World War II: Off the coast of Japan, a dive bomber hits the aircraft carrier USS Franklin, killing 724 of her crew. Badly damaged, the ship is able to return to the US under her own power.

A dive bomber is a tactical bomber aircraft that attacks its target by performing fast dives in order to provide greater accuracy for the aerial bomb it drops. Diving directly towards the target before releasing gives the bomb a faster overall speed and a greater terminal momentum, straightens the…