The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requires that each federal agency maintain an electronic Reading Room with most frequently requested documents. The FOIA Reading Room series of which this is a member presents highlights from those collections. The tragic loss of SCORPION in May 1968 draws enduring interest in the Navy FOIA Reading Room.

This volume is an ideal complement to Bruce Rule’s Why the USS Scorpion (SSN 589) Was Lost: The Death of a Submarine in the North Atlantic (Nimble Books, 2011) which provides a detailed analysis of the acoustical and physical evidence. This volume contains essential primary documents that shed light on the event and on the Navy’s subsequent investigation and remedial actions.

• Excerpts from reports by the Court of Inquiry both before and after SCORPION was found in November 1968, including:

• Index of Witnesses

• Findings of Fact

• Recommendations

• Opinions

• Letters of endorsement from successive levels of command with recommendations for action

• Correspondence between the Secretary of Navy and Congress

• Memoranda and records pertaining to major adverse maintenance events in SCORPION’s previous voyages

• Messages from the search ship MIZAR

• The MIZAR Goes on a Hunt , by J01 Sam Herzog, Navy Journalist, an eyewitness account of the search