How to destroy Carriers?

[+JonathanRL 974]

After a 4 plane flight of Mirages armed with Exocet missiles failed to destroy the Carrier HMS Hermes despite the fact that all four missiles hit the target and after the HMS Hermes tore up my wingman with a s**tload of flack, I searched the forums here and discovered that Carriers could not be destroyed.

 

How to make Carriers destroyable. I dont need em to act as airfields or anything, just tell me how to destroy them with a moderatate effort. Would be great if the carrier was destroyed after 3 exocet hits or something but If that is not possible, just tell me how to make em destroyable.

[Guest capun]

This has been discussed before since it has been a problem for a while, to make the carriers landable the damaged rating of the carrier makes it almost indestructible.

Originally landing on the carrier caused it to be destroyed.

 

There are ways to destroy the carrier but I can't remember how, search here, at C5's site and/or SimHQ archives. I think Gramps was the author of the post.

 

The easy way is to remove the Flight deck from the ini, but then you can't use it to land/takeoff.

[+JonathanRL 974]

Rifle!

 

Works great now. Appears the Hermes goes down after three hits and the Harry S Truman after seven.

(Hits: Exocet Impacts)

[+Jimbib 747]

tigertompa, could you post some screenshots of what it looks like when the carriers go down? Do they just disappear, or do they sink with a big oil spill like the tankers?

[+JonathanRL 974]

SHOWTIME FLIGHT:

OPERATION ATHENS.

 

OBJECTIVE: Destroy enemy "R12" Class Carriers.

 

SHOWTIME FLIGHT:

(Showtime 11, Showtime 12)

Two Super Etendards with standard Air-to-Sea arnament consisting of extra fuel, Exocet Missiles and Matra Magic IIs for Anti-Air Defence. Pilots are advised to cordinate their missile launches for maximum effect.

 

(Showtime 13, Showtime 14)

Two SAAB Viggens armed with AIM-9B Air to Air Missiles

 

MISSION TARGET:

Two R12 Class Carriers. Currently no operable aircraft onboard. Expect Heavy Anti Aircraft fire from Flack and Missile batteries.

 

 

Mission Recorder Video:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1971486519879124668

(Low Res)

 

(Will try to upload a hi res version on CombatAce)

Edited November 14, 2006 by tigertompa

[Wrench 9,850]

Or, another way would be to leave the carriers as is, and simply create a copy of them, with the flight deck removed, set as either a cargoship, or left as a warships.

The 'new' object would have to be renamed to something like, "Hermes_C" or whatever that would diferentitate from the landable versions {C for cargo or even T for target ;) or NL for not landable}. Something like that...

 

Weapons, radars, etc would be left alone so they shoot back.

 

This has the disadvantage of 'doubling' ground objects, but what the hell, we'd only be using that HD space for pics of nekked women

 

Wrench

Kevin Stein

[hellcat61 0]

Realistally the carriers, specifically the Truman, wouldnt sink anyway. With the way aircraft carriers are built today, it is impossible to sink them short of completely breaking them up (i.e. nukeing them). I doubt any number of exocet's would take one down. I know this doesnt solve your mission, but just a thought.

[+Jimbib 747]

Nice action there tigertompa!

[+JonathanRL 974]

Realistally the carriers, specifically the Truman, wouldnt sink anyway. With the way aircraft carriers are built today, it is impossible to sink them short of completely breaking them up (i.e. nukeing them). I doubt any number of exocet's would take one down. I know this doesnt solve your mission, but just a thought.

 

Please read "Red Storm Rising" by Tom Clancy.

[hellcat61 0]

If that's your rebuttal for sinking a carrier, it's rather weak. Try and prove me wrong with somthing a bit more concrete than a book with a fictional storyline.

 

-Hellcat

[MigBuster 2,884]

Realistally the carriers, specifically the Truman, wouldnt sink anyway. With the way aircraft carriers are built today, it is impossible to sink them short of completely breaking them up (i.e. nukeing them). I doubt any number of exocet's would take one down. I know this doesnt solve your mission, but just a thought.

 

 

I cant believe that - who made these claims?

[hellcat61 0]

A Nimitz class carrier is honeycombed with thousands of water-tight compartments and blast doors on the hangar deck. Only a massive break up of the ship could truly compromise a Nimitz-class carrier. Lets look at th USS Forrestal, which was an older, less modern ship. This carrier was smashed with multiple explosions on the hangar and flight deck from 1000lb+ bombs. She didn't sink.

 

Exocets with their 165kg warhead would definately damage, but not sink a carrier. They have been thrown at much smaller targets (USS Stark - 1987) and have not sunk the targets.

 

The burden of proof is now on your side. Do you have any compelling proof that a Nimitz class carrier can be sunk in this fashon?

 

For further and much needed learning on this matter, I implore you to look at this blog. You may find what some of the members say food for thought. (I do realize that they are not professionals on the matter, but to supply some compelling evidence for both sides.)

 

http://www.sinodefenceforum.com/showthread.php?t=2438

 

I will try to keep this my last reply so I dont get accused of trolling.

 

Tag, your it.

Edited November 19, 2006 by hellcat61

[+JonathanRL 974]

While people stopped calling ships "unsinkable" since 1912, I Agree that Exocets might not do enought damage, but that does not mean that they are unsinkable. However, A few Exocets are more then enought to sink a Hermes class Carrier.

 

For the last two years, American Carriers and Destroyers have practiced against a Swedish conventional submarine in order to learn how to detect them. This is because Iran have a number of similar, very silent submarines witch can be equipped with a new russian torpedo (forgot its name). This torpedo does have the firepower to severly cripple a carrier, and several hits would sink it.

 

While an attacker might be satisfied with only disabling the carrier or make it unable to conduct air operations, out goal is to sink it.

Aircraft is out of the question unless we can use a lot and a lot of "vampires" (Air-to-Sea Missiles). A carriers missile and phalnax system, and their AEGIS escorts as well as fighters can destroy hundreds of missiles.

 

The best way to take an carrier would be a cordinated attack. Use airplanes to distract the surface fleet, use scuds if in range and let the Subs do the killing. It might also be preferable to use subs against AEGIS crusiers instead of the carrier, giving the "Vampires" a better chance not to get shot down.

 

 

I will try to keep this my last reply so I dont get accused of trolling and I will npw also go and read the thread you hinted of.

I like theese kind of debates.

Edited November 20, 2006 by tigertompa

[Kadaicha Man 0]

One should be very careful about making assumptions in warfare. It was once claimed that the Yamamoto was "unsinkable" as was the Repulse. Both were sunk. Throw enough weapons at a ship, no matter how big and how well designed and eventually it will be sunk. Long before that point is reached though, it will be rendered inoperable and effectively hores de' combat. In the case of the CVNs, a heavy torpedo under the hull and its back would be broken. A couple of large anti-ship missiles (bigger than Exocet or Harpoon which are now considered rather small by today's standard) and it would be rendered inoperable, more than likely on fire and needing to be towed.

 

The comparison with Forrestal is inappropriate - the explosions and accompanying fires were all on the flight deck, outside the ship. While they were nasty and they did cause quite a bit of damage, it was largely superficial and the ship was able to return to operations relatively quickly. A missile hit, which penetrates the hull and then explodes would be a whole different kettle of fish. Crew casualties would be considerably greater, as well as structural damage. Further, fires would be also quite a bit more damaging. If the hit was able to put the engines out of action, the ship would be helpless. Unlike WWII, there would be nothing immediately available which was powerful enough to provide a tow. Effectively, she would be written off. She might still be floating but that would be able it.

 

Further, the comparison with Stark is also misleading. Stark was saved more by luck, than design. The missile struck when the ship was not at action stations. Thankfully it failed to explode, although as with Sheffield, the burning fuel was more than sufficient to do considerable damage. Quick thinking and hard work by the surviving crew saved her, otherwise she would have been a goner. As it was, she was rendered inoperable and only barely limped away. All-in-all, a very lucky ship indeed. Its crew should be thankful the Iraqi Airforce was so incompetant and that one of the missiles failed to explode.

 

I wonder, is it possible to set the damage rating on a carrier at some midway point - where it can still act as an airfield but can be damaged sufficiently, if not to sink it, render it inoperable?

[hellcat61 0]

rendered inoperable, more than likely on fire and needing to be towed.

No doubt inoperable, but would it sink? There is no doubt in my mind that you could reduce a Nimitz class carrier to a burning hulk, but as far as sinking it completely, I am still very skeptical. Your torpedo remark is poignant, and I would like to research it.

 

Further, the comparison with Stark is also misleading. Stark was saved more by luck, than design. The missile struck when the ship was not at action stations. Thankfully it failed to explode,

FYI, the Stark was hit by two Exocet missiles. One exploded and the other didnt. I believe it's a fair comprison due to the size differential between a Nimitz class carrier and a Perry Class Frigate. Read up on that here:

http://officersclub.blogspot.com/2005/12/u...k-incident.html

 

I think this photo speaks for itself.

 

Hellcat out-

Edited November 21, 2006 by hellcat61

[Kadaicha Man 0]

I was aware there were two missiles but failed to note it, except in the last sentence of my para on the Stark. My apologies.

 

As far as the torpedo's effect on a ship, most heavy torpedos are designed to explode below the hull of a surface target. In doing so, the water magnifies the pressure wave from the explosion, which causes considerable damage but the real killer is apparently the large bubble of gases which is produced by the explosion, which rising immediately after the shockwave, makes the ship bend - literally and this results in its frame fracturing ("breaking it's back"). Influence mines, such as magnetic/acoustic/pressure actuated ones, laid on the seabed utilise the same effect. HMS Belfast, exploded one of the first German laid magnetic mines and broke her back in 1940 and was so badly damaged that she nearly had to be scrapped, however the RN desperate for ships, decided to repair her. Apparently she still has a slight bend in her hull, with the result that the bow and stern are lower than the midships by a matter of an inch or two. Belfast was built to much stronger standards than a CVN is so I would expect one or two torpedos would finish a CVN.

[Fubar512 1,350]

Interesting debate. I have something to offer....or, to help stir the pot further

 

 

 

Scroll down to the bottom of the linked page, and read about the ordeal that the USS Independence "survived".

 

 

 

http://www.navsource.org/archives/02/22.htm

 

 

 

A ship can withstand a terrible amount of damage without sinking, that is, as long as its structural integrity remains sound. I recall the USS Nevada serving as ground zero for one of the tests, and surviving. She was towed back to Hawaii, examined, and later sunk by gunfire.

 

 

 

http://www.navsource.org/archives/01/36.htm

[Kadaicha Man 0]

On a lighter note about CVN construction

[spook27 5]

On a lighter note about CVN construction

Wow! That's fantastic! I want one for Christmas!

[MigBuster 2,884]

So it sunk after the naval fire - clearly the weapon of choice :)

 

[tank03 1]

Not that one can draw a correlation between an airstrike/naval strike and a deliberate scuttle, but a recent documentary (Discovery Channel I think) followed the preperation for the scuttling of a retired aircraft carrier to become an artificial reef. The demo team spent weeks removing doors and hatch covers and cutting holes between sections of the ship. Even then it required several thousands of pounds of explosives to sink, and the team was uncertain if they had done enough to send her down. If anything, it demonstrates the difficulties in actually sinking such a vessel. Certainly it can be damaged severely, but to sink would require an enormous effort.

[Kadaicha Man 0]

Not that one can draw a correlation between an airstrike/naval strike and a deliberate scuttle

 

As you yourself point out, one should be careful about drawing correlations. When they were attempting to scuttle the carrier, they were deliberatley attempting to make it possible that she would settle and do so quickly (one wonders if they still fit seacocks in CVNs?), so obviously they had to expend considerable effort to make it do what it wasn't designed to whereas if it was hit by an enemy's weapons, then they would do the work for them and do it in a catastrophic manner as well. Those doors and compartments they cut away/holes in, would be stoved in and burnt out.

 

Further, war damage often, as the experience of the Sheffield showed, ways of defeating ship designs which the designers never understood or expected. Look at the way Hood was destroyed by a flash-fire which ignited her magazine, after only a few lucky hits by Bismark. The RN had known about the dangers of flash-fires since Jutland when three battlecruisers were lost after being hit. Hood was intended to be modernised in 1941 IIRC but because of the outbreak of war made it impossible to remove her from service, and as a consequence she never received the scheduled update. The design fault which caused her demise was left in place, despite she having been redesigned in 1918 to prevent it, in light of the losses at Jutland to exactly the same thing - flash-fires in the handling rooms and then the magazines. Sheffield likewise was designed without fully understanding what a missile like an Exocet was capable of and she suffered accordingly. She was designed to a price. So are CVNs. As the old saying goes, "always remember the rifle in your hands was designed by the lowest bidder!" ;)

[Southernap 1]

What is really funny is how in all thre of the major American Carrier accidents that removed a major fleet carrier from service the way the ships were designed to survive the damage that was inflicted on them. How they did survive the and except for the USS Forrestal, both the USS Oriskany (which suffered a fire due to a parachute flare ignited) in 1966 was able to resume flight ops approximately 3 hours after the fire was declared out and secured. and the USS Enterprise which suffered a fire due to an aircraft starting unit blowing hot exhaust gases on a Zuni Rocket pod on an F-4. This occured just off Hawaii in 1969 while the ship was doing workups to head back to Vietnam. All of the landing area was heavily damaged, however it was believed that they crew could have restrung the arresting gears wires in the 2,3,4 spots patched the damage on the flight deck and could have resumed flight ops with out major difficulties.

 

Over at a ship fan site that has pictues shows the pictures of an Ex-US Navy LST being sunk after she had run aground off Chile. The ex-USS La Moure County LST-1194, link to the picture here . To quote from the site is how much damage she took before finally doing under.

 

The LA MOURE COUNTY was decommissioned after an accident off the coast of Chile in September 2000. It was determined that it was more beneficial for the damaged ship to be used as a target for a live fire Sink Exercise (SINKEX) rather than making costly repairs.

The SINKEX took place as part of Exercise Tamwork South 2001.

 

USS TICONDEROGA (CG 47) and USS RODNEY M. DAVIS (FFG 60) began the SINKEX on the morning of July 10, 2001, with Chilean Destroyers CAPITAN PRAT (DHL 11), ALMIRANTE COCHRANE (DHL 12) and BLANCO ENCALADA (DHL 15) and the British Destroyer HMS EDINBURGH (D 97). The exercise began with a live fire gun pass at 5,000 yards. The ships moved into a firing line position with the target ship to the starboard. TICONDEROGA was the first to send 20 five-inch rounds downrange. When the smoke cleared from the decks of the target ship, LA MOURE COUNTY, the other ships in the task group commenced fire. After the ships completed the first round, the ships changed course while remaining in a gun line firing formation and brought the target ship to the port side at 9,000 yards away. The ships again open fired on the amphibious ship hurling another 60 explosive rounds into the now severely damaged target ship.

 

The final gun approach positioned the U.S., Chilean and British ships at over 6 miles away from the target ship before they were cleared to open fire. Few of the ships in the firing line had difficulty with the increased distance. High on the starboard bridge-wing of TICONDEROGA, the ship’s executive officer, monitoring the accuracy of the guns targeting system, watched the single spotting round strike just below the bridge of the target ship with a brilliant orange glow and thick plume of black smoke. He yelled into the telephone to the Tactical Action Officer, "Round on target, batteries released!" Seconds after his command, the forward five-inch gun quickly thundered out 19 more HE-PD rounds demolishing the bridge and deck house of the target ship. Lt. Cmdr William F. Hesse, Executive Officer onboard TICONDEROGA said, "We do not have the opportunity to this sort of thing often but it is apparent that our training has paid off because the crew performed superbly sending rounds downrange accurately and getting good hits with each engagement."

 

With the gun exercises over and the LA MOURE COUNTY badly damaged, but still afloat, the exercise continued. The British Destroyer HMS EDINBURGH launched a Sea Dart surface missile at the LA MOURE COUNTY impacting to the rear of the bridge. With a Standard Missile (SM-2) ready on the forward missile launcher aboard USS TICONDEROGA, the cruiser’s powerful SPY-1A radar locked onto the target over ten miles away, ready to fire. The command was given and the missile leaped into the air leaving behind a thick cloud of white smoke on the cruiser’s foc’sle. The powerful missile exploded at the target causing extensive damage, but the crippled ship still remained on top of the water.

 

TICONDEROGA’s Commanding Officer, Cmdr Glen Sears said, "The LA MOURE COUNTY is a testament to U.S. shipbuilding technology. The ship has taken an absolute beating from the six ships out here today and refuses to go down."

 

The SINKEX continued with two air-launched surface missiles fired from the British Lynx helicopter assigned to the HMS EDINBURGH. The helicopter lifted off the flight deck of the British Destroyer carrying a Sea Skua anti-ship missile flying low and fast towards the target. The Lynx fired the missiles from more than four miles away striking the ship amidships leaving a gaping hole in the hull above the water-line.

 

The LA MOURE COUNTY, smoking and listing to port quickly fell prey the U.S. Navy’s Harpoon Cruise Missile. The first Harpoon missile jumped from the Mk 13 launcher of USS RODNEY M. DAVIS, followed closely by TICONDEROGA’s own Harpoon erupting towards the sky with a brilliant blast of fire and smoke. Once the small turbo-fan jet engine engaged, the rocket boosters fell to sea and the cruise missile closed the 25 miles to the target ship. With a shuddering explosion, the cruise missile ripped huge holes in the hulk peeling back huge sections of the shops exterior. Still afloat, the Chilean submarine O’BRIEN finished off the LA MOURE COUNTY with six Mark-8 torpedoes, finally sending the ship to bottom of the Pacific where the ship will become an artificial reef.

 

The hulk was prepared in accordance with environmental agreements between the Chilean Navy and Naval Sea Systems Command ensuring all precautions were made not to harm the environment. The sunken hulk of LA MOURE COUNTY will serve as a sea life habitat for hundreds of years of come.

[Kadaicha Man 0]

This webpage features pictures of the "back breaking" effect from the use of heavy weight torpedoes exploding under the hull of a warship:

 

http://www.btinternet.com/~warship/Feature/sink/sink.htm

 

These websites feature extensive pictures and video of the sinking of HMAS Torrens - again by torpedo, which broke her back

 

http://smmlonline.com/reference/walkabouts...ns/torrens.html

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/21456/torpedo_hit/

 

Videos of other ships being sunk:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkUu2NR6t7M

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQeWD6hm6Ak

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQm_gOwxsuc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjnpcdG8Tww

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwyNaBsITxs

 

By Penguin Missile:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mw9f3SQbLJQ

 

Interesting series of articles by an old friend of mine:

 

http://www.ausairpower.net/Warship-Hits.html

http://www.ausairpower.net/ASPC-Expand-Mirror.html

[MigBuster 2,884]

This webpage features pictures of the "back breaking" effect from the use of heavy weight torpedoes exploding under the hull of a warship:

 

 

Good stuff - thanks for posting