So who has ever had a Holy 'holy mother of god!' Moment?

[Popeye the Salior]

I very recently had a 'holy mother of god!' moment recently. Okay so I was plane dodging again off the coast of Japan well I popped up to see if it was safe to be on the surface and well the following happened. Well got a screenshot but its way to big.

Long story short I detected around twenty planes milling about within a forty kilometer radius of me. I naturally dove down deep and didn't come back up till I was near Midway Island.

[Armistead]

So u dove down near Japan and didn't come back up until near Midway?

[Rockin Robbins]

I don't even think that is possible!

[AJ94CAP]

Unlimited batteries?

[cloadmcally]

I believe he' s just joking and exagerating the situation :D
But could as well be that he had unlimited batteries and Co2 active
Just guesses though :hmmm:

[ikalugin]

Maybe he was a time traveler on I688.

[Rockin Robbins]

The irony is that in Silent Hunter planes are not a danger at all and are easily dealt with. They're almost boring to encounter as an entirely harmless and routine matter.

[cloadmcally]

Well i believe that planes in TMO are quite a threat

[Rockin Robbins]

Airplane Avoidance with Radar (https://youtu.be/Hidf8p64_CE) video. Routine, Toothless. I'll bet you've never been swarmed like I am in this video. Not only could not touch me, no one ever saw me. If you follow the procedure you can't be touched.

[Barkerov]

Airplane Avoidance with Radar (https://youtu.be/Hidf8p64_CE) video. Routine, Toothless. I'll bet you've never been swarmed like I am in this video. Not only could not touch me, no one ever saw me. If you follow the procedure you can't be touched.

I agree that they are harmless if you follow an avoidance procedure. Even in a radar-less S-class if you run it decks awash and crash dive at the first sighting of an aircraft they never touch you. The only times I have ever taken damage from an aircraft was when I 1) hesitated before diving and 2) when I foolishly came up without checking for them first.

It has to be said that we benefit greatly from having a radar which gives a 100% probability of detection in all conditions. We also benefit greatly by the lack of Japanese radar detectors.

[nionios]

Well i believe that planes in TMO are quite a threat

Not a threat with SD radar:ping:.If you play Operation Monsoon ,you'll reconsider.Just a few miles away the homebase in Lorient and you are in danger because of allied planes flying constantly over French coast.

[Rockin Robbins]

Not a threat with SD radar:ping:.If you play Operation Monsoon ,you'll reconsider.Just a few miles away the homebase in Lorient and you are in danger because of allied planes flying constantly over French coast.
Yup, our game eyeballs are nowhere near as good as real eyeballs.

[Armistead]

If you're spotted near carriers they will empty the ships, seen 50 plus doing dives on my spot in formation.

Numerous mods deal with planes differently. Some even if you're not seen by plane, but escorts, planes will join in the search and bomb runs.

[rein1705]

holy moly, I would have pulled the cork and clawed for the bottom too lol. that's still a bunch of oh crap to surface and discover after a nice nap near the bottom.

[Al Lowe]

Surface? I just extend my SD radar antenna and see what it tells me. If I don't like it, I dive as deep as I can and get the hell out of Dodge. :)

[Silversides236]

I torpedoed a DD once it kept coming at me then it dove at me still firing its guns and it stopped 2 feet from hitting my boat.

[padi]

I attacked a port at periscope depth (not more possible), I see 2 Bettys passing me, I continue the attack on the port and then without warning 2 torpedos passing right over my sub not more than 3 feet over my deck. I was totally shocked...

[Rockin Robbins]

I don't go deeper than 90 feet and then only for the least amount of time possible. Then I pop back up to radar depth and to the surface if I can. Every second I'm running on battery I'm asking "is there any reason I can't pop to the surface NOW and raise some hell?" Running your batteries low is just taking your boat and crew out of the war. Hold on. Getting a dispatch from the Admiral. I'll patch you in....

If I see on your cruise report that your batteries were below 75% I had better also see that your life was in imminent danger or your boat gets a new skipper. We put way too much trouble into training your crew to put their lives in danger from a skipper who confuses hiding with safety. As a submariner, your job is to be dangerous. A hiding submarine is only dangerous to its own crew.

Admiral Lockwood
CINCPAC

[Tshark]

Yep, the Eugene Fluckey doctrine. The fleet boat is a surface warship that can "manually" sink in an emergency. :subsim:

[Aktungbby]

As a submariner, your job is to be dangerous. A hiding submarine is only dangerous to its own crew.

Indeed, after reading Goebbler's book on the U-505, now at Chicago, where he was in the zentrelle, assigned to the valve duty specifically by his first kaleun, for dives, how many boats actually died in crash-dive accidents with faulty valve work. :hmmm:

[Rockin Robbins]

German subs were WWI technology and they were strictly Rube Goldberg machines for operation by the crew. The valve section of the control room is just a byzantine mass of unorganized valves, dozens of them and you had to know them cold to do it right. Chances of mistakes were very high, just by the terrible organization of valves in the array.

The U-Boats were amazingly primitive compared to the American Fleet Boat. Those had logical layouts, with many many fewer valves, carefully laid out in ergonometric manner. Mistakes were few and the boats much more efficient to operate.

Maybe the best kind of comparison would be the control layout on a Model T. To drive them you must learn to drive all over again. They certainly are not intuitive in any of their operations.

However, today, with standard control layouts in automobiles, gas pedal on the right, then the brake to the left and clutch, if any, to the left of that, with gearshift knobs in expected places with similar gear layouts, you can just jump from car to car to car forever and drive each one without a lot of difficulty.