My Italian Chapter 416

The encounter of the Maria Theresa angered other warships in the Spanish patrol formation, and a more violent counterattack followed. The bombardment of dozens of naval guns put the three Pennsylvaniclass ships in a difficult situation as well.

At a distance of 3,000 meters, especially the two Garibaldi-level 254mm 40L main guns fired uniformly on patrol, the hit rate is even more astonishing.

According to the statistics after the fact, in the close hand-to-hand combat with the Pennsylvaniclass 3000 meters, the hit rate of the 254mm main gun was as high as 26%, and 70 of the 268 shells fired hit the target.

The hit rate of the three Pennsylvaniclass cruisers was much worse, and the hit rate of the three battleships was only 13.4%. Among them, the most threatening 305mm main gun fired a total of 42 shots and hit 6 shots, and the 152mm secondary gun fired 284 shots and hit 38 shots.

In terms of firepower projection and hit volume, the three Pennsylvaniclass cruisers are far from being on a par with the two Garibaldi-classes.

This also caused it to gradually fall into a disadvantage after it sank the Maria Theresa.

But sometimes, just looking at the hit rate is not enough, luck also plays a very important factor.

Now, for example, a 305mm armor-piercing projectile fired from the USS New Jersey hits the gun gallery of a 140mm gun on the USS Vizcaya with a screeching screeching air. The shell penetrated the steel plate outside the gun gallery without hindrance, and the flying debris instantly killed all the personnel in the gun gallery.

Afterwards, the shell continued to move forward. After successfully penetrating the next door of the cabin, it finally exploded at the flue of the bow. The huge explosive force directly destroyed the entire flue. The yellow smoke produced by the explosives and the black smoke gushing out of the flue instantly Filling the entire midship, a thick smoke screen rose into the air. Because the flue was destroyed, nearly half of the boilers of the Biscay were forced to stop running due to the problem of smoke exhaust, and the speed of the entire battleship was gradually reduced to about 13 knots

"Let the Vizcaya evacuate quickly."

After seeing the speed of the Vizcaya slow down, Colonel Ramos, who led the team, was shocked. He was afraid that this precious cruise ship would enter the fate of the Maria Theresa again.

But it is not easy to leave, how could Colonel Simpson allow the prey to slip away like this.

"Concentrate your firepower and give priority to solving the opponent's Vizcaya."

Following his orders, the three Pennsylvaniclass patrol guns were aimed at the Biscay. The shells fired by dozens of various artillery pieces directly covered the Biscay, and the water column near the missing shells and the gunpowder smoke from the explosion of the shells covered it like a curtain. As a cruiser with a displacement of only 7,000 tons, it was unexpected to be targeted like this.

Several 305mm armor-piercing projectiles easily shredded the armor of the Biscay, and the swirling armor fragments directly cut off several steam pipes. What's worse, one of the shells exploded outside the boiler room. The huge explosive force directly shut down 3 boilers. This directly caused the Philadelphia's speed to drop to 6 knots immediately, and the ship's limit had been reached.

When the three Pennsylvaniclass cruisers besieged the Biscay, the counterattack of the Spanish cruisers continued.

"Hit the fire and kill the opponent Colorado."

Colonel Ramos saw that nothing could be done, and decided to focus on an enemy patrol. He really chose the Colorado, which had fought against the Francis. This battleship was damaged a lot in the previous duel, so it was just right for focusing fire.

In the concentrated fire of the three Spanish cruisers, the 305mm twin-mounted artillery on the bow of the USS Colorado was hit twice in a row within three minutes and was directly declared scrapped.

Still more shells fell on the broadsides of both sides. After the Colorado's front main battery was destroyed, three more armor-piercing rounds were chiseled into its broadside, one of which opened a large hole in the bow. The other shot hit the main armor belt of the hull. Although it could not penetrate, it still caused the armor to crack and knocked out a gap of several square meters.

The other shell directly penetrated the upper armor belt of the Colorado. After splitting 6 inches of upper armor, the huge shell exploded near a double-mounted 152mm secondary gun bomber, followed by raging flames and shrapnel. Together, they destroyed the fragile protection near the projectile tunnel.

A fire dragon rolled in the passage. Although the ammunition depot had fire doors, the fire dragon still ignited the picric acid high-explosive bombs accumulated inside the passage and on the gun emplacements. Then I saw that the Rurik's side line was suddenly torn off by a huge explosion. Steel, flames, gunpowder smoke and minced meat spurted out in an instant, and the entire battleship was shaken by such a strong explosion.

The influx of seawater has tilted the hull by about 5 degrees. Several steam pipes were also ruptured under the impact of various shells. The speed of the Colorado has dropped so much that the maximum speed can only be maintained at about 11 knots.

This is really a feng shui turn, and now it's the Spanish side's turn to fight the underdogs.

"Destroy the Colorado!"

With the order of Colonel Ramos, the three patrols were more powerful.

Among them, a 254mm shell from Columbus officially pronounced the fate of the Colorado. The shell penetrated the 6-inch armor belt at the stern and shattered the wheelhouse of the Colorado. So far, the Colorado, which had lost two-thirds of the firepower on the side of the war, was completely out of control, like a dead fish in its own power and ocean currents. Under the action of slowly floating on the sea. He couldn't go back, and even if he let it go, it would be sent to the depths of the ocean by the destroyer.

At this time, 10 ships on both sides were installed on patrol, but only 5 ships remained. This was really bloodshed.

Of course, the **** battle of the patrol formation was brutal, and the battleships were not bad either.

Compared with the direct-moving dog fighting method of the cruiser, battleships are much more rigid. Of course, the Turin-class also takes some advantages due to its speed.

The 330mm heavy artillery and 203mm heavy artillery of the American battle formation, and the 356mm heavy artillery and 152mm artillery of the Spanish battle fleet were constantly spewing deadly flames towards each other. Both sides are doing their best to attack, and attacking is the only choice for both sides.

With veterans who had been with the warships for ten years, the Spanish fleet made more effective hits. The USS Massachusetts, which was bombarded by the battleship Queen Isabel, in just twenty minutes. It was hit at least 5 times by the 356mm heavy artillery! One of them directly hit a twin-mounted 203mm turret into a burning torch, while the other 356mm heavy gun blew the barrel of a 330mm gun into two pieces, and the rest mostly hit the top deck position. The three 4-inch guns on the sideline and the numerous 6-pounder guns were smashed into piles of scrap metal!

The situation behind the Indiana is not very good, because the freeboard is low, and each shell that hits the broadside of the hull has a great possibility of causing flooding, and as a low-freeboard warship, the reserve buoyancy is small. It also directly determines that it is very sensitive to water ingress, and as more and more shells open one after another in the side string.

The first real battleship in the United States has already slanted to the right, and the speed has been gradually reduced to about 13 knots! But fortunately, the firepower can still be maintained, but a double 203mm turret was knocked out. At the same time almost all 57mm guns were lost. Although the twin 330mm guns on the rear deck were not destroyed, they had to temporarily stop firing due to water ingress.

As for the third USS Oregon, it is currently in happy shooting training with no one in charge.

On the Spanish side, Empress Isabel and Isabel II are in relatively good condition. Except for the inevitable fire accident, the loss of armament is that the two 152mm double turrets of Empress Isabel were destroyed. , a 152mm twin turret on the Isabel II was destroyed. In addition, the hit on the hull caused a certain degree of water ingress, especially a 330mm shell that hit the middle part of the hull broke the joint of the entire armor belt, and a crack with an area of ​​about 2 square meters caused the hull A large amount of water entered, and the destruction of the ship type also increased the resistance of the battleship, and deceleration was necessary.

The two Turin-class and three Indianclass ships also had an advantage, a result that no one expected.

"If I had known this was the case, I should have fought the U.S. Navy directly."

Lieutenant General Sedra looked at the situation in front of him and felt a little regretful at this time. It's not just him, no one thought that the first battleship of the United States was so leveled that it would be able to fight back against two and three.

Well, in fact, the main reason for this, in addition to the design performance of the battleship, is the human factor. For example, in the performance of warships, if the combat effectiveness of the Turin class is calculated by 100 points. Then the Indiana class is only 85 points. Of course, this is only a comparison of the performance of the warships.

Everyone knows that a warship requires the cooperation of many personnel, and only the more skilled the personnel, the better the performance of the warship. In this regard, the U.S. Navy officers and men on the three Indianclass ships have only served on the ship for three years at most. Moreover, in the past three years, they have not experienced any war tempering, and can only exert 80% of the performance of the battleship at most.

On the Turin-class side, the ships are all elites who have been tempered by several battles, and can exert 120% of the performance of the Turin-class combat power.

With such a plus and minus calculation, it is very reasonable that the three Indianclass ships are at a disadvantage.

Of course, according to common sense, although at a disadvantage, the loss of the three Indianclass battleships is not large, and they can continue to fight the Spanish formation for 300 rounds.

However, at this time, an accident occurred on the battlefield. A 356mm shell fired from the Queen Isabel hit the deck of the Massachusetts. The twin-mounted 8-inch gun mount was torn apart by a 356mm armor-piercing round. Hundreds of kilograms of artillery shells directly crashed into the projectile channel under the 8-inch gun emplacement! The bomber inside was blasted into a pile of twisted metal, which was detonated along with the shells and propellant packs above.

After the first explosion, followed by a loud noise, an orange fireball sprang from the bullet! The huge energy tore the entire front of the turret to pieces, and the upper 8-inch turret was also shaken. Then thick smoke and flames spread in the front of the battleship, and flames more than ten meters high rose into the air. To make matters worse, the Americans did not follow the operational requirements. The intense and intense fighting made the Americans so nervous that they forgot to close the fire doors of the ammunition depot section during the transfer. Then a larger fireball burst out, which was the detonation of the ammunition depot.

The midship of the USS Massachusetts was directly blasted through a huge gap, and the turbulent sea water violently poured into the cabin. In just 10 minutes, the Massachusetts was flooded with nearly a thousand tons of seawater. At this time, the Massachusetts was in unusual danger. It had already tilted 15 degrees to the right, and due to the inflow of seawater, the speed of the Massachusetts was reduced to 10 knots. Fortunately, the power compartment was not affected, otherwise the Massachusetts would be dead.

"Get the Massachusetts out! Order the Oregon to take her place."

Seeing the desolate appearance of the USS Massachusetts, Rear Admiral Samplin, who was taken aback, hurriedly asked the USS Massachusetts to evacuate.

After hitting an opponent's battleship, the confidence of the Spanish battleship formation greatly increased. If you want to continue to pursue the victory, make persistent efforts.

"Target the enemy Indiana and we'll sink them."

Following Lieutenant-Admiral Sedra's orders, the two Turin-class battleships aimed all their artillery at the leading USS Indiana.

Everything is so skillful, ranging, then half-salvo aiming, after forming a collapse, switching from slow to fast. The roar of 8 14-inch naval guns resounded throughout the battlefield, like the horns of the doomsday war. The Indiana, which was in the lead, was shrouded in an oval bombing zone. After the collapse, it nearly missed the shot, and then a 14-inch shell hit the stern.

This is a high-explosive projectile, and because of the angle of the two sides, it is difficult to penetrate the main armor belt even with armor-piercing projectiles at a large angle of incidence. The shell successfully tore open the unprotected area at the stern, opened a large hole of more than ten square meters at the stern, and then drilled into the interior of the hull.

With the activation of the fuse, more than twenty kilograms of explosives were detonated in the hull. Immediately, a firestorm swept the entire stern. With the impact of the explosion, the cracked steel plates, support beams, etc. turned the entire stern into a purgatory. A bright yellow fire dragon went straight to the sky, and the billowing smoke rose from the stern to cover the firing field of the tail gun.

Just when the Americans were still terrified by the blow just now, another 14-inch shell fell from the sky. Because of the angle of incidence, the shell still hit the stern.

"Standing at my position, I could see a fireball passing the stern sideline at high speed. The shell may not have hit the target directly, or it may have rubbed the ship's side. Then a huge fireball rose above the water on the starboard side of the hull. Unexpectedly, the shells caused more damage to the hull than the shells that hit the hull directly. The whole ship swayed a bit, and then tilted slightly to the right. A large amount of sea water poured in through the blasted hole hull."

Afterwards, Leifer recorded the second hit in his report.

At this time, the Indiana was already facing an extremely dangerous situation~www.mtlnovel.com~Two 14-inch shells hit the stern, causing the speed to be greatly reduced. Although it was not as bad as the Massachusetts, it was definitely not much better.

In the battle of battleships and cruisers, the Spanish side gained an advantage, and the ones who fell into a disadvantage were the two Venice-class cruisers that made huge sacrifices. Although armored cruisers are better than protected cruisers in terms of firepower and armor, if the number is at an absolute disadvantage, then the party to be beaten must be the armored cruiser.

And the two Venice-class cruisers are a good proof of this truth, and the tigers are also afraid of wolves.

In the exchange of fire with a protected cruiser, the two Venice-class cruisers suffered heavy losses in just over half an hour.

The last two 254mm guns of the Duke of Ulloa (Venice) were destroyed, and four 152mm guns and several 57mm guns were lost. In addition to the loss of artillery, the hull of the Duke of Ulloa is also in a mess. Many armor plates have fallen off, and there are even some bullet holes left on it.

As for the Marquis Venadito (Brescia), it is no better than the Duke of Ulloa. In addition to the broken barrel of one 254mm main gun, three 152mm guns and several 57mm guns were lost. In addition, the No. 2 chimney of the Marquis Venadito was also interrupted, and the unrestrained thick smoke seriously affected the firing of the rear main battery. As for the hull, just like the Duke of Ulloa, it was all messed up and not miserable.

Of course, for this group of opponents, the two mounted patrols are also fighting back hard. Among them, the Philadelphia and San Francisco were hit by 254mm main guns. After losing four 152mm guns, they dared not get too close.

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Chapter end