of the kaiten at 15:07 and it exploded, obliterating Underhill′s forward section as far back as her stack and killing 113 members of her crew. Underhill′s stern section remained afloat, but PCE-872, PC-803, and PC-804 sank it with gunfire at . I-53′s commanding officer reported sinking a large transport. At around 1300 on 27 July 1945, I-53 was submerged east of the Bashi Channel when she sighted a southbound American convoy of ten ships. I-53 began an approach, but as the convoy moved out of torpedo range her commanding officer considered letting it go. However, one of the embarked kaiiten pilots begged for the chance to attempt a long-range suicide attack, and I-53 launched his kaiten at around 17:00. She heard a heavy explosion around 18:00 and departed, heading for her earlier patrol area. On 7 August 1945, I-53 sighted a convoy of American tank landing ships bound from Okinawa to Leyte in the Philippine Sea at . She began a submerged approach. The destroyer escort detected her on sonar at 00:23 and dropped a pattern of 14 depth charges, then lost contact. After 25 minutes, Earl V. Johnson regained contact, and she conducted a second depth-charge attack at 00:55 and a third at 02:12. Although none of the attacks achieved a hit on I-53, she was rocked by explosions that knocked out some of her batteries and all of her internal lighting and disabled her rudder engine. At 02:30, she launched a kaiten from a depth of . Meanwhile, the patrol craft escort joined Earl V. Johnson in attacking I-53 and fired a Hedgehog salvo at 02:33, scoring no hits. At 02:35, Earl V. Johnson sighted a passing torpedo at 02:35, then two more at 02:45, one of which passed beneath Earl V. Johnson before exploding at 02:46. At about 02:50, the crew of I-53 heard an explosion. PCE-849 conducted another unsuccessful Hedgehog attack at 02:56, and Earl V. Johnson regained sonar contact on I-53 soon afterward. I-53 launched another kaiten at 03:00, but her remaining two kaitens developed mechanical problems that prevented her from launching them. At 03:26, Earl V. Johnson conducted a depth-charge attack against a new target, suffering slight damage from the detonation of her own depth charges, and her crew heard a heavy explosion at 03:30 and sighted a plume of white smoke. Earl V. Johnson then broke off the action to return to the