Turret expolosion on USS Mississippi

[paul.mercer]

Gentlemen,
I was watching a program on the US invasion of Japananese held islands the other day and it mentioned a turret explosion on the USS Mississippi which was bombarding and killed 43 men - does anyone know what happened - a flashback on opening the breech for instance?

[tommy303]

Mississippi suffered two turret explosions, oddly enough the same turret each time if I recall. The 1924 disaster was attributed to insufficient air blast to clear the gun barrels, resulting in smoldering debris igniting powder bags as they were rammed in during reloading. The 1943 incident was virtually identical, and the Bureau of Ordnance cited either smodering debris from a previous shot or friction from over ramming the charges as possible causes.

[paul.mercer]

Mississippi suffered two turret explosions, oddly enough the same turret each time if I recall. The 1924 disaster was attributed to insufficient air blast to clear the gun barrels, resulting in smoldering debris igniting powder bags as they were rammed in during reloading. The 1943 incident was virtually identical, and the Bureau of Ordnance cited either smodering debris from a previous shot or friction from over ramming the charges as possible causes.

Thanks Tommy,
I always thought that there was a fine spray of water as well as air to clear the barrel, did other navies have the same system?

[tommy303]

Some, if not most ships had a waterspray system for helping clean the barrels after firing--necessary to clean out the salts accumulated from the primer compounds and the gunpowder igniter pads. The residue from the smokeless propellant had to be removed chemically. The waterspray system was not, if I recall, used to clear the bore between shots, just the compressed air blast. Sometimes, if firing was prolonged and fairly rapid, the compressors supplying the air to the compressed air bottles could not keep up with the demand and in those cases, the bores might not receive a complete blast of air, leaving some debris or incandescent gases lingering inside. Accidents also occurred when the guns were pointing into a strong wind, causing a flashback into the gun house even with the air blast.

[Dod Grile]

FWIW:

The turret explosion on Mississippi in 1924 led to the inclusion of armoured turret officer's booths in our Treaty cruisers which were then being designed...