BROADSIDES

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIII, Issue 243, 11 September 1933, Page 2

BROADSIDES

BIG GUN SHOOT. THUNDER IN THE GULF. Writing from H.M.A.S. Australia, at sea, on Thursday last, the representative of the Auckland Star says: —There was thunder in the Hauraki Gulf this morning when His Majesty’s Austra.lian ships Canberra and Australia carried out a full-calibre shoot with their eight-inch guns. Each ship fired eleven eight-inch broadsides at a range of 12,000 yards. Preparations for tlie practice occupied very much more time than the shoot itself. Everything on deck was made fast, all awning stanchions were cleared away, boats were securely lashed under canvas covers, wooden doors were lifted off and all scuttles were screwed down. Below, in the wardroom fiat of the Australia, a model of the cruiser, presented to the ship by the builders, rode motionless without the glass case which usually covers it. In the wardroom itself all pictures were unscrewed and lifted down, and special precautions were taken to see that all crockery and other breakables were made snug. By 9 o’clock the Australian squadron, which had been anchored during the night off Kawau Island, was under weigh and proceeding slowly seawards. For nearly an hour it steamed, with littie or no alteration in course. Away on the starboard side, appearing on the rim of the horizon, the big battle practice target was being towed by H.M.S. Dunedin.

“ENEMY IN SIGHT.” Licreasing her lead, the Australian flagship wheeled sharply and headed back in til© direction whence she had come, so that she was steaming on an opposite coarse to that being followed by the Dunedin and target. Up till this stage the flagship’s big Bin guns had been pointing fore and aft, but with the distanoe between ship and target at 12,000 yards came the information “enemy in sight.” Simultaneously the four gun-turrets swung round and rapidly the range and angles were applied. Everything was ready. With a mighty roar the flagship fired her first broadside. From the eight gun-months came ' a blinding flash of flame and a smother of brown smoke. Officers on the bridge, with sea glasses glued to their eyes, focussed on the target and waited for the shells to land. A column of water, higher than the target, told that the first shot had landed, and a fraction of a second later seven more snowy waterspouts reared themselves upward. A sicond time the guns thundered, and again the target was partly hidden from view behind the high columns of water that the shells sent up. In all, the Canberra fired 11 broadsides, and as the result of the last was seen an officer on the Australia was heard to remark, “Nicely straddled.” Having shown her teeth, the Canberra handed over the attack lo her consort cruiser, which all this time had been steaming slowly on her original course. Smartly the Australia put about and picked up the wake of her flagship. Gun turrets swung round and the shoot was cn. In deafening chorus tire eight guns roared and a cloud of brown smoke floated back over the ship. Viewed at close quarters the flash of the guns was blinding and t ie concussitn threatened to throw one off one s feet. No sooner had one clap iff thunder died away, leaving llie air snangely still, then the guns roared again, until the 11 broadsides had been fired. Before the action cotton wool had been much in demand for plugging ears, and during the firing even weather-worn veterans were seen to put their hands to the sides of their heads as an additional safeguard against headaches. CREW AT ACTION STATIONS.

Throughout the action the cruiser’s full company had been at action stations. In the ’tween decks a fire party was ready with hoses, repair parties were at their stations forward and aft, a flood and trim party was just ns it would have been had there been any real danger of an enemy shell making it necessary for the cruiser to be quickly trimmed. In various parts of the ship men were ready with gas masks. With the firing over, gun crews immediately “sponged out” their guns, and on deck and below the ship was quickly given back her normal appearance. The effect of the firing can be gauged from the fact that on returning to his cabin, two decks below the quarter deck, a Press photographer found towels shaken off their hooks and a cup and saucer, left on the top of a flat sea chest, in fragments on the floor. TORPEDOES IN THE AIR.

Referring to a torpedo attack the writer stated: —With little else than a sharp hiss, the torpedoes shot from their tubes in the waists of the ships to splash, like huge fish, into the water 20 yards out from the sides of the cruisers. Smothered in grease, so that all but their scarlet heads looked as if varnished, they sent up short columns of spray as they dived out of sight. Their double propellers, set racing as they left the tubes, boiled up a snowy track for a short distance as the machines sped on their way. With their starboard tubes empty, the cruisers put about sharply in order that their port tubes might be fired on the same target. The practices completed, the warships reduced speed and altered their course to chase after and pick up their valuable “fish,” whose tracks had been followed by the flying boats. In such practices the amazingly complicated mechanism of the torpedo is so adjusted as to make it travel a certain distance at a certain mean depth. When the set distance has been covered, the torpedo comes up with its head bobbing lazily on the surface. Brightly burning calcium carbide helps in the locating of the spent “fish,” which is hooked on to one or other of the cruisers’ seaboats and towed alongside the warships to be lifted on board again. A machine costing anything up to £SOOO cannot be fired away in times of peace and left to look after itself. SPECTACULAR NIGHT ACTION. With the darkness came the most spectacular exercise (A >he day’s programme. At dusk the two squadrons converged, and as the light faded, all four ships were darkened, and the two New Zealand cruisers steamed out of sight. For perhaps half an hour the Australian vessels proceeded at a leisurely cruising speed, with not a single light showing. Of the enemy ships there was no sign. Astern the lighthouse on Tiri winked the way towards the myriad of lights that were the port and city of Auckland. Suddenly, a long blue-white arm of light reached out, and threw up the Canberra in a blaze of light. Simultaneously the searchlights from the other three cruisers were brought into play, each quickly finding an enemy ship on which to focus. In the matter of seconds. 4-inch guns were raining star shells which lighted up the surrounding darkness so that all four ships could be the more clearly seen. High above the cruisers the shells burst, and the lights floated ever so slowly down to the sea, like huge yellow Chinese lanterns. For five minutes or so the guns banged away merrily, and then the firing ceased as suddenly as it had com-

me need. Navigation lights were switched on, deadlights lifted, and again the two squadrons were on friendly terms.