I-8 entering Kagoshima Bay on the coast of Japan on 12 September 1939.
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History | |
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Empire of Japan | |
Name | I-8 |
Builder | Kawasaki, Kobe, Japan |
Laid down | 11 October 1934 |
Launched | 20 July 1936 |
Completed | 5 December 1938 |
Fate | Sunk 31 March 1945 |
General characteristics | |
Class and type | Junsen-class J3 Type submarine |
Displacement |
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Length | 358.5 ft 6 in (109.42 m) |
Beam | 29 ft 8 in (9.04 m) |
Draft | 17 ft 3 in (5.26 m) |
Propulsion |
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Speed |
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Range | 14,000 nmi (26,000 km) at 16 knots (30 km/h; 18 mph) |
Test depth | 100 m (330 ft) |
Complement | 100 officers and men |
Armament |
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Aircraft carried | 1 × Yokosuka E14Y seaplane (removed 1944) |
Aviation facilities |
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I-8 was an Imperial Japanese Navy Junsen III (or J3)-type submarine commissioned in 1938 that served during World War II. Designed as submarine aircraft carriers, I-8 and her sister ship I-7 were the largest Japanese submarines to be completed before the outbreak of the war in the Pacific in 1941. With embarked floatplanes, I-8 participated in operations related to the attack on Pearl Harbor, patrolled off the United States West Coast, and took part in the Guadalcanal campaign and the Okinawa campaign.
In 1943, I-8 completed a technology exchange mission with a voyage to German-occupied France and back to Japan, the only submarine to complete a round-trip voyage between Japan and Europe during World War II. Under a new commanding officer in 1944, her crew committed war crimes during anti-shipping operations in the Indian Ocean. She was sunk in 1945.