Longest Gunfire Hit

[northcape]

excuse, but the comparison with the car is silly since the car will be destroyed by a nearby artillery hit. as for ships, i think we can speak of straddles, near-misses (invoking splinter/blast damage), and hits (physical contact ship-shell). so no, the carrier was not hit by by the Yamato.

as to a previous post in this thread, i have a hard time to believe that Admiral Scheer fired a projectile up to a distance of 45,000 meters. any comments on this?

[Dave Saxton]

Paul Schmalenbach was the AO on PG during those operations. He reports in his Schiffsartllerie book that they could target objects exceeding 400hm (40km) during these operations using the shore bombardment computor and procedures. Normally, the Scheer's 28cm/L52 could not fire its normal AP projectile that far. However, they may have been able to use special munitions.

[phil gollin]

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The effect of near misses were something that the RN learnt a lot about early in the war (Norway and Med). The effect was often summarised as "the mining effect" (as it was related to the effect magnetic mines also had - depending on the depth of water) and led to a huge effort during the war to investigate both possible weapons (this had an effect especially on ASW weapons) and also on improved structures for ships.

IT WAS TOTALLY DIFFERENT FROM THE DAMAGED CAUSED BY A HIT !

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[phil gollin]

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If you go to this thread ;

http://warships1discussionboards.yuku.c ... eRJn9KOToc

And look at the third response ( "~3" ) - i.e. the 4th post, you will see a post by the Author "rlundgren"

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[alecsandros]

Does anyone know more about the sinking of this brave US destroyer ?

It appears she was chased down by 2 Japanese battleships (Hiei and Kirishima), 2 heavy cruisers and 3 aircraft carriers.

Hiei opened at 27km, and continued firing with little effect. It seems she did hit the destroyer though, at 23-24km, with 1 shell (out of 210 fired). THis could qualify for the longest gunfire hit, especialy as it was performed on a small, and very manouvreable ship...

Any info would be appreciated,

Cheers,

[Dave Saxton]

Does anyone know more about the sinking of this brave US destroyer ?

It appears she was chased down by 2 Japanese battleships (Hiei and Kirishima), 2 heavy cruisers and 3 aircraft carriers.

Hiei opened at 27km, and continued firing with little effect. It seems she did hit the destroyer though, at 23-24km, with 1 shell (out of 210 fired). THis could qualify for the longest gunfire hit, especialy as it was performed on a small, and very manouvreable ship...

Any info would be appreciated,

Cheers,

You mean Kongo and Haruna

[alecsandros]

:)

most explanations I found here:

http://www.usshouston.org/images/edsall.pdf

it seems she was under fire from Chikuma, TOne, Hiei, Kirishima... 1355 shells fired for 2 hits :)
[Hiei 18:24 and Tone 18:35]. Fire was opened at 17:47 by the battleships, range 30.000 yards...

I do not know what the range of the hit from Hiei could be...

[Dave Saxton]

Ah

[alecsandros]

So, nothing new ?

IF Hiei managed 1 hit of 210 shells fired, that means 0,47% percentage of hits. Theoretically, if Hiei was to fire her entire 14" ammo (~ 800 shells), she would have scored 3-4 times...

[Dod Grile]

Hi,

The sinking of USS Edsall (DD-219) was a messy and complicated business, and all of the relevant IJN records do not agree among themselves entirely.

But, it did take a total of 1,335 shells--with one or two claimed hits (which I find rather dubious, really)...I do not believe the range was anywhere near 23-24,000 yds however. Both appear to have been claimed a bit late in the action, and the range(s) had by then narrowed. To give an idea of the effort the IJN ships went to in this engagement, it took an hour of steaming--and shooting--for the battleships to close the range by 7,800 meters...and they were by no means very close at that point.

Oddly, the Action Report of the two battleships (BatDiv 3) does not mention any hits, but only the great distances and problems with gunnery involved.

The true killers were of course the 26 VBs from Kaga, Soryu and Hiryu. Edsall was not stopped before they bombed her, although the enemy's surface units were gaining due to her radical maneuvering & changes of speed.

IMHO the two main recorded hits on Houston at Java Sea by CruDiv 5 were probably just as far (in excess of 20,000 yds) and are somewhat better documented. Unfortunately they came during a most chaotic period in the engagement and not during the primary battle-line exchanges which opened the action.

Just my opinions, of course.

DG

[alecsandros]

Welcome to the forum and thank you for your reply !

I would add a few long-range cruiser hits:
- Prinz Eugen against HMS Hood, battle for Denmark Strait, range ~ 19km.
- Hipper against HMS Achates, battle for Barents Sea, range ~ 18km
- IJN Maya against USS Salt Lake City during battle for Komandorski Islands, range ~ 22km

[Mostlyharmless]

There may be evidence of an actual hit by Yamato on White Plains according to http://warships1discussionboards.yuku.c ... -Oldendorf. Yamato may also have hit Johnston at fairly long range according to the same post.

[Dod Grile]

For those interested, the Japanese have long claimed such hits by Yamato. Not sure why this is suddenly seen as revelatory, although perhaps Western researchers who do not work w/IJN records may have something to do with it.

If I remember rightly, an article in the Japanese magazine "MARU" on Leyte Gulf & the Yamato-class ships about a year or two ago referred to some of this, too.

DG

[alecsandros]

... All the claims have been disproved in more recent analysis, IIRC...
Japanese records are notoriously overstated.

[maru74]

... All the claims have been disproved in more recent analysis, IIRC...
Japanese records are notoriously overstated.

So every claim, huh? I'd like to see the sources for these refuted claims, if you would. Because frankly, this sounds like standard issue Ameriburger butthurt. Can't stand having the other guy get an edge up, so naturally his claims must be bogus.