(Stars and Stripes)
TIM ELFRINK November 11, 2019
Tim Taylor was about to end the mission. His team had scoured the seabed off Japan with autonomous underwater vehicles, which are essentially high-tech drones, without a hit. His ship now needed repairs, and a $7 million drone had just reported an error on its latest dive.
All that remained was to download the data from that drone before heading hundreds of miles back to shore.
That's when they spotted it: an unusual reading on the ocean floor, more than 1,400 feet deep. The next day, another submersible with high-definition cameras went to investigate.
The images it beamed back left no doubt about what Taylor's team had found: A hulking ship lay rusting in the pitch-black water. As the camera rounded the bow and panned to the bridge, an eerily preserved plaque came into view: USS Grayback.
"It was amazing. Everyone was excited," Taylor said in an interview with The Washington Post. "Then you realize there are 80 men buried there, and it's a sobering experience."
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