“Where are all the Putinas who were telling us it wasn’t badly damaged?”
In fairness I’m nowhere near a Putina and I had a hard time accepting the idea that a mere 700 pounds of explosive was enough to seriously damage this ship.
It’s very disturbing to think two missiles were enough to kill a ship like this.
If they can cause secondary explosions or start a major fire, then yes it’s possible. Often it’s not the initial damage of the munitions that kills a warship, it’s what follows after.
Just look at the missile tubes on deck - a direct hit on one with 300 lbs of explosives traveling at that speed will definitely bring about secondary explosions. Some reports stated that the ship rolled enough after the first impact for the second missile to hit below the waterline on the hull - bringing the full magazine into play.
This ship has been sailing for decades - the chances of this being caused by improper handling of munitions is almost zero.
Its got these huge antiship missiles in rows along the sides.
I doubt their canisters are substantially armored.
Ask the Brits about the Exocet anti-ship missiles during the Falkland War.
Remember the USS Cole? We nearly lost it by a rubber duck with a beer cooler full of HE. And no velocity involved. It was saved by a beam in just the right place that buffered the blast.
Two missiles with a few hundred pounds of HE hitting just above the waterline at , oh, say 400 mph, one in the machinery space, and one near the fuel, or under the con., can do the job.
Note they described the ship listing which means there was ineffective watertight bulkheads so down she went.
Don’t know about the Russian Navy, but modern US warship, with the exception of carriers, have aluminium hulls. Neptune has an 700 lb warhead? The Japanese Long Lance torpedo only had 600 lb warheads and were considered quite deadly. Ever seen what an Exocet missle Will do to a DLG? An Exocet is small potato’s compared to a Neptune. It’s not just the explosive of the missle that causes the damage, consider the mass of the missle, engine, unburnt fuel and terminal velocity of it all. The Moskova weighed 18,000 lbs, which suggests aluminium construction. Many WWII heavy cruisers weighed at in at 32,000 + lbs. They were steel hulled. On the Moskova the sixteen deck mounted missle launchers would seem to be a high risk item for detonation. Add that to the mix and it may explain why there was only 54 survivors.
It’s very disturbing to think two missiles were enough to kill a ship like this.
***The US Navy is taking note and will have the same attitude it had with Billy Mitchell, stick their head in the sand and say “It can’t happen to us because we’re the US Navy.”