The USS Torsk was the last US Navy submarine to sink an enemy warship until the war with Iran. Take a look inside.

On August 14, 1945, Torsk sank the last two enemy ships of World War II in the Sea of Japan.

After the war, Torsk was updated and converted to a fleet-snorkel submarine and remained in service for several decades, participating in Operation Springboard training exercises in the 1950s and the blockade of Cuba during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.

Torsk was decommissioned in 1968, Auer said. It served in training reserves until 1971, and became a museum in 1972.

Nearly 81 years after Torsk sank two Japanese frigates, video footage released by the Department of Defense on March 4 showed a US Navy fast-attack submarine firing a Mark 48 heavyweight torpedo at an Iranian warship in the Indian Ocean, sinking the vessel.

General admission tickets, which cost $21.95 per adult, grant visitors access to Torsk as well as the USS Constellation and US Coast Guard Cutter WHEC-37. All of the vessels are managed by Historic Ships in Baltimore.

When Torsk was in service, the wood was painted black to help camouflage the submarine at sea.

“One of the biggest dangers in World War II, and today, for submarines is aerial reconnaissance aircraft,” Auer said.

The buoy, attached to the submarine with a steel cable, would have floated to the surface and led rescue divers to Torsk’s escape hatch. While Torsk never needed to use it, 33 crew members on the USS Squalus were rescued with the help of the emergency buoy when the submarine sank in 1939.

Torsk features a total of 10 torpedo tubes, four in the after torpedo room and six in the forward torpedo room.

Each torpedo room also included 12 to 18 bunks.

Acoustic torpedoes home in on the sound of enemy ships’ engines and propellers to locate their targets.

Torsk’s top speed was about 9 knots, or about 10 miles per hour. The ability to fire torpedoes from both directions saved precious time by allowing the submarine to target enemy ships while already facing the direction it needed to flee before its location could be traced.

“These torpedoes — with one shot, I can knock out an entire ship, but we have no armor at all,” Auer said. “We’re completely vulnerable to enemy fire, and our speed is terrible. All we have is firepower. So we make up for that with the ability to hide.”

Torsk’s diesel engines generated the ship’s electricity, which crew members directed to various parts of the submarine via levers known as bus switches or “sticks.” Electricity was crucial to Torsk’s operation, powering its motors and charging its batteries.

The altimeter monitored the barometric pressure inside the submarine as its engines sucked air out of the compartment while snorkeling.

Temperatures in the engine rooms could reach up to 120 degrees Fahrenheit.

The Kleinschmidt evaporator produced 1,000 gallons of freshwater per day, most of which went to maintaining the submarine’s batteries. Crew members could shower once a week if there was any water left over.

Officers had their own separate washroom.

The room was lit with red light to make it easier for sailors’ eyes to adjust to the darkness.

If a sailor’s personal item didn’t fit in the coffin bunk or in the locker, it couldn’t come on board the submarine.

“Smoking was allowed pretty much whenever,” Auer said. “If you were not a smoker on board Torsk, you were a smoker.”

The Navy instituted a ban on smoking below deck on submarines in 2010.

Unlike other Navy ships with cafeteria-style chow lines, food was passed around on platters handed over from the galley and served family-style. Auer said that the back left table was nicknamed “starvation corner” since it was the last one to receive the platters.

Torsk could only carry two movies at a time since each came on multiple 10-inch film reels. Navy ships occasionally swapped films with each other while out at sea.

The menu included steak, lobster, and traditional holiday spreads on Thanksgiving and Christmas.

“The food onboard a submarine is the best in the Navy,” Auer said. “Still true today, and that’s not opinion. That’s documentable fact.”

On other Navy ships, coffee was only available at mealtimes. Submariners enjoyed the perk of endless coffee at all hours of the day.

Submarines were equipped with ice cream machines in the 1940s and 1950s, while other Navy ships received them later.

Garbage bags were weighted down so that they wouldn’t float to the surface and expose the submarine’s position.

The radio room also featured cryptographic equipment for top-secret messages.

The control room also featured navigational equipment and a hydraulic manifold nicknamed the “Christmas tree” for its green and red lights indicating open or closed hatches.

Typically, Auer said, Torsk’s normal operational depth was around 160 to 165 feet deep.

A screen displayed live shots of the conning tower rather than granting visitors access to the small space above the control room.

The conning tower is accessed by climbing a ladder and through a narrow hatch, which is usually kept locked.

I saw tourists walking on the sidewalk alongside the submarine and paddling boats in the Baltimore Inner Harbor where we were docked.

Torpedomen in the forward and after torpedo rooms loaded the torpedoes into the tubes and activated the standby light signaling that they were ready to fire. The buttons to actually launch the torpedoes were located in the conning tower.

The control room below featured an auxiliary helm, or backup steering wheel, in case the conning tower was damaged or flooded.

The yeoman was in charge of all of the ship’s paperwork, including personnel files and supply orders.

The chief petty officers, who slept in this five-bunk room, acted as liaisons between the officers and the enlisted men.

The room featured a folding desk and sink, and each officer received two drawers for their personal items.

The executive officer, known as the “XO,” was the submarine’s second-in-command.

The more senior an officer was, the fewer roommates he had on board.

In his room, the commanding officer had a phone, call buttons, a gyrocompass repeater, and a depth gauge so he could continue to monitor the ship from there.

The wardroom also served as a lounge and workspace for officers.

Officers ate the same meals as the rest of the crew, but they were plated and presented in a more elevated way.

The oxygen breathing apparatus was designed for use in the event of a fire on board the submarine.

Torsk may seem like an outdated museum relic, and for the US Navy, it is. For other countries with less advanced naval forces, however, it would still be a powerful asset.

Take, for instance, Torsk’s sister ship, the USS Cutlass, which was commissioned in 1945. While Torsk became a museum in 1972, Cutlass was sold to Taiwan in 1973 and is still operational in the Republic of China Navy.

“This is still a relatively state-of-the-art piece of equipment relative to the world — not compared to our Navy, but compared to, say, the Iranian navy, this is very state-of-the-art,” Auer said, standing in Torsk’s after torpedo room. “The Iranians don’t have anything like this.”