Friday on the History Channel

[Captain_Nemo]

22:00 EDT

Dogfights: Death of the Japanese Navy

I believe they sink Yamato in this one. I'm looking forward to it!!!

 

[Sgt. Brassones]

Watched this one a few weeks ago, must be a repeat. Indeed, it is very good.

 

[Chernobyl]

have to remember to record it this time...

 

[BuShips]

I've now seen this twice, so far. I'll eventually need to add it to my DVD collection, as it's a good one (you can buy it from History Channel). The artist that made my avatar did the graphics for the Yamato in it. A great companion DVD to find is "Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors", and is titled the same as the book that came out several years ago. James Hornfisher (iirc) is the author. This particular battle (The Battle Off Samar) I have read dozens of times over the past 20 years and I never get bored with it (!). What's really creepy is that it happened on the 90th anniversary of the Charge of the Light Brigade... :shock:

 

[Captain_Nemo]

I just finished that book. It was creepy. I got goosebumps when he quoted the message that alerted CinCPAC and Hornfisher wondered if the irony was caught by anyone on the receiving end.

The guy that did your your avatar also did the Bismarck for the Dogfights series, did you catch that one too?

I f you missed set your VCR or Tivo for 11AM EST this Friday on the History Channel.

 

[BuShips]

I just finished that book. It was creepy. I got goosebumps when he quoted the message that alerted CinCPAC and Hornfisher wondered if the irony was caught by anyone on the receiving end.

The guy that did your your avatar also did the Bismarck for the Dogfights series, did you catch that one too?

I f you missed set your VCR or Tivo for 11AM EST this Friday on the History Channel.

Oh yeah, that wasn't lost on me. :wink: He does some very nice work. I'll bounce something back at you, now. Did you know that he got the trip of his lifetime as was hired by James Cameron (Titanic film director/producer) and translated for the guest veteran survivors of the Bismarck :!:. He even went down in one of the minisubs to the bottom and saw the Bismarck up close! To be able to reach out and touch history like that is one om my life's dreams.

 

[BuShips]

Hey James Cameron, if you ever read this, take me on an "Expedition Musashi", OK??? :idea: :shock:

 

[DM]

Hey James Cameron, if you ever read this, take me on an "Expedition Musashi", OK???

Ha, no chance of that, there's no mony in it. He's too busy milking the "Christ's Tomb" thing at the moment to worry about mere ships

 

[Captain_Nemo]

Hey JC walked on water does that count???

Sorry to you religious types I couldn't help it.

Anyway, Buships I did read that on the guys website, right after you started using that avatar. I followed the link and just turned green with envy. well for a little while at least.

 

[BuShips]

Hey James Cameron, if you ever read this, take me on an "Expedition Musashi", OK???

Ha, no chance of that, there's no mony in it. He's too busy milking the "Christ's Tomb" thing at the moment to worry about mere ships

My theory is that while the Musashi may be resting deep, it might be close to intact, unlike her sister ship. I'd REALLY like to see the Musashi through the viewports of a minisub. The cold water in that trench should keep the ship in good condition, as was how they found the Yorktown at Midway. I also think there are divers looking for the Fuso and Yamashiro at Surigao Straight. Those poor ships never had a chance. Talk about getting beat up in a dead-end alley :shock: .

 

[Fitzwalrus]

I'll throw in something from out in left field here.
A buddy of mine who follows various scientific journals has mentioned that supposedly steel manufactured after July or August of 1945 has all picked up a certain amount of radioactivity to varying degrees from background atomic radiation. This contamination allegedly makes it unusable for the manufacture of certain types of critical scientific measuring devices. As the supply of pre-atomic steel diminishes (and it's just about gone now) the only remaining source on the planet are the wrecks of WWII warships, and that is why there has been such an effort of late to try and locate as many as possible: to recover the steel.

Not saying I necessarily buy this particular theory, but it's something to consider. Has anyone else heard or seen anything along those lines?

 

[BuShips]

I'll throw in something from out in left field here.
A buddy of mine who follows various scientific journals has mentioned that supposedly steel manufactured after July or August of 1945 has all picked up a certain amount of radioactivity to varying degrees from background atomic radiation. This contamination allegedly makes it unusable for the manufacture of certain types of critical scientific measuring devices. As the supply of pre-atomic steel diminishes (and it's just about gone now) the only remaining source on the planet are the wrecks of WWII warships, and that is why there has been such an effort of late to try and locate as many as possible: to recover the steel.

Not saying I necessarily buy this particular theory, but it's something to consider. Has anyone else heard or seen anything along those lines?

Well, that at least explains why the Japanese rebuilt the sunken Yamato into a spaceship, lol. I always wondered about that, and now your story comes along to make sense of it. :lol:

On a more serious note, if there is anything to this story (and I just can't swallow that, even if it was in a technical journal), there will be a group of naval history nuts (me being one of them) that will replicate the Greenpeace method and place ourselves at the battleship memorials and sinking sites between them and the salvage companies... :evil:

 

[DM]

Not saying I necessarily buy this particular theory, but it's something to consider. Has anyone else heard or seen anything along those lines?

He is quite correct. Its one reason why there is some concern about wrecks designated as war graves.

 

[BuShips]

Not saying I necessarily buy this particular theory, but it's something to consider. Has anyone else heard or seen anything along those lines?

He is quite correct. Its one reason why there is some concern about wrecks designated as war graves.

Well, let's hope that we begin mining space asteroids for metal soon, or I'm going to start up an outfit called "Greypeace" as in "battleship grey", to keep these scavengers away from the memorials and wargraves. :shock: :evil: At least I can skip guarding the Saratoga, Nagato and the ships near them as another group of scientists messed them up with something called the "Able" and "Baker" tests . Maybe that's the idea to take from to save these ships? If anti-logging activists can "spike" a tree with nails in order to mess up the saws of the mills, then maybe someone will place some "radiation warning" bouys near the wreck sites at Ironbottom Sound, Truk Atoll and other places to chase those metal-scavenging buzzards away :lol:. While normally on the side of the scientists, on this subject I'd be flaming mad if they started cutting up the war-graves. :evil:. I wonder if they're licking their chops over the salvage of the Admiral Graf Spee to be saved as a museum. Those people better put guards on those pieces... :wink:

 

[Jellicoe]

Not saying I necessarily buy this particular theory, but it's something to consider. Has anyone else heard or seen anything along those lines?

Yes, I have visited a number of research labs in Germany which made use of steel raised from ships at Scapa Flow.

 

[BuShips]

Not saying I necessarily buy this particular theory, but it's something to consider. Has anyone else heard or seen anything along those lines?

Yes, I have visited a number of research labs in Germany which made use of steel raised from ships at Scapa Flow.

This is fascinating, even if it is a bit "threatening" to my beloved warships. With the lack of crew loss that the event of scuttling at Scapa Flow was, maybe that is a good place to find raw steel for their instruments. Let us hope that they don't need too many instruments... :shock:

 

[Fitzwalrus]

Not saying I necessarily buy this particular theory, but it's something to consider. Has anyone else heard or seen anything along those lines?

Yes, I have visited a number of research labs in Germany which made use of steel raised from ships at Scapa Flow.

This is fascinating, even if it is a bit "threatening" to my beloved warships. With the lack of crew loss that the event of scuttling at Scapa Flow was, maybe that is a good place to find raw steel for their instruments. Let us hope that they don't need too many instruments... :shock:

I don't know how much scrap is left at Scapa (if any) but the point the original article apparently made was that most of the world's supply of even the older steel has been mixed and melted together with postwar scrap materials at some point, so there really is very little "uncontaminated" material left.
I suppose any pre-'45 shipwreck could supply uncontaminated steel, but underwater recovery is very dangerous work and it makes more sense to go after a 20 or 30,000 ton warship wreck than a 5 or 10,000 ton freighter. The grade of steel in warship armor is much better, as well.

Weird stuff.... :?

 

[Jellicoe]

It's not only a matter of the quality of the steel its also the form it comes in. You don't find thick slabs of armour on merchant ships nor is it usually cast in such a form today as there is little use for it. So if you need that type of material as part of a particle accelerator or whatever its the only source you can turn to.

 

[Fitzwalrus]

It's not only a matter of the quality of the steel its also the form it comes in. You don't find thick slabs of armour on merchant ships nor is it usually cast in such a form today as there is little use for it. So if you need that type of material as part of a particle accelerator or whatever its the only source you can turn to.

Exactly. Even if you did recover metal from merchant ships it would have to be remelted and recast before it could be used, which means you're using the smelting equipment that has alrady been used to work the contaminated steel and/or scrap, and you're right back where you started.... :roll:

 

[BuShips]

It's not only a matter of the quality of the steel its also the form it comes in. You don't find thick slabs of armour on merchant ships nor is it usually cast in such a form today as there is little use for it. So if you need that type of material as part of a particle accelerator or whatever its the only source you can turn to.

Exactly. Even if you did recover metal from merchant ships it would have to be remelted and recast before it could be used, which means you're using the smelting equipment that has alrady been used to work the contaminated steel and/or scrap, and you're right back where you started.... :roll:

...unless it's important enough to construct "clean" smelters made especially for the purpose :wink:.

Alright, let's get down to business and quit kidding around here gentlemen. We need to decide how to divide up the guard-duty :shock:. Fitz, it's now your particular job to guard those Liberty ship bows in Portland (for those on the East side of the pond, that's Portland, Oregon, USA) and the parts of the old battleship Oregon on Waterfront Park . As for me, there is a brass porthole from the Oregon in a local Chinese restaurant that I'll take responsibility for. After all, I don't know that they don't need radiation-free brass, so we better be sure :shock:. Jellicoe can guard the Belfast, so that's covered. All right, who's next? :lol: