel wreckage on the surface, and Kaga looks like it crossed that line.

[@TheEvilmooseofdoom]

Those carriers were caught in the worse possible situation, hangar decks loaded with fueled planes and a lot of ordinance. Any carrier hit in those conditions is in big trouble.

[@fafner1]

The Americans had the advantage of knowing the Japanese were coming, while the Japanese were surprised to find an American task force. The US ships also had radar to provide early warning, and were more aggressive about launching aircraft immediately even if their weapons loading was suboptimal. The result was that the American ships were generally buttoned up with bombs and torpedoes secured and gas lines drained and inerted when they were attacked, while the Japanese ships were caught in the worst possible condition.

[@rashkavar]

@@fafner1 I'm rather dubious about the claim that the Japanese were surprised to find Americans. They were, after all, at Midway with the specific intent to bomb an American airbase. Any semi-competent commander would account for at least the possibility of some manner of airstrike from the planes at the airbase. Yes, of course, the fact that the US knew they were coming and had scrambled every fleet carrier they could manage to that battle and had the air base set up ready to launch the biggest attack it possibly could on the Japanese fleet. Of course they were surprised by the ferocity of the American defense. They weren't planning on losing one carrier that day, let alone all 4. But only an idiot would sail a fleet into an offensive and not prepare for the possibility that they were going to get shot at. So, if you're right, they were idiots; I guess weirder things have happened.

[@WarpedHorizon]

I wish someone would start funding to send ROVs down to LIDAR scan these wrecks, like was just done with Titanic. Would allow far more research on them, without having to disturb them any more.

[@kencone6175]

Possibly the tubs on the port and stbd edges of the flight deck at the bow held the navigation lights rather than guns. Can't tell if the angles would be exactly correct, but they would be close.

[@jermainerace4156]

Obligatory reference to Leslie Fish's "Navy Grey Paint"

[@Kim-the-Dane-1952]

It would be great if Jon would tackle other significant WWII battles in a book similar to Shattered Sword. I really enjoyed his engaging writing style and the incredible detail that made you feel the human side of the battle for both combatants

[@warwatcher91]

Maybe not what your looking for but the man that co wrote shattered sword, Anthony Tully did a book on the battle of the Surigao Strait.

[@Kim-the-Dane-1952]

@@warwatcher91Thanks. I might give that a try

[@whtalt92]

I heard he's working on a 1943 manuscript.