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Pearl Harbor - USS Oklahoma: The Final Story

USS Oklahoma capsized after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Rescue workers in small boat and on hull attempt to save those sailors trapped inside. USS Maryland also in photo.
Courtesy of National Archives
USS Oklahoma capsized after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Rescue workers in small boat and on hull attempt to save those sailors trapped inside. USS Maryland also in photo.

Airs Wednesday, Nov. 23, 2016 at 8 p.m. on KPBS TV

Explore what happened to the USS Oklahoma on Dec. 7, 1941, as the ship foundered and capsized.

"Pearl Harbor – USS Oklahoma: The Final Story" is a one-hour film that looks at the attack on Pearl Harbor with a focus on the sinking of the USS Oklahoma. The film features first-person accounts from survivors who describe the attack in vivid, harrowing detail — from the moments just before the attack, through every detail of the terrifying hours, to the days afterward spent trying to rescue the sailors trapped aboard.

Original caption: The capsized USS Oklahoma (BB37) and the USS Maryland (BB46) after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941.
Courtesy of National Archives
Original caption: The capsized USS Oklahoma (BB37) and the USS Maryland (BB46) after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941.

But the story of the USS Oklahoma didn’t end on Dec. 7, 1941. For 75 years, families have waited for remains of “unknown” sailors to be identified and returned, and many questions still surround a lingering mystery: Why did the USS Oklahoma sink and capsize so quickly?

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Men drape flag over casket of Pearl Harbor attack victim.
Courtesy of National Archives
Men drape flag over casket of Pearl Harbor attack victim.

"Pearl Harbor – USS Oklahoma: The Final Story" will tell the stories of these unidentified sailors’ final homecoming, and dive into the mystery of the little-known Japanese “midget subs” that may have been responsible for the Oklahoma’s fate.

Presented by WCVE PBS in Richmond, Virginia.