A six foot wide gold chrysanthemum crest crowned the sleek construction of her special hydrodynamic bow, which helped Yamato plow through the sea resistance and enhanced her speed. Driven by twelve Kampon boilers and engines that could generate all of 150,000 horsepower for her quadruple three blade propellers, she ran at 27 knots, an engineering marvel for her day. To do so she consumed 70 tons of fuel each hour.
Inside the ship was a maze of passageways and compartments, so complicated that the decks were painted with arrows indicating which direction was forward so her crew of 2800 men could find their way around. There were 1,150 watertight compartments in her hull design to restrict or allow flooding to correct a list if necessary. Even her massive fuel stores could be moved by pumps to special compartments to help correct a list as much as ten degrees.
Now the cranes and catapults on her enormous aft deck were feverishly working to launch two more of her seven seaplanes. One was already in the air, but these two would be tasked with helping gunfire direction by spotting shell falls near the target, as her guns could lob shells well over the horizon. The ship already knew the approximate position of her enemy, and even now the range finders perched atop her hundred foot high main mast were scanning the dark glistening seas ahead to try and pinpoint their sighting. To either side of this point, two flat antennae jutted like squarish black ears, the Model 1 Mark 2 set, which ranged out to 20,000 meters. It would not work that night, as her foe was quietly jamming the 1.5 meter band to render it useless, though it seldom worked at all after the first firing of the enormous guns. The concussion was so great that the radar sets would be shaken senseless.
Yet even without her fire control radars, Yamato had other means of sighting and aiming her powerful guns. The quality of her optical fire control systems were matched only by the Bismarck, and for combat at night, she had no other equal on earth, until Kirov arrived. Yet the actual system used to control and aim her guns was primitive compared to the capabilities of the enemy she now faced.
The Type 92 Shagekiban low angle analog computer used on Yamato was first developed by the Aichi Clock Company in 1932. It was a complex system relying on information from numerous sources outside the computer itself, and the efforts of at least seven operators. A graphic plotter noted the basic heading and speed of the target, and calculated bearing change versus time. A range averaging panel selected out the most likely range by averaging results obtained from several optical rangefinders. The main panel of the device had displays for present range and rate of change, spot correction, the speed of the firing ship and its bearing, wind deflection, a compass card and other functions. It worked in close cooperation with the type 94 Hoiban gun director, and other control systems on the ship, and thus its overall operation could be degraded when any of these supporting systems were damaged or put out of action by enemy fire.
The entire effort of the machine was to produce one vital calculation: future target position. It was, in effect, a time machine trying to peer into the future and see where the enemy ship would be two minutes on. The seven man team saw one man reading range averages and bearing plots, a second slowly cranking a wheel to set the range change obtained by this control officer. Other men adjusted the settings for bearing, deflection correction, ship speed, target inclination, compass course from the gyro, and then the final variable was the all important averaging of the range solutions obtained by different rangefinders. This man exercised his best judgment of the results he received, favoring one or excluding another that he deemed inconsistent or invalid. In short, he was making his best guess of the actual range from a weight of opinion obtained from three to five different rangefinders. As such, the system required a great deal of manual input, and as a gun battle continued, human factors such as fatigue, fear, distraction and other emotional responses all played a part in the final solution obtained.
By contrast, Kirov’s electronic systems were a million times quicker to their solution, and there were layers of possible ways to target the enemy—radar, laser range finding and HD optics as well. The difference meant one thing in the end: Kirov found her enemy in the here and now. It did not have to predict where the target would be at some future time. What Kirov fired at she was going to hit, and virtually without fail. What Yamato fired at she might hit, given enough time and just a little good luck in the mix. The one remaining factor was this: did Kirov have enough warheads left to put damage on the target sufficient to ‘mission kill’ or sink it before Yamato obtained that one lucky hit that could cripple its enemy?
With the sudden appearance and attack by the Japanese night fighters concluded, Karpov now returned to Samsonov, intent on his principle target.
“Reset range to target data feeds,” he said his breath now controlled as he imposed calm on himself.
“Target at 32,300 meters and closing.”
“We’ll continue with two Moskit II missiles now. Give me one for low level attack but key elevation at the number two strike setting. Then I want the second set for plunging descent. Clear?”
“Aye, sir, missiles keyed to targets and ready.”
~ ~ ~
Admiral Yamamoto arrived on the bridge just in time to see them coming, two bright lights in the sky, faster than any plane he had ever seen. It was astounding! One came surging in at sea level, and the second fell from the sky like a flaming meteor, a bolt of lightning thrown from the Gods above. The sea skimmer hit first, rising ten feet just before it hit the ship to just barely clear the main weather deck and strike amidships, twenty feet to the left of the fire still raging from the P-900 attack. Seconds later the ship was rocked again and the plunging missile came down from above, falling on the aft section where it struck right atop the armored six inch gun turret mounted just behind the main guns, penetrating with its tremendous kinetic impact and a 450kg warhead. The smaller turret was a total loss, and a large secondary explosion blasted against the back of the more heavily armored number three turret, shaking it badly, though its massive armor was not compromised.
Only the armor on that six inch turret had prevented the missile from plunging deeper into the ship, and while the secondary explosion was serious, it was not fatal with the much smaller rounds stored beneath the turret in a well protected magazine. It was only the ready ammo that had already been lifted higher into the turret itself that detonated in the second explosion. Elsewhere, the sea skimmer took out two 127mm batteries on the port side of the ship, then struck the main superstructure behind them, and flailed the tall inclined smoke stack with tearing shrapnel. Kirov had scored a powerful reprisal to the damage done to her own engine ventilation system, but the fires aboard Yamato were now much more severe.
Undaunted, the battleship charged ahead toward her enemy, and Admiral Yamamoto spoke in a firm controlled voice. “We will not allow this to go unanswered. Fire your main guns, Captain. Fire at once!”
Thirty seconds later they heard the bugles sounding over the roar and commotion of the firefighting effort aft. They were a warning for all crew members that the massive main turrets were about to fire their guns in anger at an enemy ship for the very first time. Yamamoto saw the two forward batteries elevate their barrels, rotate a few degrees to port, and then the night was ravaged by the enormous blast of six 18.1 inch guns. Any man who had not heeded the brave bugle call in warning was thrown from his feet, some knocked unconscious by the tremendous concussion.
Yamato had thrown her first punches, a strong right hook followed by an uppercut meant to find and demolish her foe, and end the battle in one titanic blast.
Part XI
SHADOW ON THE SEA
“Ships that pass in the night, and speak to each other in passing,
only a signal shown, and a distant voice in the darkness;
So on the ocean of life, we pass and speak to one another,
only a look and a voice, then darkness again and a silence.”
~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Chapter 31
&nb
sp; Down in the heart of the ship, Admiral Volsky sat with Dobrynin, watching the digital readouts for neutron flux levels in the core. The Chief Engineer fingered his monitor, pointing out a violet line. “You see that variation is ten points high, yet it is not sustained. Look how it pulses up and down, almost like a heartbeat.”
“And this only happens after you run this maintenance routine? Have you checked the earlier records—data from our sea trials before this mission?”
“I have, sir, but I had no such readings in the past until… Well until we installed that new maintenance control rod. It’s the number twenty-five rod, sir, and we installed a new one at Severomorsk just before we set sail for the live fire exercises. I ran maintenance on the number thirteen rod, and dipped number twenty-five for the first time about six hours before that incident with the Orel.”
“I see,” said Volsky. “It looks like thirteen was our lucky number, or unlucky, depending on how you look at it I suppose. Then every time you have used it since we have experienced these odd time displacements.”
The rumble and roar of the missiles firing above was a pointed distraction, their eyes looking up to the ceiling, as if seeing the battle begin through the many decks above them.
“What could be so special about this rod twenty-five?”
“I don’t know, sir. All I can say is that these variations occurred after it was installed.”
“Well, knowing this much is a good deal more than we knew before. Thank you, Chief. It was your keen ear for the equipment that put us on this trail. Now Fedorov thinks we can choose where and when we move the ship, in time as well as space, and from the sound of things I think he is getting eager to hurry on from this year and say goodbye to the 1940s for good. Listen, Dobrynin. Fedorov gave me this list earlier. He wrote down the times he believes we have moved and he wanted to compare it to the time log on your maintenance procedure. I think he is counting hours now, yes? He wants to know the average time between the completion of the procedure and our time displacements. Can you calculate it?”
“Certainly sir. Just give me a minute, I’ll have Mister Garin take care of it.”
Minutes later they heard the firing of yet another missile, and Volsky knew the sound of the weapons as well as Dobrynin knew the song of his reactor.
“That was a P-300 SAM,” said the Admiral, “the last one we had.” They heard a distant explosion, then the droning wail of aircraft engines growling louder, the chatter of machine gun fire followed by the sharp whirring rattle of Kirov’s close in defense systems.”
All Volsky could think of was that a seaplane had attempted to make an attack on the ship. Then Dobrynin’s eyes were pulled to a yellow warning light on his reactor panel.
“What’s this,” he breathed. “We’re losing ventilation pressure on the turbines.” He began fiddling with some controls, but it was not long before Byko reported that the main shafts at the rear of the tall central con area had been perforated by a strafing attack. It wasn’t serious, he said, but it was going to cause some variation in the pressure for a while.
“One of the rounds must have penetrated a little deeper,” he said over the intercom. “I’m putting some men on it now.”
“That will cost us some speed,” said Dobrynin. “You’ll lose two or three knots. I’ll see what I can do.”
They soon heard something Admiral Volsky had hoped he would never have to listen to again, the sound of a heavy caliber main gun shell screaming through the night, aiming for his ship. The distant swoosh and explosion of the heavy rounds in the sea was also audible, and it gave him no comfort to think that shells the size and weight of his car back home were now being hurled at his ship.
But Kirov had nothing to fear from those huge rounds for the moment. It was a much smaller shell that would cause the problem, just a twenty millimeter round that had pierced the ventilation shaft down low, near the base of the main con mast, and traveled inward deep enough to nick a small metal hose that was carrying the outflow from the reactor’s secondary cooling water cycle. The water was used to generate the steam that would drive her turbines. It seemed a small wound compared to the damage the ship had suffered earlier, just a pin prick in fact. But it was to have far graver consequences. Pressure dropped. The heat in the steam reaction changed with the reduced water flow. For a time the steam would actually increase with the added temperature, but the heat was rising too rapidly there and the water flowing through the U tubes that would eventually return to the reactor core was getting too hot.
Temperature and pressure are part of the delicate balance in any reactor core, and Dobrynin was soon to have more on his hands than a strange neutron flux.
~ ~ ~
The big rounds fell wide and very long, as Fedorov expected the first salvo would. There was virtually no chance the opening salvos would find their target under these conditions, and he was surprised the ship had even fired with the range at 28,000 meters. The British battleship Warspite had managed a stunning hit on the Italian dreadnought Giulio Cesare at 26,000 yards, and the German battlecruiser Scharnhorst had achieved the same with a long range hit on the carrier Glorious, but these were rare events for the record books, and seldom achieved in most combat at sea.
He knew that spotter planes would be calling out the shell falls even now, and watching Kirov’s wake closely to note any curvature that would indicate a new heading change. It would take some time for the enemy to slowly adjust her fire and find the correct range and bearing, and in that time Kirov had to punish the ship so badly that it could no longer pose a threat.
Thankfully they still had the means to do so. They could already see the fires flaring up amidships on the HD video screen, and knew they had hurt their enemy, putting more missiles on this target with four hits than any other ship they had fought, yet its speed was undiminished, and there was obviously nothing wrong with her guns. Yamato was still a dangerous threat.
Karpov noted the fires himself, reaching up to adjust the fit of his cap briefly. “Missiles remaining?” he asked calmly.
“Six Moskit-IIs still ready sir. Four P-900 cruise missiles; five MOS-III.” They were down to fifteen missiles.
“I read three small contacts closing to 24,000 meters” said Rodenko. “Those must be destroyers.”
“Very well. Activate forward deck guns, both the 152mm and 100mm guns please. Engage those targets at once.”
The Captain wanted to pepper the destroyers well beyond the range of their small deck guns, but he was forgetting the enemy torpedoes, and minutes after the deck guns had begun their work he saw Tasarov stiffen, eyes alight, and his own heart leapt with the thought that they now also had a submarine to contend with.
“Torpedoes in the water!” said Tasarov, “multiple contacts. Three, now five… now eight contacts from a bearing of 225 degrees.”
“Submarine?”
“No, sir. Those must be off those destroyers.”
“I’ll handle this,” said Fedorov. “Helm, left rudder twenty. Come to 45 degrees northeast.”
“Helm answering and coming around on 45 degrees, sir, aye.”
Fedorov was turning his backside to the torpedoes, presenting the slimmest possible target. Though the Long Lance torpedoes could easily close the distance, he had little fear they would find his ship. They could not home on his wake, and all he had to do was watch carefully for their approach and steer an evasive course if necessary. He knew the Japanese destroyers had fired in anger more than anything else, as their own ships were straddled with Kirov’s accurate gun fire.
“Two more Moskit-IIs on the battleship,” said Karpov firmly. “Same program, above and below. We’ll give them another one-two punch.”
“Aye sir,” said Samsonov, “missiles firing.”
Yamato was going to suffer again, but even as the sleek missiles leapt up and declined to their aiming points, the men on the bridge saw the night horizon ripped open yet again as the enemy guns sought them in the darkness. The bright backwash
of the missile firing lit the ship up, and the sharp eyes aboard the crow’s nests tuned their superb night optics another few points to the good.
Yamato’s second salvo would also miss; Kirov’s would not. The Sunburns struck the ship aft again, one slamming directly into the massive rear turret this time, and the second plunging down on the broad fantail where it hit one of the huge cranes and exploded before its armor piercing warhead could strike the 200mm deck armor. The deck was still buckled downward with the explosion, and the missile fuel now ignited another fire aft, right in the midst of the seaplane tending operations. No more spotting planes would rise to search for the enemy, and two that had been spotted on the catapults were immolated.
As for the aft turret, it had been turned to face the distant unseen foe, and the missile struck just beneath the leftmost gun barrel, flush against its hardened faceplate of 26 inch steel. The gun barrel was jerked upwards by the explosion so violently that the gears used to elevate and depress it were broken and made inoperable. The crew inside the turret took a fearful pounding, and new fires were raging outside their massive armored shell, but the armor held. Seven men had been knocked senseless, yet others were crawling up from the depths of the huge magazines below, to take their place. Two of the three guns could still be fired. The turret was still in the fight.
Kirov III: Pacific Storm k-3 Page 28