Adjust fire, over!

[Apocalypse 31]

How we doing today, gents?

[Sequoia]

Notice the blast wave.

[John Kettler]

LT Mike,

Great shot!

Sequoia,

I've seen other broadside firing shots in which you can see how the recoil has driven the BB sideways in the water.

Regards,

John Kettler

[Sergei]

Notice the tennis court in the aft section.

[MikeyD]

I'm trying to recall, was it the Iowa who's forward gun turret exploded or the New Jersey? It doesn't help much doing a search on the web for "New Jersey + accident"

[Sequoia]

I think it was the New Jersey and they tried to blame some sailor for sabotage but as I recall the evidence was less than conclusive. I could be remembering wrong though.

[Sequoia]

Here's an interesting tidbit from Wikipedia.

"On 8 February 1984, New Jersey fired almost 300 shells at Druze and Syrian positions in the Bekaa valley east of Beirut. Some 30 of these massive projectiles rained down on a Syrian command post, killing the general commanding Syrian forces in Lebanon and several other senior officers. This was the heaviest shore bombardment since the Korean War."

[Lee]

Great picture, you've got to love that awesome battleship broadside. That blast wave is incredible! And the enemy on the receiving end of that get hit with devastating effect. We need to get our battleships back out of mothballs and up and running. Perfect for covering our troops operating anywhere near a coast, and bombarding Iranian and North Korean ports and sinking whatever ships they might have.

[Sequoia]

More from Wiki. It was the Iowa.

"On 19 April 1989, an explosion ripped through the Number Two 16 inch gun turret, killing 47 crewmen. Sailors quickly flooded the #2 powder magazine, likely preventing catastrophic damage to the ship. At first, the NCIS investigators theorized that one of the dead crewman, Clayton Hartwig, had detonated an explosive device in a suicide attempt after the end of an alleged homosexual affair with another sailor. This theory was later abandoned and Hartwig cleared. The cause of the explosion, though never determined with certainty, is generally believed to have been static electricity igniting loose powder. The captain of the Iowa, Fred Moosally, was severely criticized for his handling of the matter, and the Navy changed the powder-handling procedures. Iowa deployed to Europe and the Mediterranean Sea in mid-year. Turret Two remained unrepaired when she decommissioned in Norfolk for the last time, 26 October 1990."

[Lee]

The Syrians got owned by the New Jersey. I would love to see video of that, as the Syrians run around screaming while huge shells rain on their heads, blowing the command post and everything else around it to bits. haha

[flamingknives]

As much as I like videos of 'splody things, I have to say that a video of people being ripped asunder by heavy artillery would not make my "must-see" list

[Imperial Grunt]

The sound of an incoming 16" shell must really elicit some "oh ****" comments..I wonder how you would say that in Arabic?

Too bad we dont have these battleships active anymore, they are awesome and are great for forward presence.

[Sixxkiller]

Even being in the near vicinity of an arty barrage at Ft Campbell when you arent the target elicts the oh **** comments. Cant even fathom what it must have been like on the Eastern Front in WWII with the Stalins Organs (The commie one, not our resident sheep accoster )playing on your fortification if you were the target.

[Sixxkiller]

Originally posted by Sequoia:

Here's an interesting tidbit from Wikipedia.

"Some 30 of these massive projectiles rained down on a Syrian command post, killing the general commanding Syrian forces in Lebanon and several other senior officers."

Now in CMSF, that would just make your day to have a barrage hit like that!

[Severin]

So who here hasn't made a custom scenario in June of 44 in CMBO? Those big guns sure are fun.

[Chelt]

John Kettler:

I've seen other broadside firing shots in which you can see how the recoil has driven the BB sideways in the water.

Does a battleship move sideways when she fires?

Battleship: 35,000 tons

Broadside: 18 tons, ballpark figure

I don't think so.

More detailed analysis: http://www.navweaps.com/index_tech/tech-022.htm

[JonS]

Chelt - you are looking at it the wrong way. Think: conservation of momentum.

End result: the ship will move, just like the earth moves away from me when I jump up.

[John Kettler]

Chelt,

A most unusual analysis! Neither of the pics shown is the one I'm thinking of, which might've appeared in Preston's BATTLESHIP. Shot is of an Iowa class BB firing a broadside at low elevation, is in color, and not only shows that the vessel has moved sideways in firing, but comments on it in the caption. Looks like the vessel moved sideways a number of feet in the picture, and I'm not talking about the kind of blast wave induced ocean surface deformation visible in the pics above. This was a local effect visible only within a few feet of the hull.

Regards,

John Kettler

[flamingknives]

Warships tend to have a fairly low metacentric height, so they roll reasonably easily. The observed effect could be due to a broadside imparting a rolling motion to the ship.

The previous analysis is not unusual in any way, shape or form. Basic physics, gentlemen.

[Lee]

I have the actual photo in question of the Iowa class battleship firing a full broadside of all guns simultaneously, and you can clearly see the ship is pushed directly sideways in the water from the force. I think the photo's caption in the white border of the photo from the Navy even specifically states that the ship's hull is shifted sideways in the water from the blast. It's very impressive looking.

[civdiv]

Wow, someone turned this into a very detailed and time intensive hoppy. I never would have thought you could do this at this scale;

http://www.ausbg.org/index.html

[Wicky]

<a href="http://www.navweaps.com/index_tech/tech-022.htm" target="_blank">Do Battleships move sideways when they fire?

By R. A. Landgraff and Greg Loco</a>

What looks like a side-ways wake is just the water being broiled up by the muzzle blasts. The ship doesn't move an inch or even heel from a broadside.

The guns have a recoil slide of up to 48 inches and the shock is distributed evenly through the turret foundation and the hull structure. The mass of a 57,000 ton ship is just too great for the recoil of the guns to move it. Well, theoretically, a fraction of a millimeter.

[rudel.dietrich]

Originally posted by Lee:

Great picture, you've got to love that awesome battleship broadside. That blast wave is incredible! And the enemy on the receiving end of that get hit with devastating effect. We need to get our battleships back out of mothballs and up and running. Perfect for covering our troops operating anywhere near a coast, and bombarding Iranian and North Korean ports and sinking whatever ships they might have.

I could not think of a worse way to waste money than to spend it in brining back a concept that has been dead since Japan did their buisness in Dec of 41

But when its the US military we are talking about, they always manage to suprised me in new and exciting ways of money wasting

Seriously, the idea just boggles the mind.

If you want to sink a ship in North Korea, have a sub surface 700 miles away and fire a missle at it.

If you want to support ground forces then 3 USN carrier task forces and their aricraft can have air superiority and 40% interdiction rates over any nation in the world.

The battleship is best left in the dustbin of history where it belongs besides such things as the musket and the broadsword

Hacking at someone with a sword is pretty cool and looks pretty damn cool.

But I would rather use a modern assualt rifle thank you very much

[Peter Cairns]

rudel.dietrich,

I am with you on this one.

In an age when we are emphasising precision and using the smallest bomb possible with the maximum accuracy, why on earth would someone want to bring back a weapon more suited to WW1 than the "War on Terror".

Peter.

[rudel.dietrich]

Originally posted by Peter Cairns:

rudel.dietrich,

I am with you on this one.

In an age when we are emphasising precision and using the smallest bomb possible with the maximum accuracy, why on earth would someone want to bring back a weapon more suited to WW1 than the "War on Terror".

Peter.

Me and someone at work hashed this one out.

He said 'but now they can put guided missles onto the battleships'

So what?

A Ticonderoga class cruiser with the Aegis system can launch missles at 18 different targets and track them for up to 500 miles.

And can do it with a ship that is smaller, faster, uses less fuel, takes less crew and has about 1/8 of the matinence cost per year.

And hell, if you really really want to fire shells at a target. You have a laser guided 5 inch gun that with ERGM shells can hit targets up to 12 miles out.

An armour is not really an issue anymore and has not been since the 50s

Is has been 60 years since you could put enough armour on a ship to protect it aganst aircraft bombs and guided missles.

So that leaves one thing that a BB can do and that is fire 16 inch broadsides.

I will be the first to tell you, those are cool as hell.

But also inpractical as hell. Not only do they have very limited usage.

They still have a very very very low hit to rounds fired ratio compared to modern system.

And a 16 inch shell is like a 406mm artillary shell

It does a massive amount of collatral damage even if you do manage to hit your target.

Miss your target and you could level a small hotel with one shell.

And their range is what? 22 miles at most?

And everytime you fire a broadside you have to spend a few hundred thousand dollars and a week of man hours to fix all the **** you break and comb over the structure of the ship.

After the long Pacific bombardments in the 40s ships had to spend a while in dry dock fixing are the structral stress damage associated with firing their main guns.

And at this point do I really need to add in the fuel cost and that even the modern verions of the Iowas tie down 1600 men?

That is 4.5 crews for the Ticonderoga class or 14 Virginia class attack submarines

Im done ranting now

I really need a social life and to stop letting my work interfer with everything I do :eek: