USS Flying Fish (SS/AGSS-229), a Gato-class submarine, was the first submarine and second ship of the United States Navy to be named for the flying fish. Flying Fish is credited with having sunk a total of 58,306 tons of Japanese shipping and received 12 battle stars for World War II service. Construction and commissioning The keel of Flying Fish was laid down on 6 December 1940 by the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard at Kittery, Maine. She was launched on 9 July 1941, sponsored by Mrs. Dorothy K. Kimmel, wife of Admiral Husband E. Kimmel, Commander-in-Chief, United States Pacific Fleet. Flying Fish was commissioned 10 December 1941, Lieutenant Commander Glynn "Donc" Donaho in command. December 1941–May 1942 After shakedown training, Flying Fish transited the Panama Canal and departed Balboa in the Panama Canal Zone on 17 April 1942 bound for Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. During her voyage, a United States Army Air Forces plane mistook her for a Japanese submarine and dropped depth charges on her, but she submerged and avoided damage. She arrived at Pearl Harbor on 2 May 1942. First war patrol - Battle of Midway On 17 May 1942, Flying Fish was ordered out to patrol west of Midway Atoll in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, which was threatened by an expected Japanese attack. During the Battle of Midway of 3–7 June 1942, she and her sisters fanned out to scout and screen the atoll, at which she refitted from 9 to 11 June. Continuing her first full war patrol, she searched major shipping lanes in the seas around Japan and scored a hit on a Japanese destroyer off Formosa during the night of 3 July 1942. She returned to Midway to refit on 25 July 1942. Second war patrol, August – September 1942 On 15 August 1942, Flying Fish departed on her second war patrol, bound for a patrol area north of Truk. On 28 August, only three days after arriving on station, Flying Fish sighted the masts of a Japanese battleship (now known to be Yamato), guarded by two destroyers and air cover. She launched four torpedoes at this prime target, and two hits were detected by sonar. Immediately the counterattack began, and as Flying Fish prepared to launch torpedoes at one of the destroyers, rapidly closing to starboard, her commanding officer was blinded by a geyser of water thrown up by a bomb. Flying Fish went deep for