Wreck of USS Mannert L. Abele (DD-733)

 Second World War 1939-1945, shipwreck, destroyer (ship), United States Navy

USS Mannert L. Abele was a Allen M. Sumner Class Destroyer laid down December 1943 and commissioned into US Navy service on July 4th, 1944 as a member of the US Atlantic Fleet. After conducting training and shakedown, the Abele and her crew transited the Panama Canal and joined the US Pacific Fleet at San Diego in December, where she was augmented with special radio and radar equipment for duty as a radar picket & fighter director ship.

Seeing her first combat at Saipan during the American campaign to retake the island in February 1945, the Abele joined the US Fleet massing at Ulithi Atoll for the invasion of Okinawa and sailed as a screening ship in advance of the American Fleet in late March. After providing shore bombardment as part of the initial assault, the Abele steamed North of Okinawa and took up her role as an advance radar picket ship for the invasion fleet, alerting the force of inbound Japanese aircraft.

The Abele's radar picket role was inherently dangerous, as her radar equipment dictated she operate essentially without escort and highly vulnerable to air attack, the very thing she was directed to identify. This danger was heightened by the increased amount of Kamikaze attacks hurled at the American fleet during the Okinawa campaign, the first of which found the Abele and her two fire support ships USS LSM(R)-189 and USS LSM(R)-190 on April 8th. Fighting off this attack while claiming three kills, the crew of the Abele were under near-constant attack for the next four days as they maintained their isolated position and service to US forces on Okinawa.

April 12th found the Abele and her two escorts operating approximately 70 miles Northwest of Okinawa at Picket Station No. 14. After a relatively quiet morning spent at general quarters, the radar screens of the Abele began to register another wave of inbound aircraft around 1300hrs and the ship and her crew prepared for more action. As the flight of Japanese planes drew closer, several broke off and made straight for the Abele and the two LSM(R)s and at 1345hrs all three ships opened fire on a formation of 'Val' divebombers, downing one. At 1400hrs, an additional 15-25 aircraft began circling the ships out of gun range, seemingly taunting the crews for over forty minutes until a flight of two 'Zero's made an attack, both of which were shot down within minutes. A third aircraft was then sighted diving on the formation at speeds higher than any propeller plane could reach and despite intense AA fire from the Abele the plane came down at a 30+ degree angle and slammed into the Destroyers aft engine room and detonated, causing massive damage. The Abele wallowed from the impact of the first hit and had begun slowing down when stunned crews on the LSM(R)'s watched in horror as a second high-speed aircraft slammed into the ship's starboard waterline abreast the forward fireroom, where it too detonated. Within seconds of the attack, the Abele began breaking in half as her shattered keel gave way, hurling dazed crewmen into the sea as her Bow and Stern sections went briefly vertical before sinking at this location at 1448hrs on April 12th, 1945. After driving off another massed kamikaze attack, the crews of the two LSM(R)'s rescued all but 73 of Abele's crew, including her Captain who went down with the ship.

For her actions on the date of her loss, which marked the first successful use of the Type 11 'Ohka' rocket-propelled manned flying bomb against American ships, the USS Mannert L. Abele (DD-733) received her second and final Battle Star.

www.navsource.org/archives/05/733.htm