Operational History
Commissioned on 31 March 1912, Kawachi had a short operational history. During World War I, Kawachi was assigned to patrol the sea lanes south of Japan, in the South China Sea and the Yellow Sea, as part of Japan’s contribution to the war effort under the terms of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance. She was also at the Battle of Tsingtao.
Kawachi was sunk by an explosion caused by spontaneous ignition of unstable cordite in its ammunition magazine on 12 July 1918, while anchored at Tokuyama Bay, with the loss of 621 officers and crew out of a complement of 1,059 men. Stricken on 2 September 1918, its hulk was later salvaged and scrapped.
Read more about this topic: Japanese Battleship Kawachi
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