The FReeper Foxhole Remembers The Battle of Santa Cruz(10/25-27/1942) - Sep. 25th, 2003

http://www.microworks.net/pacific/battles/santa_cruz.htm ^

[Victoria Delsoul]

Thanks Snippy!

[Victoria Delsoul]

At least there's no In-Laws visiting.

LOL! Lucky you.

[Light Speed]

Came across this article while researching todays thread.

IJN Destroyers Long Lance Torpedo launcher

Long Lance Torpedo

Historians mark how leathal the Long Lance Torpedo versions were...that Japan had put the platform into most of their surface fleet ..including Heavy Cruisers.

American gunfire crippled many Japanese surface combatants ..adrift with failing powerplants..they were able to get a final volley of torpedos off.
A burning Japanese warship on the horizon was not neccessarily out of action just yet.

Historians note the failure of the Japanese to use their submarine force more offensively...at Santa Cruz..the Japanese had 11 Submarines..with more involved in later weeks.

Failures in Command decision making figures prominently in the long Guadalcanal campaign.
At Santa Cruz..the Japanese had the numerics..they should have prevailed.
Yet their command was tenative....memories of Midway still plagued certain commanders.

Guadalcanal was a journey in Chaos....the U.S. regrouped better than the Japanese..who seemd vexed by their mental demons and fears..which lead to tenative projection in battle.

[SAMWolf]

Evening Light Speed.

The Japanese Long Lance was deadly. They were the only major combatant in WWII that didn't have troubles with their torpedoes.

Both the Germans and United States were plagued with faulty exploders, running too deep and premature detonations. The Japanese seem to have worked out all the bugs in their torpeodes .

[GATOR NAVY]

Actually, that picture is of a TAKAO class heavy cruiser. And that bad boy had 4 of those quad mounts, plus reloads for every tube.

[SAMWolf]

Here's an interesting (if a little bit beaten up) picture of the 'Kate' which finished off the already damaged USS Hornet on October 24, 1942. The splash of the torpedo (which most likely would have been a Type 91 Mod 2 or 3) can be seen at the lower right. This weapon struck Hornet at 1523 hours, and ended any hopes of saving her.

[snippy_about_it]

I had heard there were mud slides and it sounded pretty bad. I know you get a lot of quakes and it's usually nothing. Good to hear this wasn't near you and yours.

Any stories from your trip to Hawaii to tell? Did you at least get away for some fun?

[SAMWolf]

I want to know what it's like to see the USS ARIZONA and USS MISSOURI together.

[GATOR NAVY]

My meetings were at Hickam AFB and I didn't make it to Pearl so I only saw pictures of the ARIZONA and MISSOURI. I've been to the ARIZONA before so I wasn't worried about seeing it this time.

I did get a nice tour of the island on Saturday from my cousin, who I hadn't seen in almost 10 years. We had a good time.

[SAMWolf]

I've been on the Missouri, she stopped in Astoria, and they allowed visitors, on her way to Pearl. Only been to Hawaii once and that was a plane refueling stop in 1969. Didn't get to see the Arizona. :-(

[GATOR NAVY]

The Japanese torpedoes worked during the war because they took the trouble to test, retest and test again actual warshot torpedoes before the war. We were idiots and so positive our torpedoes worked we tested them without warheads and so never knew our exploders were faulty. And without warheads we didn't also know about the depth problems either.

[snippy_about_it]

Good picture, thanks.

[GATOR NAVY]

I've been on MISSOURI when I was a kid and she was mothballed in Bremerton and again in the 80's when she was active in Long Beach. They're charging $16 to see her now, I thought that was a little steep.

[SAMWolf]

They're charging $16 to see her now, I thought that was a little steep.

That is a little steep especially if you have a family along. I guess if the money is used for upkeep and repairs I can understand it though I don't really like it.

[SAMWolf]

Technological Problems

Both Germany and America experienced technological problems with their torpedoes. In 1939 Lt Gunther Prien fired seven torpedoes at HMS Royal Oak which subsequently sank but only two torpedoes detonated. Only two weeks later Lt Wilhelm Zahn skipper of U-56, was presented with one of Britain's most powerful warships HMS Nelson, at that time hosting not only important officers but also Sir Winston Churchill himself. Unknown to these dignitaries U-56 launched three torpedoes at the battleship. Inside U-56 Zahn and his crew waited impatiently for the tell tale explosions. Instead the crew heard two clanging noises as metal merely hit metal. The torpedoes had merely struck the side of the battleship and sunk to the bottom of the North Sea. Deep dejection overwhelmed Zahn and his crew to the extent that on return to Germany Admiral Donitz was forced to take them off U-boat duties. After all it was an extremely dangerous task for a submarine to get through British defences and return home safely. Further, surprise would no longer be an element possible against anchored British warships in their home ports.

Similarly, during 1943 Lt Cdr John Scott of the USS Tunny fired ten Mk 14 torpedoes at a range of 800 yards at two very large Japanese aircraft carriers. Most of the torpedoes detonated prematurely and the carriers escaped with some damage. Due to these faulty torpedoes many good commanders were accused of failure and incompetence. However when aces such as Richard O'Kane and Dudley Morton started complaining action had to be taken.

The main problem with the Mk 14 was with the magnetically operated detonating device. Torpedo experts overlooked the fact that a vessel's magnetic earth-field varies according to its position on the globe. It was nearly two years before the USN established the cause of all the defects. The depth mechanism and contact exploders were also found to be faulty. This was undetected in the prewar navy because it was considered a serious offence to lose a torpedo in a training run. Therefore, many submariners had never heard the sound of a live torpedo detonating. The Mk 14 cost $10,000 each, a substantial sum. The Bureau of Ordnance was to blame for being overly niggardly. Even when Admiral Charles A. Lockwood, C-in-C Submarine Fleet South West Pacific, tested the torpedoes, found fault and then complained, the Bureau of Ordnance was slow to react.

[GATOR NAVY]

One last point on Santa Cruz-it was the last battle of the Japanese carrier avation "A" team. The attack on HORNET was almost flawless and they came real close to getting ENTERPRISE too. The next time the carriers came out it was at the Philippine Sea battle and by then their naval aviation had been decimated flying from land bases during the Solomons campaign.

[Light Speed]

Ya duh!!..I copied the wrong text from the web page.

Have collected the magazine "Sea Classics" over the years..really enjoy their writers.

Had dinner with an officer from USS Benham in Frisco at a naval reunion.

He commented that the battles at night were almost mesmerizing visually..yet terrifying.
A Long Lance blew away USS Benhams bow on Nov14/15 1942, just north of Guadalcanal....Pete was blown from the bridge..drifted about for some time amongst many U.S. and Japanese survivors.

Pete served on USS Isherwood for a year+..after Leyte Gulf he was trans to another can...where he survived a kamikaze which penetrated into the ships CIC .

He was at sea with a carrier group..delayed due to DD'S needing refueling..they were late..arriving Pearl later on Dec 7th.
Pete saw alot of the war...I count it a gift to have met him and listened to his stories.
Poor Pete..he was not a "Plank owner" on USS Isherwood..the guys loved to tease him about this at reunions.

[SAMWolf]

Good catch Gator Navy.

[SAMWolf]

Thanks for sharing Pete's story with us Light Speed.

[Light Speed]

I came accross some info on a search on SC and SG radars U.S.
One article mentioned the probability that the Japanese were using signal capture via several aircraft..which detected the U.S. SC radars energy beam print.

The writer commented that they probably flew in a weaving pattern using a few aircraft in a line...as the signal weakened,,they corrected flight path to obtain a stronger signature..and rode the beam right up to the U.S. Warships.