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http://www.combinedfleet.com/shoksink.htm
教主差不多把Tully全文翻译了……功德无限啊
可以把作者脑补的这个也写上，我觉得很不错
In the foregoing analysis we attempted to locate the likely impact points as indicated by the best evidence, but bear in mind the results must be regarded as hypothetical. However, the description of the aftermath and sinking that follows belongs to the realm of reported fact, and relates details of Shokaku's last hours beleived to be previously unpublished in English.
At 1120 the Shokaku's watch was preoccupied scanning the skies for enemy aircraft, and were later judged to not have been as mindful of danger from below as they should have been. Thus when the lookout sighted torpedoes bearing 60 degrees off the starboard bow and gave warning, the tracks were already very close and it was too late. Though Captain Matsubara ordered evasive action, the situation was beyond redemption. Three, possibly four, torpedoes (survivors disagree) struck the ship at eight second intervals. The torpedo hits, whether three or four, were devastating, but not immediately fatal.
Hits were recorded concentrated on the starboard side forward and amidships. One torpedo hit under and forward of the island, shattering and igniting an av-gas main that sent a fireball and burning spray bursting upwards in front of the bridge, burning and injuring several aviators relaxing before the island. Immediately some of the just-landed and fueling aircraft in the hangar exploded into flames, and the pressure of the detonation lifted the elevators 90 centimeters (nearly three feet). The wrecked lifts fell back into the wells, dumping hapless mechanics who had been standing on the forward lift into the inferno.
Shokaku had just recovered planes and was fueling others when the torpedoes struck; thus highly volatile av-gas was flowing through pipes in the vicinity of the impacts. Nothing could have been as catastrophic in timing. As many as nine aircraft were in the hangar, and the hangar was turned into chaos by the shocks. Gas spewed from ruptured aircraft tanks and caught fire, and ammunition on hoists began to explode, turning the hangar into a blast furnace. Exploding bombs and aircraft fuel tanks added to the conflagration and cut down men trying to fight the fire, so that pieces of "dismembered bodies lay everywhere about the deck".
With boiler rooms on the starboard side flooding quickly, the Shokaku at once lost speed, fell out of formation, and began to list rapidly to starboard. Reacting quickly, Captain Matsubara ordered port spaces counterflooded to correct the list. This was done, but too well, as damage control efforts overcompensated, and Shokaku flopped over into an opposite heel to port! [It should be noted that the magnitude of counterflooding necessary to accomplish this reverse heel to port most likely would have involved flooding of port-side machinery spaces, further complicating Shokaku's power situation.] At the same time the carrier was beginning to trim noticeably by the bow, for one of the torpedoes there had opened a large hole. [Our analysis revealed just such a hit and raised the distinct possibility that the bow was rent clean through, which could explain the marked head trim reported throughout]. The upshot was that before noon the Shokaku had become unnavigable and gone dead in the water, fires raging.
In the interim, the fire in the hangar had become an inferno, for all electric circuits had failed immediately following the hits. One of the torpedoes had struck close to the forward bomb magazines and apparently this had knocked out the generator and switchboard located in this very area. [Once again, the historical record gives striking confirmation of our reconstruction, which shows just such a hit]. When power failed it was impossible to power the pumps. The blaze made it impossible to reach or man the armored control booths for the fire mains in the hangar and thus there was no effective means to contain the mounting conflagration. In desperation the veteran damage control teams broke out portable extinguishers and even formed bucket brigades. However, such measures could hardly prevail against the flames, and the burning gasoline spewing from shattered pipes that "came down like burning rain on their heads". The ship was in extreme jeopardy.
Nonetheless, Shokaku's damage control was among the most experienced in Kido Butai, experience born of hard-trials, when they had saved Shokaku twice---first at the Battle of the Coral Sea, and then at Santa Cruz. Those lessons now came into play and by early afternoon there seemed cause for hope. Though the fire in the hangar still raged, those in the gas tanks had been extinguished by closing off all access in the surrounding spaces. There were not too many aircraft aboard, and there was a chance the fuel fires in the hangars could be doused if they could just be contained. The inadvertent list to port remained moderate, and helped balance the rising water in the starboard side. However, the pumps were not operable and the bow continued to settle. If power could be restored, there might be hope, but this seemed unlikely. Not only that, but the deadly and highly flammable vapor from the unrefined Tarakan fuel oil (now being widely used in extremis aboard Japanese warships as Japanese refineries had run dry due to shipping losses) and the ruptured gas tanks had begun to spread through the ship. The enclosed hangar had poor ventilation in the best of conditions, and many of the ventilators were now destroyed. Thus, even though damage control had made progress in isolating the main outbreaks of fire to forward and amidships, their efforts were nullified as leaking gas and ammunition periodically exploded.
In the meantime, the Shokaku's attacker had been weathering a rather ferocious depth charge attack from Lt. Comdr. Yokota Yasuteru's Urakaze. The first salvo of four exploded at the same time as Kossler's fourth torpedo, close and to port of the sub. Subsequently over the next three hours, the Cavalla counted 106 depth charges, 56 of which "were fairly close". The shocks started flooding in the hull induction and ventilation supply piping outboard, the QB and JK-C supersonice gear burned out, and all sound but JP disabled. But this damage was moderate, and by 1330 the depth charges began to slacken. Moreover, JP sound gear began to report "loud water noises" from the target. Evidently something was happening to the carrier. Indeed it was.
By 1330 the fires on Shokaku were growing much worse and flames began spouting from the flight deck and elevator wells and could be seen from the other ships. Moreover, the bow continued to subside into the sea, and the situation soon became hopeless as the forecastle came awash. Reluctantly Captain Matsubara bowed to the inevitable and gave word that all hands should come up on deck, and prepare to abandon ship. Thorough check was to be made that no one remained below to perish. Officers groped their way through burning and smoke-filled compartments, calling out names and looking for any one left behind. Several hundreds of the ship's company now gathered on the flight deck aft, where the fire had not yet reached, and assembled for roll call. Others energetically threw wreckage and rafts overboard to men who had been blown into the water, or leaped into the sea and swam to the floats themselves.
On the flight deck aft, the men waited in supernatural calm as the chiefs and officers made their head count, even though explosions continued to rock the ship and the flight deck was now starting to slant perceptibly downwards. In fact, at that very moment the seas were swallowing the forecastle and rising up to the level of the flight deck itself. As the bow settled, wreckage and bombs and burning planes in the hangar began to slide and bump forward. It was then that total catastrophe, even greater than that already in progress, struck.
Either it was touched off by one of the fires, or was set off by tumbling as the ship nosed forward, but at 1408 an aerial bomb on the hangar deck forward exploded. Immediately the volatile gases that had been accumulating below were ignited, and the Shokaku was rent by an ominous grumble deep down inside. This was followed by a truly devastating cacophony of "four terrific explosions" followed by several smaller ones as the forward bomb and torpedo magazines were touched off. In a prolonged convulsion of three minutes the Shokaku literally began to blow apart at the seams.
The men gathered aft were caught completely off-guard--they had assumed they had several minutes to evacuate; in reality they now had only seconds. They were sent tumbling and sliding down the flight deck as Shokaku's shattered bow plunged under the waves. Water surged over and across the flight deck and poured in a torrent through the open No.1 elevator into the hangar. The inrush yanked the stricken carrier downward, causing her fantail to rear terrifyingly and suddenly into the sky.
Screaming and frantically trying to grab anything to hold onto, the mass of humanity on Shokaku's flight deck aft slid down the incline to their deaths and a "fiery hell" as they fell headlong into the open and blazing No.3 elevator into the cavernous inferno that had been the hangar. Survivors already in the water were horrified and the sight of the white-clad mass streaming down to incineration in the elevator pit would remain with them for the rest of their lives. The blazing carrier's stern continued to rise, till it was nearly vertical, and in a scene reminiscent of the sinking of the Titanic, then corkscrewed downwards with a "groaning roar" and collapsed into the deep, disappearing amid churning seas, fire and smoke. Bobbing among the wreckage littered waters the scattered patches of survivors began "to sing Shokaku's song with blood tears". The time was scarcely twelve past two----only two minutes had elapsed since the induced explosion. (Position: 12°00' N, 137°46' E)
The stunned Yahagi and Urakaze wasted little time in dashing forward among the mass of wreckage to the rescue. The sea was fairly calm, but the suddenness of the catastrophe precluded most chances for escape. The loss of life was appalling: fully 887 petty officers and men, and 376 men of Air Group 601; a total of 1,263 souls in all, had perished. Among the dead were some of the last of Kido Butai's great veterans, including Shokaku's Air Officer, Mitsueo Matsuda, the man who had led the bombing raids that subdued Wake Island. The death toll was keenly felt, for it was the worst to date for Kido Butai, having surpassed even the much-mourned loss of Kaga at Midway. However, by some miracle Captain Matsubara Hiroshi was among the 570 fortunate survivors rescued by light cruiser Yahagi and destroyer Urakaze. As the rescuers worked, small squalls gathered about, as if "adding their tears". In contrast to the human, the aircraft toll was small---only nine planes were listed by Mobile Fleet as having gone down with Shokaku. With the sinking of Shokaku, only her sister-carrier remained of the once proud Kido Butai that had attacked Pearl Harbor. |
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发表于 2013-11-22 00:18
发表于 2013-11-22 00:35
楼主
建议公主和Tully合作马里亚纳的新书 
