Willow Bark. Scientific names: Salix alba, Salix purpurea, Salix fragilis, and other species. Common names: Willow also is known as weidenrinde, white willow (S. alba), purple osier willow/basket willow (S. purpurea), and crack willow (S. fragilis).
Japanese battleship Yamato is sunk by Allied forces. Share this: On this day in 1945, the Japanese battleship Yamato, ostensibly the greatest battleship in the world, is sunk in Japanâs first major counteroffensive in the struggle for Okinawa. Weighing 72,800 tons and outfitted with nine 18.1-inch guns, the battleship Yamato was Japanâs only hope of destroying the Allied fleet off the coast of Okinawa.
(By comparison, the new American Iowa-class battleships were 887 feet long, but displaced only 45,000 tons and had a top speed of 33 knots.) 1  A view of the Yamato as a bomb explodes near her forward 460mm gun turret during the Battle of the Sibuyan Sea on October 20, 1944.