OUR NAVAL GUNNERY.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 144712, 22 June 1915, Page 5

OUR NAVAL GUNNERY.

SOME INTERESTING FACTS. Many of the letters that have reached Australia and New Zealand from the Dardanelles refer to the remarkable shooting of the Queen Elizabeth with her loin, guns; and last week a cable message from Sydney described the sinking of a Turkish destroyer by a shell from the groat battleship at a distance of ton miles. It is difficult to conceive the, amount of skill and accuracy involved in such shooting as this ; but it is by no means unparalleled in the recent records of our fleet. Thus Sir David Beatty, in his official report of the naval battle in the North Sea, in which the Blucher was sunk, says: “Wo began to hit at 17,000 yards.” To realise what this means, we have to remember that a modem battlecruiser is about 700 ft. long and 90ft. broad, and her hull stands up from the waterline between 20ft. and 30ft. She travels on the average about half a mile a minute, and at 10,000 yards a shell takes eight seconds to reach her. With the mark broadside on, the space in which the shell must fall if a “hit” is' to be recorded is less than 120 ft. (width of deck plus height above waterline). With the enemy cruiser retreating as the German squadron was when the Lion began to hit at 17,000 yards, the mark would, of course, be the total length of the cruiser plus height above water. But even 730 ft. is a very small target at ten miles distance; in fact, it is about the size and thickness of the disc of blacklead in an ordinary pencil when the end is held a foot or so away from the eye. Perhaps this comparison may suggest something of the oxtrordinary difficulties that have to be overcome by our nava! gunnery experts. We must remember that when the Lion was landing shells on the Moltke and the Soyolitz she was travelling at over 30 knots an'hour, and her victims were probably steaming at 27 or 25 knots. The shells of a 13.5 gun at this range would rise in,a curve that would have carried them over the top of the highest Alps before they reached their mark; but so marvellous is the accuracy of range-finding and gun-laying that the shells "got there” most effectively. Of course, there are many minor facts to be taken into account in naval gunnery, such as the pressure of the atmosphere, tho_ temperature, and the degree of moisture in the air; fer the barometer, the thermometer, and the hygrometer all play tluir part in determining what is called “the error of the day”—that is, the margin of allowance that must be made for special meteorological conditions at the moment the gun is fired. For cordite will not behave in the same way at .ill temperatures, and the refracting power of the atmosphere. may play havoc with calculations of distance. But, in spite of all these obstacles, the big guns of tho British fleet make marvellously accurate practice at enormous-distances. The'Navy and the nation- owe a debt that they can hardly hope to discharge to Admiral Fisher and Sir Percy Scott for their untiring efforts to revolutionise our naval gunnery methods. For it was not till ten years back that the modern system of “fire-control” was .introduced, and ’ perfected, largely through 1 the exertion's of Sir Percy Scott; and since then the training of the Navy for active warfare has been completely transformed. In place of the old method of individual prize-fir-ing practice, the fleets are trained at “battle practice;” which monns'in general terras ,'that in the British. Navy nowadays tho warship is regarded simply as a gun-platform. The theory of “battle practice,” we are told, is that “tho captain, gunnery-lieutenant, quartermaster, engineer-commander, and stoker, all co-operate with the guns’ crews with the one object of hitting tho target.” The details of *roattlepractico”—the size of targets, the speed of vessels, and .other essential points—are carefully kept secret; but we can be perfectly satisfied with the result; “We began to hit at 17,000 yards.”—Auckland Star.