Best one yet!

[CybrSlydr]

So I thought I'd throw caution to the wind and try the Hard mission - relocate to La Spezia port through the Strait of Gibraltar.

Everything is great up to about 100nm from the strait. Figure I'll go down to periscope depth and run on electrics through the straight at night.

Well, I massively underestimate the amount of noise the boat makes as well as how fast the air depletes. By the time the air is almost out, I've barely made it to the Strait and have dropped to about 50m. So I have to turn on ventilation - which attracts the attention of the escorts of a convoy I just apparently passed underneath.

Long story short, I get depthcharged by a couple Corvettes but manage to go on without any damage - went all the way to 180m at one point. Couple crew freak out and the Captain subdues them.

So I come back up the periscope depth and trundle on through. I'm finally through the strait and on the other side - but I'm out of battery and I've taken on some water and am down at the stern about 10 degrees from running at depth.

Since I'm negatively buoyant and the electrics are dead, only choice I have is to surface and book it.

I break the surface and start up the diesels and slam the telegraph as far forward as she'll go.

I take some shells from some Corvettes but it looks like I'm outrunning them! I'm thinking, holy hell - I did it!

Then comes the Shorts Sunderland.

I had the Captain manning the 20mm figuring he'd take out the plane. He got the first one - but apparently decided he didn't want to shoot at the 2nd or 3rd.

I watch one fly right past us and drop the depth charges right next to the boat. BOOOM. Three starboard leaks and 4 crewmen critical.

Engineers get to fixing - manage to patch the holes JUST AS ANOTHER BOMBER DROPS MORE DEPTH CHARGES.

WTF IS MY CAPTAIN DOING UP THERE???

So I get them to keep fixing holes while I manually man the gun.

I shoot down two Sunderlands and unfortunately catch a depthcharge inbetween reloads.

This is the one that got us - we could repair the holes, but this one knocked out our diesels, electrics, main power board, pump, lights... Killed the Captain in the AA gun too (blew me out of the mount and overboard). I didn't realize this until it was too late. We started slowing down, so I sent my guy back to repair them - by the time he repaired them, we were a couple meters below water and dropping.

They kept trying to fix the holes and got all of 'em. But there was just too much water.

Three of my men were barricaded in the control room with respirators, trying to repair the ballast valves and pumps as the boat sank and reached crush depth.

-----------

It's Das-freaking-Boot!

Just as we thought we'd gotten away, with casualties, the last one comes in and proves too much to bear.

[Sailor Steve]

Great story, and it brings hope for the future of the sim. One complaint, though - a U-Boat was extremely unlikely to shoot down one Sunderland, let alone several. Also, they didn't usually travel in groups.

Don't take that as a true negative, though. We've been making the same complaints about the Silent Hunter series since SH3. All I hope is that they see comments like this and try to make it more in line with how dangerous it really was.

[Hjalfnar]

Thanks for the story! Yeah, Sunderlands are bitches...especially in groups. Best chance to survive them is full throttle, evading and diving, and the latter was obviously not an option. Damn!