So how did a captain decide the tonnage of a sunken ship?

Ping Panther · 01-22-09, 12:47 PM

I had read a very detailed book from a Pacific fleet submariner a while ago that indicated that it was very common to surface right after a merchant sinking. Primarily, this surface contact was made for establishing a very accurate ship-kill report while on patrol. The sub captain would verify tonnage, cargo, and in particular the ship name/I.D, route from port-to-port info., etc. The author indicated that most of the estimates of sub captains of ship tonnages that were not checked on at sea, were often greatly exaggerated in the initial sub patrol records. Usually, many post-war verifications of war-time shipping logistics records from merchant ship home port offices uncovered many of these inflated battle statistics.

01-22-09, 12:47 PM	#8
Ping Panther Lieutenant Join Date: Sep 2007 Location: the armpit of the Mid-Atlantic / Quadrant CA42 Posts: 262 Downloads: 8 Uploads: 0	I had read a very detailed book from a Pacific fleet submariner a while ago that indicated that it was very common to surface right after a merchant sinking. Primarily, this surface contact was made for establishing a very accurate ship-kill report while on patrol. The sub captain would verify tonnage, cargo, and in particular the ship name/I.D, route from port-to-port info., etc. The author indicated that most of the estimates of sub captains of ship tonnages that were not checked on at sea, were often greatly exaggerated in the initial sub patrol records. Usually, many post-war verifications of war-time shipping logistics records from merchant ship home port offices uncovered many of these inflated battle statistics.