Akagi

Akagi was the flagship of the Imperial Japanese Navy's First Carrier Division and the heart of the striking force that attacked Pearl Harbor in December 1941. Completed in 1927 and rebuilt during the 1930s, she displaced over 40,000 tons at full load and carried some of the most experienced naval aviators in the world. Through the spring of 1942 she led raids across the Indian Ocean, striking Ceylon and scattering the Eastern Fleet. At Midway on the morning of 4 June 1942, while her deck was crowded with aircraft refuelling and rearming for a second strike on the atoll, a single bomb from an American dive bomber detonated the fuelled planes below, dooming the ship. Vice Admiral Nagumo Chuichi shifted his flag to a light cruiser, and in the early hours of 5 June Akagi was scuttled by Japanese destroyers with torpedoes. Her loss, together with three sister carriers in one day, ended Japanese dominance of carrier warfare in the Pacific.