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At random: Fleet Admiral Halsey in a book called "The Admirals" when asked "What is the ultimate strategic weapon that is bringing the enemy to its knees? Halsey's reply "If I had to give credit to the instruments and machines that won us the war in the Pacific, I would rank them in this order: SUBMARINES, FIRST; RADAR, SECOND; PLANES, THIRD AND BULLDOZERS FOURTH."
Human Torpedos.
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Hairball
Posted 2009-11-17 12:45 PM (#32487)
Senior Crew

Posts: 168

Location: St. John's, Newfoundland.
Subject: Human Torpedos.

I’ve been watching a movie about, ‘human torpedoes,’ where two riders sit astride a modified torpedo which they then navigate into a harbor and attach a warhead to a warship. The one thing that strikes me is that all of them have the two man crew sitting bolt-upright on their steed. This must have created a lot of drag by doubling the head-on cross-sectional area while making them difficult to manoeuvre.

But they were effective. On December 21st 1941 an Italian team called, “The Sea Devils,” with three of these vessels entered Gibraltar Harbor (or Malta) and put the Battleships, HMS Valliant, HMS Elizabeth and a the tanker Segona out of action.

But did anyone come up with the idea of having the two man crew lay face down? They could have still read their compass and when needed - take her up and sit upright to, in other words, ‘up-periscope.’

By laying flat I think it would have been possible to increase the speed, range and controllability of their craft.

Did anyone try this?

Cheers, Hairball
610ET
Posted 2012-09-24 12:04 PM (#59541 - in reply to #32487)


Old Salt

Posts: 438

Location: Fort Lauderdale, FL
Subject: RE: Human Torpedos.

A little different than what you asked about.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaiten
rover177
Posted 2012-09-25 6:08 AM (#59550 - in reply to #32487)
Master and Commander

Posts: 1576

Location: Wollongong, NSW
Subject: RE: Human Torpedos.

The Germans had some whereby the pilot pointed the torpedo at the target and then bailed out shortly before it hit - apparently the casualty rate was high. Have not yet researched them.
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