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Punch through the compartments lining both sides of the hangar deck, and dump it all overboard.
The A6Ms had time to get up to SBD altitude after the VT6 attack but it wasn't doctrine to loiter up there per Shattered Sword. They relied on visual signals from the ships below to tell them were to go, and if they were too high, they couldn't see them. The Yorktown airgroup was intact when it pierced the distant Japanese screen, then the SBD's split up and headed north, eventually attacking the Soryu, the most northern carrier. VT3 took the most direct path, attacking the closest ship, the Hiryu, with 2 Wildcats directly in support of the torpedo bombers. Above and some distance back was Thach with (originally 3) two other Wildcats. Thach's group drew a lot of the A6M attention and they defended themselves well using a version of the "Thach Weave" beam defense tactic.That was the point being made. The Yorktown strike arrived about twenty minutes after the Enterprise torpedo strike. The A6M's had time to get up to SBD altitude. As to forming up an organized and efficient CAP, I think we covered that.
I am so glad you saved me the trouble of looking it up. Did I mention I was the slow kid in class?
As pieced together by Parshall and Tully in "Shattered Sword", in the 10:20 AM time frame when the damaging attacks started. In a rough line from Southwest to North East, it went, Kaga, Akagi, Soryu, and Hiryu, with the latter two ships separated from the former two by enough that they were barely in sight of each other. Enterprise's SBDs came up from the Southwest to take out Kaga and Akagi. Yorktown's TBD's attacked Hiryu almost from due East, and Yorktown's SBDs came around to take out Soryu from the North.I can travel between time and space so in my reality, it was Hiryu that was hit first. So technically I am correct.
I will have to remember that I have to speak about your reality time frame. So yes Soryu was hit first.
I agree. We need the IJN radar, CIC and Zero pilots to stop the SBDs. Leave the TBDs to the few low level Zeros and AA. As luck has it the USN's torpedoes are rubbish. The IJN knows that dive bombers are the greatest risk to their carriers, and they've just been alerted that several dozen are approaching.The aircraft belowdecks of the three carriers were fueled and armed.
They're not loitering, they've been vectored by radio by their CIC to intercept incoming wave(s) of HA dive bombers.The A6Ms had time to get up to SBD altitude after the VT6 attack but it wasn't doctrine to loiter up there
Again, how does the IJN's radar determine that there are dive-bombers inbound?
Radar shows several dozen unknown aircraft approaching at medium to high altitude. The IJN CIC will assume they're either level or dive bombers. My bet is they guess they're dive bombers, but either way the IJN knows there's a HA strike inbound and will vector their fighters accordingly.Again, how does the IJN's radar determine that there are dive-bombers inbound?
Radar shows several dozen unknown aircraft approaching at medium to high altitude. The IJN CIC will assume they're either level or dive bombers. My bet is they guess they're dive bombers, but either way the IJN knows there's a HA strike inbound and will vector their fighters accordingly.
Even with crappy radar, wouldn't the Kido Butai assume that some of those returns must be carrier planes?Again, how does the IJN's radar determine that there are dive-bombers inbound?
Nagumo did not know there were two USN task forces.Even with crappy radar, wouldn't the Kido Butai assume that some of those returns must be carrier planes?
For some reason, we're trapped at 10:22 a.m. when the SBDs commenced their attack.They didn't have radar (or working radios in the Zeros) either. Just getting into the spirit of the thread. I took a couple of hits off Thumpalumpagus's retrospectroscope bong when he was making a beer run.
They achieved nothing anyway, just send them.Particularly with the Kates, changing bombs out for torpedoes meant something. The Kates couldn't dive-bomb, and I think we all know how useless level-bombing ships is open water is
A 500Lb bomb on the deck is going to do something, it'll wipe out AA crews, destroy any aircraft parked on deck, kill all personnel within a few hundred feet. Both the US and RN jury rigged torpedo's and bombs to aircraft like the Catalina and sent them on strikes, I bet if the roles were reversed they would have sent what they had instead of re armed.They may have, repeat may, used different fuses on the bombs for land and ship targets?
They didn't have radar (or working radios in the Zeros) either. Just getting into the spirit of the thread. I took a couple of hits off Thumpalumpagus's retrospectroscope bong when he was making a beer run.
We're giving the IJN shipborne radar and aircraft radios equal to the best then in service in the RN, USN and KM (German naval radar was for FC, so limited here), whilst making them early innovators in CIC and fighter coordination (essentially what the RAF had in 1940). We're not inventing radar or radio tech that wasn't in existence in 1942.I wasn't aware that 1942 Radar technology was so sophisticated...
They achieved nothing anyway, just send them.
Title: Battle of Midway, June 1942
Description: USS Yorktown (CV-5) is hit on the port side, amidships, by a Japanese Type 91 aerial torpedo during the mid-afternoon attack by planes from the carrier Hiryu, 4 June 1942. Photographed from USS Pensacola (CA-24). Yorktown is heeling to port and is seen at a different aspect than in other views taken by Pensacola, indicating that this is the second of the two torpedo hits she received. Note very heavy anti-aircraft fire. Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives.
Catalog #: 80-G-414423
I always think the war photographer has one of the most dangerous jobs.Here's a picture of the USS Yorktown catching an aerial torpedo amidships port later that day.
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