PBY SAR role in USS Indianapolis Rescue
PBY's role in the last major SAR operation of the Pacific War.
When the survivors of USS Indianaplois were found by good luck, four days after being torpedoed, the PBY played a major role in the rescue of survivors & directly saved 59 lives.
By chance the survivors remaining on day 4 after the sinking were found by Lt W.Gwinn flying a Ventura on AS patrol. He initially found 30 survivors & dropped what liferafts he had and radioed the situation to a disbelieving base ops.
There was no record of a ship missing.
His C.O. (VPB-152 ) Lt Cdr Attebury took of from Pelelui to relieve him and deliver more liferafts , arranging for a PBY (from VPB-23) to follow him as soon as possible.
By now more survivors had been found by Lt Gwinn, & ships & acft diverted to the area to assist.
The PBY from VPB23 flown by Lt. R.Marks arrived and dropped liferafts to survivors located by L/Cdr Atteberry. Lt Marks saw isolated survivors were being attacked by sharks & decided to attempt to land & pick them up,despite a 12 ft swell that was running & the fact that he had never made an ocean landing . The landing was heavy, rivets sprung & seams in the hull opened, the acft began taking some water but at a controllable rate.
Directed by L/Cdr Attenberry on R/T he was able to eventually pick up 58 isolated survivors before night fall as well as distribute water & emergency rations to other groups in rafts. The acft was so crowded survivors lay on the wings and were covered with parachutes for the night.
Late in the day another PBY landed from USAAC Emergency Rescue Unit at Palau Island piloted Lt R. Alcorn but he was only able to find one survivor before dark. A few hours after last light, about midnight, the USS Doyle arrived on scene & began to pick up survivors by by motor whale boat taking all survivors from Lt Marks PBY. By searchlight , air dropped parachute flares & star shells Doyle continued to pick up survivors in her whaleboat. In the course of the night more aircraft & ships arrived , by sun up there were 5 ships involved in the search & rescue of the survivors, who were spread over a large area. Before long there were eleven ships & numerous patrol craft searching the area as well as aircraft overhead spotting for the ships.
The search area was 100 nm radius from the initial survivor group.
At first light Doyle took Lt Alcorn's survivor . A rough sea & strong wind made it hazardous to consider taking off with survivors. He took off and returned after refuelling to act as a spotter for the next 5 days for the ships which had now arrived on the scene.
Lt Mark's inspected his PBY & determined it was not airworthy. The crew, & equipment that could be salvaged , were taken off by USS Doyle.
The PBY which had saved the lives of 58 of the isolated survivors was sunk by 80 rounds of 40 mm.
The search lasted 6 days and after the first day only badly decomposed bodies were found. Of the 800 sailors who abandoned ship only 316 survived.