Science Fair Project Encyclopedia
Categories: World War II Japanese submarines | World War II Japanese suicide weapons | Submarine classes
Kairyu class submarine
 A Kairyu "Sea Dragon" in the Aburatsubo inlet. | |
| Career | 
|
|---|---|
| Ordered: | 1943 |
| Laid down: | 1943–1944 |
| Launched: | 1945 |
| Commissioned: | 1945 |
| Decommissioned: | 1945 |
| Fate: | Dismantling |
| General Characteristics | |
| Displacement: | 19 tonnes |
| Length: | Up to 57 feet |
| Beam: | 4 1/2 feet |
| Draught: | |
| Surface propulsion: | 85 HP gasoline engine |
| Submerged propulsion: | 80 HP electric engine |
| Surface speed: | 7 knots |
| Submerged speed: | 10 knots |
| Range: | |
| Complement: | |
| Armament: | 600kg of explosive |
| Motto: | |
The Kairyu (海龍 "Sea Dragon") was a class of Kamikaze midget submarines designed in 1943-1944, and produced from the beginning of 1945. These submarines were meant to meet the invading American Naval forces upon their anticipated approach of Tokyo.
Over 760 of these submarines were planned, and by August 1945, 200 had been manufactured, most of them at the Yokosuka shipyard.
These submarines had a two-man crew and were fitted with an internal warhead for suicide missions.
Most of the Kairyu submarines were based at Yokosuka at the entrance of Tokyo Bay, and in the Moroiso and Aburatsubo inlets on the southern tip of the Miura peninsula, where a training school has also been set-up.
None of these submarines saw action eventually, since Japan surrendered in August 1945 upon the atomic bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima, before American forces had made it to the main islands of Japan.
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