WL413 AKISHIMO

Akishimo was a Japanese destroyer whose keel was laid in March 1943, launched in December 1943, and commissioned in the Imperial Japanese Navy in March 1944. The length of the ship at the time of launching was 119.2 m, width 10.8 m, and the actual full displacement - 2,520 tons. The maximum speed of destroyer Akishimo was up to 35.5 knots. The main armament at the time of the launch was 6 127 mm guns in three twin turrets, and the secondary armament were 25 mm cannons, depth charge launchers and eight 610 mm torpedo tubes with eight spare torpedoes. Akishimo was the eighteenth and penultimate Yugumo-class destroyer. Units of this type were created as part of the 1939 and 1941 Japanese fleet expansion program. Units of this class were in fact an improved Kagero type: they were slightly larger, with new main artillery turrets and an extended stern. The stock of depth charges was also increased. However, they had the same engine room, similar ship layout, and identical main and torpedo armaments. The weak anti-aircraft armament, which was systematically strengthened during the war in the Pacific, was still a drawback. Destroyer Akishimo began its very short combat route during World War II with participation in the Battle of Leyte Bay in October 1944 - it was twice during this battle to take survivors from sunken Japanese cruisers: Myoko and Noshiro. Then, in November, he was in charge of convoys heading to the Philippines. In the course of one such action, it was severely damaged by B-25 Mitchell bombers, as a result of which it entered the port of Kawite in the Bay of Manila. There, on November 13, 1944, it was sunk by the American air force.