WWII-era aircraft carrier mapped with 3D sonar

The shipwreck of the USS Independence aircraft carrier has undergone 3D sonar scanning, revealing a remarkably intact vessel.

Independence (CVL 22) operated in the central and western Pacific from November 1943 through August 1945 and later was one of more than 90 vessels assembled as a target fleet for the Bikini Atoll atomic bomb tests in 1946. Damaged by shock waves, heat and radiation, Independence survived the Bikini Atoll tests and, like dozens of other Operation Crossroads ships, returned to the United States.

While moored at San Francisco’s Hunters Point Naval Shipyard, Independence was the primary focus of the Navy’s studies on decontamination until age and the possibility of its sinking led the Navy to tow the blast-damaged carrier to sea for scuttling on Jan. 26, 1951.

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Story: Sarah Marquis, NOAA | Photo: NOAA, Boeing, and Coda Octopus