My Longest Shot

[sharkbit]

Thought I'd share:
I'm on my third patrol in the Med out of La Spezia in Jan. of 1943(the Med gives you a whole different challenge, doesn't it? ). I pick up a Granville freighter escorted by a Hunt III frigate in the afternoon with mirror like seas and I'm submerged and right on the target's track . I'm trying to get off the track as quickly and quietly as possible but the escort picks me up and drives me down for about a half an hour or so.

I plot an end around to get ahead of him after dark for a night surface attack. I get in good position ahead of him after dark and in good position. I want to keep my distance though when in firing position because the escort has radar and I've not been having very good luck dealing with escorts with radar.

So I get set up about 4500m off his track with decks awash and wait for the escort to pass and the freighter to get in position. I fire 3 eels-initially planned two but I was not very confident about my chances of a hit at that range and I am still pretty new at manual targeting.

After about a four and half minute run time that seemed to take forever, the stop watch was past the red line and I thought I had missed with all three eels when the last 2 eels hit.
Oddly enough, there was no "Torpedo impact" message. Only a quick "She's going down!" message.
She went down quick with a big explosion and lots of smoke, but I was too far away to see much and it was too dark.

I just don't like these long shots, but at this stage in the war, they may become more and more necessary. I'm just so used to 1-2 km shots. Also, I try to aim at different spots on the ship when firing a spread, so it was difficult to see the target at that range in the dark and exactly where on the ship my UZO crosshairs were pointed on the ship when I fired. I may have to do a little more training to get used to some of these longer shots.