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Is it possible for enemy ships to sink without you knowing it? In a recent carrier battle off of Wake, I managed to score multiple bomb hits on a pair of Japanese carriers. My TFs pursued them all the way to Marcus Island, but lost contact with them for one turn. The next day I engaged a TF which included (seemingly) all the ships that were previously escorting the carriers, but the carriers were nowhere in sight. I should note that after I hit the carriers, they stopped sending aircraft at me, and I wasn't attacked by them during the pursuit despite being in range (and sending attacks of my own). If the carriers did sink without me noticing, would there be any way to confirm their loss?

Yes and no. There is no way to confirm anything except to play the scenario out to the end. Sometimes you may hear sound effects of a ship sinking. You check to make sure it wasn't one of yours. If it isn't, something of your opponent's sank but you can't be sure what. The Japanese made an art out of underestimating her opponents and overestimating themselves.

ORIGINAL: evilman222

If the carriers did sink without me noticing, would there be any way to confirm their loss?

Another clue you can use to determine if an enemy carrier has been lost recently is to go to the Air Losses screen and look under the "ground" column for losses that day. If you see a squadron sized number of dive bomber or torpedo type planes listed, that's a very strong indicator that they went down with their ship.

However, it's best to do this on the turn after that you think you sank a carrier. After that they just get lumped into the total losses column and it becomes harder to determine.

Or it could just be that they did not sink and were automatically put into an Escort TF.
 
Alfred

ORIGINAL: Alfred

Or it could just be that they did not sink and were automatically put into an Escort TF.

Alfred

Looking at the ground losses (or, more specifically, lack thereof) for Japanese carrier planes, I'm now fairly certain that they didn't sink. I'm a bit surprised they managed to outrun my TF, since both enemy carriers had (according to the combat animation) severe engine damage and ammunition explosions.

The carrier planes could have diverted or they could have been in the air but unable to land where they are shown as OPS losses.

You could be seeing the escorts from those carriers if they got to Marcus and disbanded for emergency repairs or fire fighting. If you have carriers, bomb the port ASAP before he gets fighters there.

Fog of war. If you hit it hard it will be out of action for quite a while. If it's Japanese it could be more that a year.
I always search the area thoroughly. You might find a floating wreck to finish off.