Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen announced that his research team has found the Musashi, a Japanese ship that sank off the Philippine coast over 70 years ago during World War II. The ship was reportedly the largest battleship to have ever been constructed at the time and sank after being hit by American bombs.

Allen’s research team, on board his superyacht M/Y Octopus, found Musashi over the weekend, after beginning the search for it over eight years ago, according to The Associated Press (AP). Allen posted photos of the sunken ship on his Twitter feed and described the vessel as an "engineering marvel." The ship was sunk in October 1944 in the Sibuyan Sea during the battle of Leyte. Half of the ship's 2,400-strong crew died when it sank.

"I was really surprised because the location of the sunken ship has never been identified since it went down. I have heard countless stories in the past that the ship was discovered, but they all turned out not to be true," Kazushige Todaka, director of Japan's Kure Maritime Museum, said, according to CNN, adding: "It's a wonderful discovery, if it's true, as we have long been looking for the battleship."

Allen also posted a photo of a valve with Japanese inscriptions and said that it was the “first confirmation” of the ship's identity. The ship is described as a “mighty battleship” with “mammoth 18-inch guns” on the U.S. Navy’s website said, according to The Guardian.

"It's fateful that the discovery was made on the 70th anniversary of (the end of) World War 2. The memory of the war has been fading away after 70 years and the survivors of the war are disappearing. It is very meaningful discovery and a good chance for us to remind ourselves about the war and its tragedy," Todaka said, according to CNN.

Allen, who has a net worth of about $17.5 billion according to estimates by Forbes, also said that he will post a video of the ship’s catapult and valve areas, Agence France-Presse reported.

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