Anyone kill a friendly? I almost did...

[sharkbit]

Had some time to kill before dinner last night to start my fifth patrol in my good ole VIIB U-48 out of Wilhelmshaven.
I'm a little over a day out when I get a ship sighting mid-morning. I'm in good position, submerge to P-depth. The large freighter gets in range, perfect set up and...bummer, he's a neutral. I let him go. My son(5 y.o) is watching and full of questions and wants to see me "Shoot a ship."

So I continue on. That night, I sight another ship and identify her as a ore carrier. Hmmm...haven't seen one of those alone before. Course is taking her toward Denmark. Probably neutral but she is unlit. All the neutrals I've seen up to now have been lit up. Little bell going off in my head.
Well, I'll make the approach, id the nationality, and whack him if I can.

I get in perfect position-about 1000m off his track and perpindicular to it, decks awash, and slow speed. I finally can start making out his flag and it is definitely not English. I'm telling my son I might not be able to shoot him as well but we'll wait and make sure.
Of course my son is saying to shoot and asking if I can shine a light on him("Searchlight on the U-boat" mod anyone?:p ) or wait till morning.

I start seeing some white on the flag and it almost looks like it is the tri-colors of the French flag. Hmmm.....maybe I will be able to get this guy, but the little warning bell is still going off in my head. I still got a little time before he is in position for me to shoot. I just want to make sure.
All I have to do his open doors and...LOS! My nose is like 3 inches from the screen trying to identify the flag -damn these old eyes!

Time is running out and just as I'm gettting ready to shoot, I see the flag is all red with a white circle in the center and some lines in the circle. Damn...he's German. Of course, a German ore carrier hauling iron ore from Norway. (GWX is awesome!!)
He probably had no idea how close he came to being blown out of the water and causing me to lose a lot of renown.

Moral of the story:
Always make sure of your targets.

Anyone ever kill a friendly? C'mon...admit it.

[seafarer]

Me, no, never, no sirree, not me, not my boat

Now, up north during the Norwegian campaign, I heard, just heard, stray talk and all mind you - of one of our supply ships going down from a torpeding, and there was no intell of any Tommy boats in the area, just our boats. But me and my crew were, uhh, far away. That's it, we were far away - I could tell you where, but then I'd have to kill you, and we don't want that. So just take my word for it, IT WAS NOT US, really and it was reallly realy dark, black as pitch and all, and anyway, we weren't there so....

[predavolk]

No, I'm very careful with that sort of thing. I've definitely stalked some friendly and neutral boats, but I always check the flag first. The closest I came was, I think, shooting at a Brazilian boat near the Med mistakenly thinking they had gone Ally at that point (1940). But I double-checked before firing and discovered my error.

[Kipparikalle]

I kill friendlies when I have nothing else to do, its quite entertaining tho'

So yeah, I have killed. A lot. And I enjoy it

[Slateford-5]

By far the two most tricky flags to tell apart at night: Romania and France.

[irish1958]

John Wayne: "Sink them all and let the Lord sort it out."

[Laughing Swordfish]

Originally Posted by Slateford-5

By far the two most tricky flags to tell apart at night: Romania and France.

If you even suspect it might be French, blow it out of the water. Better to be safe than sorry. And no Brit has ever been sorry about sinking frenchies!

LS

[Frank0001]

Originally Posted by seafarer

Me, no, never, no sirree, not me, not my boat

Now, up north during the Norwegian campaign, I heard, just heard, stray talk and all mind you - of one of our supply ships going down from a torpeding, and there was no intell of any Tommy boats in the area, just our boats. But me and my crew were, uhh, far away. That's it, we were far away - I could tell you where, but then I'd have to kill you, and we don't want that. So just take my word for it, IT WAS NOT US, really and it was reallly realy dark, black as pitch and all, and anyway, we weren't there so....

:rotfl: LOL:rotfl:
That really made my day, just hilarious! :rotfl:

I haven't sunk a friendly ship on purpose before, but I was trigger-happy a few times with the American vessels. When I see one, I immediately think 'USA.....Germany.....lifelong enemies'
So WHAM! there goes another...

...only afterwards realising we were not at war yet

[seafarer]

Originally Posted by Frank0001

I haven't sunk a friendly ship on purpose before, but I was trigger-happy a few times with the American vessels. When I see one, I immediately think 'USA.....Germany.....lifelong enemies'
So WHAM! there goes another...

...only afterwards realising we were not at war yet

We understaaand, really we do. You're confined in a dank steel tube, spending weeks and weeks at sea. Those grey seas, those grey skies. The endless storms and foul weather, the monotony of it all! The dull food, the dreary, monotonous days, watch after watch after watch, with nothing to relieve the mind-numbing dullness. You hardly know whether it's a.m. or p.m., lunch or dinner. One can hardly expect you to know what dang day it is, let alone the month or year.

Memo to BdU - we REALLY need to tighten up our selection protocols for command rank. Two notes re: requirements for command - (a) only people with enough sense to know that humans cannot see in complete darkness and hence, in zero visibilty conditions, should perhaps refrain from firing torpedoes at anything on the surface that moves, and (b) those with sufficient mental faculty to remember to look at a calendar at least once every 12 months

[Frank0001]

Memo to BdU - we REALLY need to tighten up our selection protocols for command rank. Two notes re: requirements for command - (a) only people with enough sense to know that humans cannot see in complete darkness and hence, in zero visibilty conditions, should perhaps refrain from firing torpedoes at anything on the surface that moves, and (b) those with sufficient mental faculty to remember to look at a calendar at least once every 12 months

Haha nicely put :rotfl: And totally right too...

..But!

I was only off by a couple of months

[seafarer]

Sure, sure. As I said, we veterans understaaand these things. And that whole Norwegian campaing thing, I sure, err, that other boat, must have just had a malfunction. A short circuit or something, that just happened to cause a tube (or, perhaps two) to flood, open its outer doors and fire the eel. I'm sure that kind of thing happens more then we care to admit, right?

certainly more then I'm ever going to admit, that's for sure

[richardphat]

First day i try sh3, i sank almost every axis ship because. i didnt know they were our friends......... and yet i cannon them with my deck gun shell

[Frank0001]

Originally Posted by richardphat

First day i try sh3, i sank almost every axis ship because. i didnt know they were our friends......... and yet i cannon them with my deck gun shell

Haha nice one
Anything that doesn't shoot at you, is either friendly or neutral!
Or can't find you

[andym]

Yes,last night i came upon a US vessel,so went along side to have a closer look and the schwein opened fire on me!Put a bloody great hole in my Starboard saddle tank!So i sank him!

[goggles]

never sank a friendly

killed a few neutrals...including a neutral ocean liner (lusitania anyone?)

i always seem to accidently sink american ships before dec 1941

american flag is hard to distinguish from a distance all the stars and bars blur toghter into a red/whit/blueish mess