well as a Type 22 surface-search radar. The latter system had received a modification that allowed it to be used for fire-control as well. Construction and career Sakawa, named after the Sakawa River, was laid down on 21 November 1942 at Sasebo Naval Arsenal. The ship was launched on 9 April 1944 and completed on 30 November. On commissioning, she was assigned directly to the Combined Fleet. On 15 January 1945 Sakawa became flagship of Destroyer Squadron 11, training with new destroyers in the Inland Sea, and participating in a series of tests of a new anti-radar submarine coating. On 1 April, the squadron was assigned to Operation Ten-Go, the suicide mission against the American invasion forces at Okinawa. They were originally scheduled to accompany the battleship and her sister ship , but there was no fuel available for the squadron to participate in the mission. On 26 May one of Sakawas propellers struck a rock in the Kanmon Straits between Kyushu and Honshu, but only had its tips partly bent. The ship was later transferred to the Maizuru Naval District and arrived there on 19 July. She was attacked by aircraft from the aircraft carrier six days later, but was not damaged. When Japan surrendered on 2 September, Sakawa was docked at Maizuru. Post-war operations Shortly after the war, she was demilitarized, with her guns disabled, and her torpedoes, ammunition and other armament removed. On 5 October, the ship was struck from the navy list. Later that month Sakawa was used to evacuate 1,339 Imperial Japanese Army troops stranded on four small islands (Sonsorol, Fanna, Merir and Hatohobei) in the southern Palau group. She continued to work for the Repatriation Service as a transport until the end of February 1946, returning Japanese troops from New Guinea, Korea and from other locations. On 25 February 1946, Sakawa was sent to Yokosuka, where she was formally handed over to the United States Navy as a prize of war, for use (along with other surviving ships of the former Imperial Japanese Navy) in the upcoming Bikini atomic experiments. The salvage crew found her leaky hull infested with rats, and that most of the ship's systems were not functional. Together with the battleship , the ship departed Yokosuka for Eniwetok with a 165-man American crew on 18 March, with eleven of her former Japanese officers aboard to assist them. Ten days later, from