Pearl Harbor During the
attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941,
I-17 patrolled north of
Oahu. Its mission was to reconnoiter and engage any ships that tried to sortie from Pearl Harbor.
I-17 proceeded to a patrol station off
Cape Mendocino following the attack on Pearl Harbor. The 6,912-ton General Petroleum tanker was sailing in ballast from
Seattle, Washington en route to
San Pedro, California.
I-17 hit the tanker with five shells in the early afternoon of 20 December 1941. The tanker was within sight of land, and survivors reached the Blunt Reef lightship in lifeboats. The tanker drifted north onto rocks off
Crescent City, California where the wreck remained until scrapped in 1959. A scheduled shelling of American coastal cities on Christmas Eve of 1941 was canceled because of the frequency of coastal air and surface patrols.
Shelling the U.S. continent At night on 19 February 1942,
I-17 covertly landed on
Point Loma, San Diego to determine her position after arriving from
Kwajalein Atoll.
I-17 then headed north along the coast of California. The following night, the anti-aircraft defenses in Los Angeles exploded into action in response to an imagined invasion (later to be known as
the Battle of Los Angeles. During a 30-minute fusillade, guns hurled 1,440 rounds of and 37 mm ammunition into the night sky at a supposed enemy aircraft, and about ten tons of
shrapnel and unexploded ammunition fell back on the city.
Aleutians and Guadalcanal In early June 1942,
I-17 took part in the opening stages of the
Aleutian Islands campaign. In November 1942,
I-17s 14 cm deck gun was removed and she set out for
Guadalcanal on the first of many supply missions.
Torpedoing Stanvac Manila On 24 May 1943, south off
Noumea .
I-17 sighted the 10,169 ton Panamanian-flagged tanker
Stanvac Manila. The tanker had six PT boats on board as cargo. At 0407,
I-17s torpedo hit the tanker, flooding the engine and fire room and disabling all power and communications. At 12:05
Stanvac Manila sank, taking
PT-165 and
PT-173 with her.
Kingfisher floatplanes of US Scouting Squadron VS-57, based in
New Caledonia, joined the search. One of these indicated that
Tui should investigate smoke on the horizon,
I-17 was sighted on the surface and
Tui opened fire at maximum range, scoring one, possibly two hits.
I-17 was severely damaged and sank, leaving a trail of bubbles and oil. Five minutes later,
I-17 resurfaced with her bow exiting at a steep angle. The floatplane briefly strafed the submarine, before dropping more depth charges and
I-17 sank at .
I-17s with the loss of 91 of her crew.
Tui rescued six survivors, who said
Tuis depth charge attacks had damaged
I-17, forced her to the surface and the Kingfisher's depth charges had sunk her. ==Notes==