One
of the darkest events to come out of WWII. The Oryoku Maru was a “Hell
Ship”
used to transport prisoners in very inhumane conditions to
"The
Oryoku Maru Story" has an accounting of the
sinking of this ship in the views of different survivors. The
Oryoku Maru Story is taken from a legal summary from the War Crimes
Trials and it is this summary that Mr. Brown very aptly renamed The
Oryoku Maru Story.
It describes the events that occurred to the 1,619 POW's who were
loaded aboard the Oryoku Maru in Manila, P.I. on December 13, 1944,
through the arrival of approximately 450 survivors, in Moji, Japan on
January 29, 1945.
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As a dive site and a war grave, the Oryoku Maru sits about 300 meters off shore. She sits in 15 to 25 meters of water. The wreck is a tangle of metal the results of war dmage, clearing operations and time. Visibity is often poor as the wreck is very near a commercial pier. coral and fish life is healthy, with large schools of jacks found near the bow.
