USS Laffey: The Destroyer That Refused to Sink

Alone on the Radar Picket Line

On the morning of April 16, 1945, USS Laffey was operating approximately 30 miles north of Okinawa.

The destroyer’s assignment placed it on a radar picket station beyond the main American fleet. Ships in these exposed positions provided early warning when Japanese aircraft approached Okinawa.

It was essential work, but it also made the picket ships some of the first targets encountered by attacking aircraft.

Laffey’s crew had already helped repel an air attack the previous day. On April 16, the destroyer faced something far greater: a sustained assault that would continue for approximately 80 minutes.

By the time it ended, bombs and attacking aircraft had torn through the ship. Fires were burning, weapons had been destroyed, compartments were flooding and casualties covered the decks.

Yet USS Laffey remained afloat.

A Destroyer Built for Combat

USS Laffey, designated DD-724, was an Allen M. Sumner-class destroyer commissioned in February 1944.

The ship carried six 5-inch guns in three twin mounts, supported by 40 mm and 20 mm anti-aircraft weapons. It was designed for speed, escort duty, surface combat and air defense.

Before reaching the Pacific, Laffey had operated in European waters. It supported the Allied invasion of Normandy and participated in operations around Cherbourg.

The destroyer was later transferred to the Pacific, where it joined the enormous naval force supporting the invasion of Okinawa.

Okinawa was strategically important because its airfields and position could support future operations closer to Japan. Japanese forces responded with conventional aircraft and organized kamikaze attacks intended to overwhelm Allied naval defenses.

Radar picket destroyers such as Laffey stood between those attacks and the main fleet.

The First Aircraft Arrived

At approximately 8:30 in the morning, a Japanese aircraft appeared near the ship. What initially looked like a reconnaissance contact quickly became the beginning of a much larger attack.

More aircraft approached from different directions and altitudes. Some made bombing or strafing runs, while others attempted to crash directly into the destroyer.

Laffey’s gunners opened fire.

The crew had to identify each approaching aircraft, rotate weapons toward it, calculate range and continue firing while other attackers were already beginning their dives.

A destroyer was a narrow, moving target, but it also offered very little space to escape an impact. Gun crews remained exposed while bombs, aircraft fragments and machine-gun fire struck around them.

Several attackers were destroyed before reaching the ship. Others continued through the anti-aircraft fire.

Bombs and Kamikaze Impacts

The Naval History and Heritage Command records that USS Laffey was severely damaged by four bomb hits and five kamikaze impacts.

The attacks struck different parts of the destroyer and progressively weakened its ability to defend itself.

Aircraft crashed into gun positions and the ship’s superstructure. Bombs penetrated or exploded against the vessel, starting fires and damaging internal spaces. Some anti-aircraft weapons were destroyed along with the sailors operating them.

The ship’s rudder became jammed, limiting its ability to maneuver. Communications and electrical systems were damaged. Smoke and wreckage made it difficult for surviving crew members to understand what was happening beyond their immediate stations.

The attack did not arrive as one clean formation. Aircraft approached repeatedly, giving damage-control teams little time to contain one emergency before another impact created a new one.

Laffey continued firing with every weapon that remained operational.

The Human Cost

USS Laffey carried a crew of approximately 336 officers and enlisted sailors during the attack.

Thirty-two men were killed and 71 were wounded.

These numbers are essential to the story. The ship’s survival should not be remembered only as an engineering achievement or an example of a destroyer absorbing extraordinary punishment.

Gun crews continued operating while nearby positions were destroyed. Medical personnel treated wounded sailors under ongoing attack. Damage-control teams fought fires, controlled flooding and moved through compartments that could become trapped or isolated without warning.

Other sailors carried ammunition, replaced casualties at weapons and maintained pumps and machinery.

Every surviving system required people to operate it. Every fire brought under control prevented damage from spreading toward fuel, ammunition or machinery spaces.

The ship survived because the crew continued performing these tasks while the attack was still happening.

Help Arrived Above the Ship

American fighter aircraft eventually reached Laffey’s position.

Their arrival placed additional pressure on the remaining attackers and helped bring the assault to an end. By then, the destroyer had endured approximately 80 minutes of almost continuous danger.

Parts of the ship were burning. Numerous weapons were damaged or destroyed, and the vessel’s ability to maneuver had been severely reduced.

The crew now faced a different battle: preventing the ship from sinking after the aircraft had gone.

Fighting Flooding and Fire

Damage control continued long after the final attacking aircraft disappeared.

A surviving message sent by Laffey reported that compartments aft of the after engine room were flooded. The full extent of the underwater damage was unknown, and pumps were required to maintain the water level.

A tug was needed alongside the destroyer, and the crew requested gasoline to keep portable pumps operating.

This surviving message reveals how uncertain the situation remained. Laffey had survived the air attack, but survival was not yet guaranteed. Progressive flooding, fire or structural failure could still have taken the ship.

The crew isolated damaged spaces, controlled water, fought remaining fires and stabilized the vessel sufficiently for assistance.

On April 17, the damaged destroyer was moved from the exposed area and taken toward safer anchorage for temporary repairs.

From Okinawa to an American Shipyard

After emergency work near Okinawa, Laffey began a long journey away from the combat zone.

The destroyer traveled through Pacific bases before reaching the United States. It arrived at Tacoma, Washington, in May 1945 for major repairs.

Photographs taken after the attack show torn bulkheads, destroyed gun positions, punctured plating and heavy damage throughout the ship’s upper structure.

The damage was extensive, but the vessel was considered repairable.

Laffey returned to service and later operated during the Korean War and the Cold War. Its career continued until the destroyer was decommissioned in 1975.

In 1978, USS Laffey became part of the Patriots Point Naval & Maritime Museum in South Carolina.

The ship that survived Okinawa still exists today.

Why USS Laffey Survived

There was no single reason for Laffey’s survival.

The destroyer’s compartmentalized construction helped limit flooding. Its damage-control equipment gave the crew tools to fight fires and remove water. Redundant systems allowed some weapons and machinery to continue functioning after other positions were destroyed.

Assistance from nearby ships and American fighter aircraft was also important.

But none of those advantages worked automatically.

Sailors had to close openings, operate pumps, move ammunition, treat casualties, extinguish fires and continue defending the ship. They had to make decisions while communications were damaged and attacks were arriving from several directions.

Laffey remained afloat because its structure, systems and crew continued functioning together under extraordinary pressure.

The Ship That Would Not Die

USS Laffey became known as “The Ship That Would Not Die.”

The nickname captures the astonishing condition of the destroyer after the battle, but it can also hide the cost behind the achievement.

Thirty-two sailors did not return from the attack. Seventy-one more were wounded. Survivors carried the memory of the men lost at their stations and of the work required to keep the ship alive.

Today, visitors can walk aboard Laffey at Patriots Point and stand inside a destroyer that served at Normandy, Okinawa, Korea and during the Cold War.

Its survival is not simply the story of a strong warship.

It is the story of a crew that continued fighting fires, flooding and repeated attacks when abandoning the ship might have seemed inevitable.

That is why USS Laffey remains one of the most powerful surviving witnesses to the Pacific War.

Sources

Naval History and Heritage Command — “Ordeal of USS Laffey (DD-724)” and official battle-damage photograph collection.

Patriots Point Naval & Maritime Museum — USS Laffey history and archival collections.

Patriots Point Naval & Maritime Museum — USS Laffey message to Combat Task Force 51.15, April 16, 1945.