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USS Indianapolis Survivor Recounts His Experiences

By Alexander McCall

Posted November 11, 2015

This year marks the 70th anniversary of the sinking of the USS Indianapolis, the single-greatest loss of life at sea for the Navy.

The Greentown Public Library played host to a survivor of the wreck on Monday.

Richard Thelen was only 18 years old when a Japanese submarine torpedoed the USS Indianapolis.

"Everybody asking me, 'Where'd you jump off the ship?' I didn't jump off - it left me. I just swam away," he says."

Seventy years later, Thelen is still talking about it, keeping alive the memory of those who perished and passing along the story for future generations.

Thelen gave a presentation Monday at the Greentown High School Performing Arts Center to an audience that included fellow veterans, Boy Scouts and family members of those who died in the shipwreck.

Commissioned in 1932, the Indianapolis had a long and decorated career, including taking President Franklin Roosevelt to South America.

In July 1945, the ship delivered part of the "Little Boy" atomic bomb to the island of Tinian as part of a secret mission. They were then ordered to Guam and later, Okinawa.

Just after midnight on July 30, 1945, the ship was struck by two torpedoes. Twelve minutes later, the 610-foot-long Indianapolis was submerged. Nine hundred of the 1,196 crewmen aboard the Indianapolis were left bobbing in the Pacific Ocean.

Only 317 of them survived, and Thelen says he "fought like hell" to stay alive.

"It's just as easy to die out there as it is to stay alive," he says. "You had to fight to stay alive. I saw men take off their life jackets, go down, get a drink of water, and if you drink salt water on an empty stomach, it'll kill you. Foam comes to your mouth, your eyeballs pop out and about two hours later, you're dead. You go surely insane, and I saw quite a few guys do that."

The 900 initial survivors were subjected to dehydration, saltwater poisoning and exposure. Thelen had an interesting way to beat the extreme power of the sun.

It's just as easy to die out there as it is to stay alive.


"All I had were my shorts," Thelen says. "In the daytime, I would put them on my head to protect me from the sun. At night, I'd put them back on so I wouldn't lose them. I saw other men do that and thought good idea and did it myself."

Sharks posed even more danger to the stranded seamen. The wreck attracted sharks from miles around - leading them to attack the helpless sailors.

In the film "Jaws," the character Captain Quint relays his experience of the shark attacks.

Thelen now lives in Lansing, Mich., and gets together with other survivors of the wreck every year – fewer than 30 of them are still alive.

But their memories live on through a memorial in Indianapolis, inscribed with the names of all those aboard.

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