Bad Day For Japanese Forces

WED 16 SEP 1942
Pacific
Japanese overland assault on Port Moresby, New Guinea, "grinds to a halt" at Ioribaiwa.

Japanese forces evacuate Attu, Aleutians.

Atlantic
TF 23 (Vice Admiral Jonas H. Ingram) is designated South Atlantic Force, Atlantic Fleet.

Patrol Wing 12 (Captain William G. Tomlinson) is established at Key West, Florida, for operations in Gulf Sea Frontier.

U.S. freighter Commercial Trader is torpedoed and sunk by German submarine U-558 east of Trinidad, 10°30'N, 60°16'W; seven of the 29-man crew perish in the attack, as do three of the 9-man Armed Guard. The survivors, in one lifeboat, reach Tobago later the same day.

Laconia Incident: USAAF B-24 from Ascension Island bombs German submarine U-156 (see 12 September 1942), which, along with U-506 and U-507 and Italian submarine Capellini, is engaged in rescuing survivors of the torpedoed British transport Laconia (see 17 September 1942).