Racing into the Devil’s Jaw: The Honda Point Disaster of 1923

On the night of September 8, 1923, 14 of the U.S. Navy's sleekest Clemson-class destroyers, affectionately known as the Greyhounds, were charging south from San Francisco to San Diego at a blistering 20 knots. Eager to prove his squadron's flawless competence following a prior minor mishap, Captain Edward H. Watson enforced a strict wartime doctrine: centralized navigation, radio silence, and a ban on independent positional checks or depth soundings.

Unbeknownst to the crew, the catastrophic Great Kanto Earthquake in Japan just a week prior had sent unpredictable submarine currents surging across the Pacific, quietly throwing off their calculations. Blindly trusting...