Love the SH series
.. really got into the pacific theater beginning with the pig boats out of Cavite in the early days of WW2.
Gettin into the Balao class boats *really* is a huge leap.
Personal best encounter: Late 1944, in a Balao
Was runnin South along east coastline of Japan
..Tokyo was out there about 30 miles abeam ..
..it was nearing 2am in the morning.
Rainin so hard I could not see much beyond the bow.
Our last refit had added a pretty decent surface radar and if ever there was a night for it..
..we were trackin surface targets closing from behind us and I was angling into
the projected track at full speed ..they were going to be close comin up on our left.
..sonar said it was multiple screws .. a capitol ship ..and perhaps a few escorts?
At 900 yards I still could not see anything but blackness filled with heavy rain and we had at least one
CLOSE that we were intercepting .. I stayed on the surface ..caught a fleeting glimps of a huge silhoutte
of superstructure .. a Pagoda ..and fired 4 from the front as fast as we could pump them out.
..hard left rudder . . we passed within 30 yards of the aft end of what could be a battleship..
..just as all 4 ripped into her side.. a short spread blooming right in the middle of the shape
and lighting it up.
The Yamato or her sister the Musashi.
Rudder amidships, and put 4 out the back ..they all caught that big monster
in a short spread from the screws forward .. and now it was time to hide.
Did an arc right, still on the surface runnin like my hair was on fire, full speed ..comin up on a parrallel course with the wounded monster.
We had only had visual for seconds ..the rain and darkness swallowed the burnin battlewagon before our sub even began to turn.
..using radar as my eyes to avoid the escorts ..the big battleship was still runnin away from us..and fast!
I managed to put a couple thousand yard between us and the escorts, now circling far behind us..
..probably thinkin we had submerged and gone quiet.
The battlewagon just plain ran off and left ..we lost all trace of it about daylight.
This close to Japan I finally gave the order to take her down and slowed to best cruise-patrol speed.
I could not beleive that monster had taken *eight* of our best and just shrugged them off.
On a slim hope I continued on course .. ears out ...throughout the morning.
Noon came and went ..no sign.
About 2 in the afternoon smoke was spotted on the horizon along with faint screw sounds.
Quiet, stealthy ..we closed.
It was makin 4 knots .. somethin obviously burning out there ..far too much smoke for a funnel.
It was the monster from the night engagement!
..listing to port badly, burning from midship to stern, but still making 4 knots!
Full sweep of the area ..nothing else around ..we had her!
Closed in classic beam attack ..put 4 into her amidships ..cranked hard left until rear tubes came to bear..
..put 4 more into her ..all from 900 yards.
That big monster took them *all* .. began to slow ..
..tipped ever so slowly onto her side ..and the waves swallowed the Yamato.
-Frank aka GE (never had another mission to equal that one in years of playing)
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