Japanese submarine I-183

On the day of her commissioning, I-183 was attached to the Sasebo Naval District and assigned to Submarine Squadron 11 in the 1st Fleet, an element of the Combined Fleet.[4][5] On 5 October 1943, she got underway from Kobe for workups in Hiroshima Bay and in the Iyo Nada in the Seto Inland Sea.[4]

At 10:40 on 6 October 1943, I-183 began diving exercises in the waters of Hiroshima Bay west of Osu on Etajima.[4] During a practice crash dive, a sailor failed to close the main induction valve, causing I-183′s engine room to flood.[4] I-183′s crew made an emergency blow of her main ballast tank, but her stern sank to the bottom, and she came to rest with her bow sticking out of the water.[4] Engineer Lieutenant Yoshio Hirobe managed to close the watertight hatch leading to the aft crew compartment, containing flooding to the main engine room and electric motor room, but trapping him and 15 other men in the aft section of I-183.[4] Most of I-183′s crew escaped through her forward torpedo tubes, and local fishermen rescued them.[4]

After a floating crane and a team of divers arrived on the scene from the Kure Naval Arsenal at Kure, Japan, a rescue operation began at 20:00 on 6 October 1943 under the personal direction of the commander of Submarine Squadron 11, Rear Admiral Marquis Tadashige Daigo.[4] I-183 was refloated at 1400 on 7 October 1943, but by then all 16 men trapped in the after compartment had died.[4]

While I-183 was under repair after her accident, Submarine Squadron 11 was reassigned to the 6th Fleet, another element of the Combined Fleet, on 25 November 1943.[5]

Repairs to I-183 were completed in January 1944, and she began post-repair workups that month.[4] On 27 March 1944, Japanese forces sighted an Allied task force heading toward Palau, and I-183 and the submarines I-44, Ro-47,Ro-116, and Ro-117 received orders to patrol in the Pacific Ocean east of Palau.[4] I-183 got underway in company with I-44 on 31 March 1944 bound for her patrol area, but she suffered a mechanical failure that forced her to turn back, and she returned to Kure on 6 April 1944 for repairs.[4][5]

On 28 April 1944, I-183 was reassigned to Submarine Squadron 22 in the 6th Fleet.[4][5] With her repairs complete, she departed Kure that day bound for Saipan in the Mariana Islands and then Truk Atoll in the Caroline Islands.[4][5]

On the first evening of her voyage, I-183 was exiting the Bungo Strait on the surface, zigzagging and making 17 knots (31 km/h; 20 mph), when the United States Navy submarine USS Pogy (SS-266) detected her on radar at 21:21 on 28 April 1944.[4] Pogy gave chase at flank speed, and by 00:34 on 29 April 1944 had closed to a range of 1,300 yards (1,200 m) 30 nautical miles (56 km; 35 mi) south of Cape Ashizuri, the southernmost point of Shikoku.[4][5] Pogy fired four Mark 23 torpedoes set to run at a depth of 6 feet (1.8 m).[4] The second torpedo struck I-183 at 00:36, and she sank in 40 seconds at 32°07′N 133°03′E.[4][5] Pogy′s crew heard four or five loud explosions at 00:39, and after 00:42 Pogy reversed course and passed through a large oil slick which her patrol report described as "smelling like the new 100-octane aromatic aviation gasoline."[4]

On 28 May 1944, the Imperial Japanese Navy declared I-183 to be presumed lost with all 92 hands south of Honshu.[4][5] The Japanese struck her from the Navy List on 10 August 1944.[4][5]