The Japanese squadron made a total of 348 escort sorties from Malta, escorting 788 ships containing around 700,000 soldiers, thus contributing greatly to the war effort, for a total loss of 72 Japanese sailors killed in action. A total of 7,075 people were rescued by the Japanese from damaged and sinking ships. This included the rescue by the destroyers "Matsu" and "Sakaki" of nearly 3000 persons from the troopship which was hit by a German torpedo on 4 May 1917. No Japanese ships were lost during the deployment but on 11 June 1917 "Sakaki" was hit by a torpedo from Austro-Hungarian submarine U-27 off Crete; 59 Japanese sailors died.