The Deepest Wreck Ever Located: The Destroyer Escort Samuel B Roberts

YouTube / Caladan Oceanic

In The Deep

On October 25, 1944, US Navy destroyer Samuel B. Roberts was sunk during the Battle of Samar. That day, the destroyer was supporting the Allied Army assault when 23 Japanese ships opened fire at them. Roberts fought with the vessels for hours, firing more than six hundred 127 mm shells before the commanding officer ordered them to abandon the ship. 

It sank at around 10 AM, taking down 90 of its crew members in the process. The remaining 120 survivors clung to life rafts for more than two days before they were rescued.

In 2022, 78 years after it sank, Samuel B. Roberts’s wreck was discovered by Victor Vescovo’s exploration team at a depth of almost 23,000 ft – the deepest shipwreck ever identified. A year before that, Vescovo’s team also found the wreck of USS Johnston, which was sunk in the same battle. 

Regardless, Robert’s wreck remains at the bottom of the ocean and is protected from disturbances by the Sunken Military Craft Act.