Twenty-four "Long Lance" so twisted "Mikuma" that the cruiser ceased to look like a battleship. An hour later, its ruined skeleton was photographed by an American plane, that picture became a symbol of the victory at Midway. Abandoned by the crew, the cruiser was still floating on the water, but her fate was a foregone conclusion. The next night, the destroyers sent to search found nothing but floating debris …
The paradox of the death of “Mikuma” lies in the very ability to stay afloat after the detonation of the torpedo ammunition. Each Long Lance contained 490 kg of THA explosives and an oxygen cylinder with a capacity of 980 liters. An explosive mixture multiplied by twenty four is the equivalent of 40 … 50 European or American torpedoes!
Under normal conditions, two or three torpedo hits were enough to knock the ship into the abyss in a matter of minutes. And here - the cruiser did not even fall apart in half.
The paradox is explained by the laws of nature: an explosion in an air environment is tens of times inferior in its destructive power to an underwater one. That is why a single torpedo under the keel is capable of breaking a ship in half, but even a whole rack of such torpedoes cannot lead to instant death of the ship if they detonate above the waterline.
But can everything be explained only by differences in the properties of the environment? Russian researcher Oleg Teslenko draws attention to many other oddities in this naval detective story.
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Having lost four aircraft carriers near Midway, the Japanese decided on the last decisive step: to shoot the damned atoll from the cannons of their cruisers. Kumano, Suzuya, Mogami and Mikuma rushed forward at 35 knots. When it was less than three hours' journey to the atoll, an American sub was sighted ahead of the course. The cruisers began an evasive maneuver, during which the Mogami rammed the Mikume. The collision of two 15 thousand tons of hulks did not pass without consequences for both: the entire bow of the "Mogami", right up to the first turret of the main battery, turned out to be rolled sideways at 90 degrees! And in the fuel tanks "Mikuma" formed a 20-meter hole, which, moreover, served as the source of the traitorous oil trail.
"Kumano" and "Suzuya" moved in full speed to the northwest, and the two losers trudged on 12 knots, praying that they would not be noticed by the Americans. Naturally, they were noticed. And the fun began.
The first attack was successfully repulsed by the ships' anti-aircraft weapons. The pilots of the Marine Corps did not achieve a single hit, only "freshening" the cruiser with clouds of debris from nearby bomb explosions. The only bright event was the death ram: the downed plane of Dick Fleming repeated the feat of Gastello, ramming the Mikum TKR (the wreckage of the plane can be seen in the title illustration, on the roof of the fifth main turret). However, this did not produce much effect: the cruisers continued to retreat into the open ocean.
The denouement came the next morning. Already pretty shabby for the previous day (to say the least) "Mogami" and "Mikuma" were hit by aircraft from AB "Enterprise" (over 80 sorties in total). And, probably, this story could have ended, if not for one BUT.
"Mogami" returned home on its own. But his sister ship died.
At first glance, everything is explained by the fatal detonation of the torpedo ammunition aboard the Mikuma. The crew of the second cruiser managed to avoid this by throwing all 24 torpedoes overboard immediately after the navigation accident at Midway.
The presence of torpedo armament on Japanese cruisers is still considered an ambiguous decision. With the help of this weapon, many brilliant victories were won (the sunken cruisers of the allies "Java", "De Reuters", "Perth", "Houston"), but the price was too high. Three of the four Mogami-class cruisers fell victim to the detonation of their own torpedoes. Perhaps the whole point is in the poor storage of oxygen "long-leans" in unprotected compartments and TA on the upper deck? It is quite possible … And we have to travel again to the central part of the Pacific Ocean, to the hot waters near the Midway Atoll. There, where on June 7, 1942, American carrier-based aircraft tormented barely alive Japanese cruisers. Moreover, with very paradoxical consequences.
What is the reason for the miraculous salvation of one and the death of the other? After all, "Mogami" and "Mikuma" belonged to the same type and were identical in design. Moreover, if we rely on the official data on the course of the battle, the miraculously saved "Mogami" received much more severe damage than his comrade!
Torpedoes are just a consequence. And here is the root cause: in the course of air attacks, both cruisers received FIVE direct hits from aerial bombs (not counting numerous close explosions and the plane that crashed on Mikumu).
Hits in the “Mogami” were incl. in the aft main turret (all the gun servants were killed), in the middle part of the ship in the MO area (fire in the torpedo storage, fortunately for the Japanese - empty), as well as in the area of the main main caliber bow towers, immediately in front of the superstructure. As a result, the disfigured Mogami, after refueling in the ocean, developed a 20-knot speed and returned safely to base.
Refueling the damaged Mogami from the Nichi Maru tanker, after which the cruiser crew no longer needed to save fuel. And there was an opportunity to increase the stroke
And here is the main question of this article: could the 500-pound American bombs penetrate the 35-mm deck of the Mogami?
What if yes? This means that the explosions thundered below the main armored deck, in the engine rooms and the ammunition cellar of the main battery (“… right in front of the bow superstructure”). Hundreds of kilograms of explosives and tens of thousands of incandescent shrapnel that riddled all bulkheads and turbines. Not to mention the consequences of getting into the ammo rack.
And so the ship, as if nothing had happened, returns to base. A speed of 20 knots with a torn off nose means that the entire power plant of the cruiser was operating at maximum power. Despite the allegedly riddled turbines and steam lines.
It turns out that the thin 35-mm deck turned out to be an insurmountable obstacle for 227 kg of bombs. Otherwise, it is not possible to explain the results of that battle.
Bold conclusions of O. Teslenko are somewhat lost against the background of damage to the same type of "Mikuma". Five bombs - two each in the right and left side of the Ministry of Defense, as well as in the main gun turret # 3. Officially, the cruiser lost its speed. A strong fire broke out on board, which, after an hour and a half, led to the detonation of the torpedo ammunition. After that, “Mogami” and two destroyers took off the surviving members of the crew of “Mikuma” and moved further towards Wake Atoll.
Even the naked eye can see that there is a logical inconsistency in the description. A heroic one and a half hour standing under the continuous attacks of American aircraft. What did the Japanese expect? Would you like to see the fireworks? When torpedoes explode on a burning, immobilized cruiser.
One of the laws of naval warfare: as soon as a ship loses its course in a combat zone, the team is immediately removed from it, and destroyers finish off the damaged one. The slightest delay threatens the death of the entire squadron. This rule was followed by all naval commanders at all times.
With a high degree of probability, this was the case. A fire was raging on the Mikum, but it never dropped its speed below 12-14 knots. Just like his sister ship "Mogami", which also took about an hour to fight the fire.
Not a single fragment of bombs could penetrate under the armored deck and disrupt the work of the ship's mechanisms. Hits in the middle of the Mikuma ignited the torpedoes located there. Initially, this did not threaten the ship until the fire reached the warheads, which were kept separate from the torpedoes. An hour and a half later, an explosion thundered, which completely disabled the cruiser. Although he did not scatter the Mikumu into dust, which could be expected from the explosion of the warheads of 50 torpedoes.
A similar story happened three decades later, on August 30, 1974 at the roadstead of Sevastopol. Explosion of ammunition on the Otvazhny large anti-submarine ship.
In total, there were 15 B-600 anti-aircraft missiles in two drum magazines of the Volna aft air defense system. And this is already serious. The first stage of the rocket consisted of a PRD-36 solid-propellant booster equipped with 14 cylindrical powder bombs, with a total weight of 280 kg. The second stage was directly a rocket, made according to the aerodynamic "duck" scheme with a solid fuel engine containing 125 kg of solid powder. The warhead is of a high-explosive fragmentation type, with ready-made submunitions. The total weight of the warhead was 60 kg, of which 32 kg was an alloy of TNT with hexogen, the rest was fragments.
Six tons of an explosive substance and half a ton of the most powerful explosives! Such an explosion could have been enough to overturn the firmament and disperse the entire Sevastopol raid.
Despite the terrible internal hull explosion, the small BOD (5,000 tons, which is half the size of modern destroyers and three times less than the aforementioned Japanese cruisers) lasted more than five hours, and all this time its crew was desperately fighting for the survivability of the ship. Work to rescue "Otvazhny" was stopped when the fire began to threaten the aviation fuel storage and the depth charges cellar. 19 sailors became victims of the tragedy.
It is curious how the results of the devastating explosions on Mikum and Otvazhny are in agreement with the results of tests of modern anti-ship missiles?
How can their relatively light warheads, the content of the mass are dozens of times less than explosives, cause such terrible destruction to ships?
