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The more advanced torpedoes had their drawbacks.
During World War II, which took place in 1939-1945, submarines played a vital role.
Until 1940. Adolf Hitler won on all fronts in the summer of 2006, and the arsenal of submarines in the arsenal, which sank the British sailing fighters, contributed significantly to this.
Working on submarines was brutally difficult and dangerous. The ships’ crews stayed underwater for a few days, so it took a great deal of dedication and strength.
Torpedoes were the main weapons of these submarines, but these systems also had a number of shortcomings. Also, people weakened by war and stress sometimes couldn’t hold on and made wrong decisions.
After the First World War, engineers developed more advanced torpedoes for which it was possible to adjust their course. That is, aim them more precisely towards the desired target.
This was accomplished using a mechanically adjustable gyro angle. The action was carried out on the submarine itself before launching the torpedo towards the target.
When the torpedo was fired, it moved for a time until the gyroscope control mechanism on the torpedo adjusted the direction of the torpedo, began to rotate towards the target, finally straightened the direction of rotation of the torpedo again, and the warhead hit the objective.
It sounds quite complicated and even complicated. And unsurprisingly, those torpedo gyro mechanisms sometimes failed. That is to say, the torpedoes, when they began to turn, they did not stop doing it.
The rotating torpedoes around the submarine that launched them did not promise anything good. This clearly posed a direct threat to the attacking ship itself.
There are 30 documented cases in which these incidents occurred during WWII and how submarines launched like torpedoes became their hostages.
Fortunately, most managed to escape. Still, 2 cases ended tragically.
The first fatal incident was the sinking of the USS Tullibee
One such disaster occurred on July 29, 1944. For the submarine USS Tullibee.
The submarine patrolled the islands of Palau and used radars to capture the enemy convoy. The USS Tullibee fired 2 torpedoes, and a couple of minutes later they returned and hit the submarine that fired them.
Only one in 80 crew members survived. Captain Clifford Kuykendall, standing on the bridge, watching the torpedo launch.
“It just came to our notice then. Now we’ll see what happens,” Clifford recalled the teammate’s supposed words, and a couple of minutes later the explosion exploded.
It was very strong and knocked Clifford out of the sub. “It just came to our attention then. I swallowed so much diesel that I could taste it in my mouth a year after the tragedy,” Clifford said in a 2008 interview.
For a few more minutes, Clifford heard the screams of his teammates, but eventually they fell silent – the sub sank and buried 79 people with it.
“I remember everything as if it happened yesterday. It’s something I can’t forget, “Clifford said.
The surviving Clifford was captured by a Japanese ship and sent to a prisoner of war camp. Clifford stayed there for more than a year before so-called “VJ” day, August 15, 1945, when Japan capitulated and the end of World War II began. In Europe, it ends on September 2 of the same year.
When he returned home, Clifford learned that he was the only surviving member of the submarine USS Tullibee. The man sat at his sister’s kitchen table and wrote letters to all the families of his deceased crew, explaining what had happened to them and how he had died.
Countless families never knew what had happened to their relatives who had served in the Navy, so Clifford’s letters to some families were a real comfort.
In addition to the USS Tullibee incident, there was another, perhaps even more pronounced sinking of the submarine.
The second fatal incident was the sinking of the USS Tang
The USS Tang was the most successful submarine in the United States. During his service during World War II, he managed to sink up to 33 ships.
Just a year after its mission began, the USS Tang encountered a large convoy of enemy ships on patrol.
It was the night of October 23, 1944 and the USS Tang began firing torpedoes at enemy ships. He did it safely and accurately. The number of sunken enemy ships was constantly growing. Every ship that burned or sank that night was the work of the USS Tang.
The night was busy, but the next one, October 24, turned out to be even tougher. The USS Tang collided with another convoy of Japanese ships carrying aircraft.
The USS Tang launched a torpedo power and was already preparing for an escape plan when two Japanese ships began to pursue it.
The USS Tang began evasive maneuvers and intended to complete its job of sinking the remaining Japanese ships. Of the 24 torpedoes in the arsenal, only 2 remained.
wikimedia.org/ USS Tang submarine during WWII
The crew of the USS Tang fired the last torpedoes. One of them flew straight, unimpeded, and the other began to turn left and turn until finally hitting the stern of the USS Tang.
The explosion shocked the submarine USS Tang. The crew members who survived the hit gathered in the torpedo compartment and waited to reach the escape hatch ahead. The ship was 55 meters deep.
However, a Japanese ship on patrol on the USS Tang began dropping special cartridges into the water, the explosions of which caused even more damage to the USS Tang.
Thirteen crews from the USS Tang managed to escape through the escape hatch in front of the ship, and 4 more people escaped from the ship’s bridge. However, not all of them made it to the surface of the water: out of 13, 8 did and only 5 were finally saved.
A total of 78 crew members of the USS Tang died that night and only 9 survived.
The effectiveness of the USS Tang was astonishing. The result of that night is this:
- 24 torpedoes were launched, all the ship had;
- 22 torpedoes hit enemy ships;
- 13 Japanese ships sank;
- 1 torpedo missed the target;
- 1 and the last torpedo sank the submarine USS Tang itself.
The commander of the USS Tang, Officer Richard O’Kane, received the Medal of Honor at the end of the war.
For its contribution during the war, the USS Tang was awarded four battle stars and twice the Presidential Unity Citation Award, which rewards only war heroes with exceptional heroism.
These are just two of the most memorable and unfortunate endings of WWII. There are many such stories and they have often resulted in many painful deaths.
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