Four of the eight remaining survivors of the Dec. 7, 1941, attack on the doomed battleship USS Arizona will drink a toast to their shipmates in arms on the 73rd anniversary of the day of infamy, the National Park Service said.
John Delmar Anderson, Lauren Fay Bruner, Louis A. Conter and Donald Gay Stratton will drink from original Champagne glasses from the USS Arizona, according to the park service.
On Tuesday the survivors will hold the ceremony on the USS Arizona Memorial to mark their final reunion.
"This historic event will mark the end of an era for the USS Arizona survivors," now all in their 90s, who have announced this will be the final time they will come together, said the park service, which administers the USS Arizona Memorial.
The survivors will be greeted by the Pacific Fleet Band at the Pearl Harbor Visitor Center and watch a live video feed of National Park Service divers filming the exterior of their sunken battleship.
They also will be presented a 3-D model of the ship produced using laser scanning, high-resolution sonar and photogrammetry from a yearlong survey of the wreckage.
When a Japanese armor-piercing bomb slammed into the forward deck of the USS Arizona, igniting fuel stores and powder magazines, the explosion and fireball killed 1,177 men.
Stratton, then a 19-year-old seaman first class, was burned over 65 percent of his body.
He and Bruner were among sailors who climbed hand over hand across a rope to safety despite their burns. A doctor wanted to amputate three fingers on each of Bruner’s hands but he refused.
"Very few men from the mainmast forward got off," Conter recalled in 2010. "Everything from the mainmast forward was just burning and in flames. They didn’t have a chance."
Anderson helped the wounded on the Arizona but lost his twin brother, Delbert, who was among those who perished on the ship. The sunken battleship and memorial remains the grave for most of the killed crewmen.
