1000 Pounders versus Battleships

[Nikademus]

Nik....the vicodin fanboy. [:D]

[bradfordkay]

" There was an old thread around here, many moons ago (by Feinder?) that attempted to ask whether there any ships (other than Yamato and Musashi) that required three or more torps to sink. "

Weren't we just discussing the Hornet in another thread? How many torpedoes did it take to put her under? The original attack put two into her and a follow up attack put one more into her. Upon abandoning salvage efforts the US destroyers fired several more into the Hornet, but she continued to float until the Japanese navy fired a couple of more torpedoes into her. I forget how many she took, but think that it was about eight torpedoes before finally sinking.

[mlees]

ORIGINAL: bradfordkay

Weren't we just discussing the Hornet in another thread?

"What do you mean "we", pale face?" Heh.

How many torpedoes did it take to put her under? The original attack put two into her and a follow up attack put one more into her. Upon abandoning salvage efforts the US destroyers fired several more into the Hornet, but she continued to float until the Japanese navy fired a couple of more torpedoes into her. I forget how many she took, but think that it was about eight torpedoes before finally sinking.

Ok. Hornet took 8. Any others? (I am really interested, I am not trying to be snarky. [;)])

[John Lansford]

Didn't Yorktown take three torpedoes before sinking?  Two by aerial attack and then at least one from the submarine.
 
USS Helena was hit by I believe three torpedoes (Long Lances even!), and Houston survivors remember several torpedo hits in her last melee.  Of course, Oklahoma and West Virginia both were hit by more than three torpedoes...
 
IIRC no warship 10,000 tons or larger sank from being hit by just one Long Lance torpedo, although many were badly damaged.  Not many survived two though.  Allied torpedoes were smaller so it would make sense that more hits would be needed (but then you've got Kongo...), but AFAIK only Shinano was hit by 3-4 torpedoes before sinking.
 

[Cavalry Corp]

quote:

ORIGINAL: Historiker

quote:

The exception that proves the rule is Marat. A Stuka hit her with a 500kg bomb and detonated her forward magazine. (The other three turrets were all back in action within a month.) Deck protection on the Sevastopols was poor by pre-WWI standards; a typical WWII light cruiser might be better off.
The Marat was hit by a 1000kg AP bomb, not a 500kg. Moreover, some sources quote that it was a 1800kg AP bomb...


Not any Stuka!!!!!!!! but one flown by ... a man they could make films about that no one would believe
Hans-Ulrich Rudel The most highly decorated German serviceman of the war.

Michael

[Nikademus]

ORIGINAL: bradfordkay

" There was an old thread around here, many moons ago (by Feinder?) that attempted to ask whether there any ships (other than Yamato and Musashi) that required three or more torps to sink. "

Weren't we just discussing the Hornet in another thread? How many torpedoes did it take to put her under? The original attack put two into her and a follow up attack put one more into her. Upon abandoning salvage efforts the US destroyers fired several more into the Hornet, but she continued to float until the Japanese navy fired a couple of more torpedoes into her. I forget how many she took, but think that it was about eight torpedoes before finally sinking.

There have been other ship classes that have taken 3 to 3+ and not immediately sink. Hornet was crippled after one or two (away from source) A weakness of the Yorktown class was the vulnerability of it's motive power plants to a single disabling hit by a torp if in the right spot. A number of torps were fired at her afterwards though how many actually detonated or detonated properly is in question given they were the infamous Mk-15's. Its funny sometimes how derilicts can sometimes prove the most stubborn to surcomb. Ultimately though she was done in by the 1 or 2 hits.

[panda124c]

So the procedure would be to flatten a BB to deck level with GP's then send in the Torpedo's. [:D]

[niceguy2005]

How many torps did it take to sink all of force Z?
 
Seems to me it is impossible to say how many hits a ship requires to be effectively sunk.  Wasn't Hornet essentially done for by the time the last torpedos hit?

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: niceguy2005

How many torps did it take to sink all of force Z?

Seems to me it is impossible to say how many hits a ship requires to be effectively sunk.  Wasn't Hornet essentially done for by the time the last torpedos hit?

Took 86 torps to sink all of Force Z, that's the number of G4Ms that attacked it. Of course, only a handfull of those 86 torps actually hit. [:)]

And actually all of Force Z didn't sink, the DDs escaped.

Here's a good site for Force Z info: http://www.forcez-survivors.org.uk/

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: Shark7

ORIGINAL: niceguy2005

How many torps did it take to sink all of force Z?

Seems to me it is impossible to say how many hits a ship requires to be effectively sunk.  Wasn't Hornet essentially done for by the time the last torpedos hit?

Took 86 torps to sink all of Force Z, that's the number of G4Ms that attacked it. Of course, only a handfull of those 86 torps actually hit. [:)]

And actually all of Force Z didn't sink, the DDs escaped.

Here's a good site for Force Z info: http://www.forcez-survivors.org.uk/

did all Nells carry torps? I remember bombs being dropped also...

[Nikademus]

no. Force Z's executioners used both bombs and torpedoes.

[niceguy2005]

ORIGINAL: castor troy

ORIGINAL: Shark7

ORIGINAL: niceguy2005

How many torps did it take to sink all of force Z?

Seems to me it is impossible to say how many hits a ship requires to be effectively sunk.  Wasn't Hornet essentially done for by the time the last torpedos hit?

Took 86 torps to sink all of Force Z, that's the number of G4Ms that attacked it. Of course, only a handfull of those 86 torps actually hit. [:)]

And actually all of Force Z didn't sink, the DDs escaped.

Here's a good site for Force Z info: http://www.forcez-survivors.org.uk/

did all Nells carry torps? I remember bombs being dropped also...

IIRC there was a night bomb attack, but it didn't produce any damage.

[Shark7]

Right, found the info.

61 Betty's carrying torpedos, the rest were bomb armed Nells.

Repulse took 5 torpedo hits, as well as at least 1 250kg bomb hit.

PoW took at least 6, possibly 7 torpedo hits.

Edit, typo on the number of Betty's.

[niceguy2005]

ORIGINAL: castor troy

ORIGINAL: Shark7

ORIGINAL: niceguy2005

How many torps did it take to sink all of force Z?

Seems to me it is impossible to say how many hits a ship requires to be effectively sunk.  Wasn't Hornet essentially done for by the time the last torpedos hit?

Took 86 torps to sink all of Force Z, that's the number of G4Ms that attacked it. Of course, only a handfull of those 86 torps actually hit. [:)]

And actually all of Force Z didn't sink, the DDs escaped.

Here's a good site for Force Z info: http://www.forcez-survivors.org.uk/

did all Nells carry torps? I remember bombs being dropped also...

I don't know how many Nells attacked, but I'd be willing to bet it was less than 86. IIRC the hit rate of the torpedo bombers on these sorties was ultra high (something like 25%-30% of torpedoes hit).

[Nikademus]

ORIGINAL: niceguy2005

How many torps did it take to sink all of force Z?

Seems to me it is impossible to say how many hits a ship requires to be effectively sunk.  Wasn't Hornet essentially done for by the time the last torpedos hit?

Rather than count torpedoes, Force Z provides (to me anyway) the ulitmate example of proof of the eclipse of the beloved battleship as Queen of the Seas by the Carrier. It took 1 torpedo hit to cripple one of the most recent and modern BB's then built....a BB designed to operate and survive in an environment that included air attack.

Granted it was a very unlucky hit with a further (though quick) unlucky chain of events that helped make it. But it still happened. Thats what killed the battleship. No matter how well built....no matter how tough made, you still couldn't eliminate the possibility that a far cheaper to build weapon [[i.e. the torpedo] carried by a far cheaper to build airplane might still cause severe damage to your large investment.

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: niceguy2005

ORIGINAL: castor troy

ORIGINAL: Shark7



Took 86 torps to sink all of Force Z, that's the number of G4Ms that attacked it. Of course, only a handfull of those 86 torps actually hit. [:)]

And actually all of Force Z didn't sink, the DDs escaped.

Here's a good site for Force Z info: http://www.forcez-survivors.org.uk/

did all Nells carry torps? I remember bombs being dropped also...

I don't know how many Nells attacked, but I'd be willing to bet it was less than 86. IIRC the hit rate of the torpedo bombers on these sorties was ultra high (something like 25%-30% of torpedoes hit).

Read the story. It was 27 G3Ms, and 61 G4Ms that attacked Force Z. This number is a direct quote from one of the Japanese air unit commanders who took part in the attack.

[Nikademus]

ORIGINAL: Shark7


Read the story. It was 27 G3Ms, and 61 G4Ms that attacked Force Z. This number is a direct quote from one of the Japanese air unit commanders who took part in the attack.

and they didn't all carry torpedoes.

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: Shark7

ORIGINAL: niceguy2005

How many torps did it take to sink all of force Z?

Seems to me it is impossible to say how many hits a ship requires to be effectively sunk.  Wasn't Hornet essentially done for by the time the last torpedos hit?

Took 86 torps to sink all of Force Z, that's the number of G4Ms that attacked it. Of course, only a handfull of those 86 torps actually hit. [:)]

And actually all of Force Z didn't sink, the DDs escaped.

During most of the war, one in nine air-borne torpedoes launched actually hit, but the early-war IJN pilots were able to double that.

The basic idea is that torpedoes or mines sink a ship by destroying its water-tight integrity incrementally--which translates into exposing portions of its water-line area to the open ocean. A torpedo warhead destroys or damages the water-tight integrity of those compartments within a blast radius proportional to the cube root of the warhead weight times the explosive power. Statistics of warship losses in WWII and some post-war studies indicate that a good estimate of the average number of airborne torpedoes required to sink a WWII surface warship was LPPxBeam/10000, with perhaps 70% of that number being required if all the torpedoes hit on one side. WWI designs and carriers were about 2/3rds as resistant to this mode of sinking as WWII-era surface warships.

86 torpedoes launched would suggest about 19-20 hitting. 7 would have been enough for the Prince of Wales and perhaps 4 or 5 for the Repulse. Bubble-bubble.

To see where this goes, suppose the US Battle Fleet had moved to Lahaina Roads and the KB had found it and launched a strike. 6x18x2/9 = 24 torpedoes expected to hit. That would have sunk 4-5 of the US BBs or (more likely) seriously damaged about 6, with a couple more sinking. Meanwhile, Pearl was hit by the IJN VBs. I suspect it would have been pucker up time for both sides.

[John Lansford]

Prince of Wales wasn't the first BB to succumb to a "golden BB" hit though.  The year before, Bismarck suffered a similar fate when her steering was disabled by a torpedo.  She's one of the examples of ships needing several torpedoes to actually sink; didn't she get hit by three aerial ones and at least that many fired by destroyers and cruisers before finally sinking?

[niceguy2005]

ORIGINAL: Shark7
Read the story. It was 27 G3Ms, and 61 G4Ms that attacked Force Z. This number is a direct quote from one of the Japanese air unit commanders who took part in the attack.

I just saw your other post. I could believe 61 torpedo bombers. 11 topedo hits out of 61 planes is 18% which is reasonably high.