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From: terryr@ogicse.ogi.edu (Terry Rooker)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: Sinking Tankers
Message-ID: <1990Sep4.014745.26407@cbnews.att.com>
Date: 4 Sep 90 01:47:45 GMT
References: <1990Aug31.030327.22986@cbnews.att.com>
Sender: military@cbnews.att.com (William B. Thacker)
Organization: Oregon Graduate Institute (formerly OGC), Beaverton, OR
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Approved: military@att.att.com



From: terryr@ogicse.ogi.edu (Terry Rooker)
In article <1990Aug31.030327.22986@cbnews.att.com> wb9omc@ea.ecn.purdue.edu (Duane P Mantick) writes:
>
>What effect would a 16" shell from the Wisconsin have (aside from the
>obvious ignition of any combustibles on board) to the ship?  Now that
>may seem like an obvious question with an obvious answer....what I
>am thinking of is: while there would be a big hole in the thing (assuming
>for the sake of arguments, holds with NO oil, mostly empty), would
>it get blown in half with one well placed round?

First, the moderator's note on fusing is most pertinent.  It is
difficult to get the proper fusing to detonate while the round is
still in the ship.  There is no obvious combustion effect, not every
round that hits a ship starts a fire.  Short of a catastrophic
explosion caused by detonating a magazine or large storage tank, it is
very difficult to have a single round sink a ship (I am not
considering progressive damage).  About the only way a single round
could break a ship in half is to break the keel, which is the effect
of many modern anti-ship torpedos.  In this case you might want the
16" round to go through the hull and detonate immediately under the
hull.  

To make matters worse, with all their tankage, tankers tend to be very
resilient.  Look up some references about the Ohio (?) in one of the
Malta convoys during WWII.  -- 
Terry Rooker
terryr@cse.ogi.edu