Otto has just come back from his second patrol.
Starting out at 4.10.39 heading out sank a number of freighters, including a Norwegian ship that didn't have lights on and Graf thought it was British. After patrolling the grid for the time frame needed, U-35 went hunting north of Ewe and Southwest of Scapa, in a storm he found a V&W crossing his bows at a ideal angle, and a single eel put it in the bottom in seconds, no time for lifeboats, and quickly another DD, this time a J class came along the same line, but they had lost sight of each other in the storm and the J Class stumbled on like a dunk girl at a nightclub. It too was sunk and U-35 sailed on, wishing the sailors best of luck in the storm, and glad to adding to the misery of the Royal Navy. The rest of the patrol consisted of putting eels in single merchants on the North West coast of scotland, and had just put the finishing touches of a sinking, when the boat had a real scare as the watch officer, Gustav Reschinsy spotted a plane, his alarm saved the boat as we just had enough time to crash dive before bullets and bombs fell. Other then glancing off the bottom as the boat didn't stop fast enough once Otto realized that he was in just 40 some odd meters of water, and sunk a last coastal freighter with the last two eels and then returned home. Gustav Received a Iron Cross, 2nd class, and Otto has informed him that after the next patrol, he will be released for his own command. Patrol results Crew losses: 0 Ships sunk: 8 Aircraft destroyed: 0 Patrol tonnage: 23297 tons |
July 1940. Kiel. Just finished my 11th patrol in the type IIA U-6.
One ore carrier and a medium merchant sunk in the area of AN55 for ~12000GRT (4 short range impact pistol, 1 dud). Have noted increased RN ASW activity but bad weather helped me to avoid them and kept the RAF grounded. Have finally upgraded to a type VIIB :woot: We've sortied for patrol 12 but have only gone as far as the Kiel breakwater. Wow the VII is fast compared to the type II. Doing 14kts at ahead standard. She's so quick and I was so busy admiring the boat I scraped it along side the Kriegsmarine pilot boat taking me out of the harbour :oops: Luckily no damage. Just a dent or two, some scratched paint and many red faces. I'll never live that down. Do I need all these crew members? I notice there's not enough beds like in the type II, so where to keep the extra's - the torp rooms or the inactive engine? Looking forward to going into action tonight once I get home from RL. :) -kwm Career #1 @ 60% difficulty |
Monk, it better to put them in the inactive engine then the torp room in regards to fatigue....
and congrats on the VII, just as a note, the II, while not having many torpedoes and no deck gun, is very nimble, and the VII can get a great II captain killed by not timing it up right. :shucks: |
Started a new campaign in the Med out of Salamis with the 23rd/29th Flotilla. On way to patrol grid I came across a small convoy of two granvilles escorted by FOUR Black Swan destroyers, I shadowed them for a bit and got in front of them to set up an attack run. Then the Luftwaffe show up and start to bomb the merchants. after the planes got shot down I sank both merchants and then started getting depth charged by all the destroyers. After about 40 minutes some stukkas show up and sink one of the destroyers and while the other three are caught up i slipped away to safety. Thanks fly boys! :salute:
Wish I could have taken screen shots but it doesn't work and trying with FRAPS causes CTD :cry: |
While on the way to DG99, on my second patrol after taking over U-64 from her first commander, I received on 4 September, 1940, at around 2345 hours, a radio contact report of a large convoy approximately 60km from me in CG42.
It's now 0730 in CG75 and I've attempted five attacks, two which have been successful. The first attack netted a large cargo and a large tanker at 0236 on 5 September, while the second one netted a large merchant and an ore carrier on 6 September at approximately 0220 hours, for a total GRT of 35002. Of the three unsuccessful attempts, two of them I aborted due to poor positioning, while the third one resulted from an early detection by the escorts, who swarmed in my direction like bees to spilled honey. Twice now the convoy has made slight course changes, making a good intercept resolution difficult. I've been harrassing them for about a day and a half and I'm still shadowing them as we 'speak', calculating their course once again before heading off at flank speed to reach a good interception point. |
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I then used a picture editor to change these to jpeg's and then upload to somewhere like photobucket and post the photobucket link here. |
@ fozzy 22 - check yr PM's. :up:
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10 jan '43
I am being chased by a DD in the med for more than 8 hours! Will I ever make it through? It's quite wierd and never happend to me something like that, I am at 230 m and I've finished the bolds... I don't know if the boat will resist; I hope is not some kind of bug. |
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At the end I made it. :woot: Now I am back safe and sound to La Spezia. But that wasn't a nice experience. |
ich bin auf Rockall Bank.
...days come and go like the waves around us. Nov 1939. we have been here for weeks. the weather is flat calm, constant sun. we wait. we hear nothing from BdU other than wait. we think something is coming. the crew are restless. we had a birthday and threw him in the sea because he wanted a present, so. we left Wilhelmshaven in September. encountered nothing so far. it is cold but hot, how is that? when we pulled Jurgens from the water he did not seem so cocky! it is like a holiday - but anxious limbo, we wait. this morning we saw two planes, dived, but nothing. they could have been anyone. they were so high and we sat almost motionless. maybe we looked like a whale as we dissapeared? how is everyone else coping Lt.z.S. V. Frankz |
Sept 10, 1939
GWX3,COMMANDER,REALISM 100%,D.I.D LEUTNANT Z. S.: Kurt Giesse Finished shakedown and assigned to Kiel transferred from Königsberg. Crew was excited to get to sea as the Luftwaffe have been pounding targets none stop. Our Panzers have not quite secured the land bridge to Danzig so our 1st stop is Gotenhafen hoping to snag a few stragglers in all the confusion before they sail away to enemy ports. 21:00 We arrive to a deserted port with everything that isn't nailed down (and a few supplies that were) managed to sprout legs and leave before we arrived. Not to be deterred we set course for the adjacent port of Hela. 21:30 Skies slightly overcast we can make out the outline of ships harbored in port. At 5 klicks out set speed to 10 knots decks awash and have the deck crew load the 1st round. We can clearly see the well lit colours of the neutral ships of a Norwegian freighter, Lithuanian tramp steamer, medium cargo and tanker (dammit!) and a Yankee Freighter. Moored side by side are two Polish V&W class destroyers and nestled in docks are also two Polish Tramp steamers. I set my course to seam broadside to the destroyers like we expected to be there with the intent to get 2 broadside eels from the Bow tubes while the aft takes out one of the Tramps. At 2 Klicks out I order P depth and set to all ahead one third. At 1500 meters my sonar man starts telling me we are being pinged! CRAP! I was hoping this was going to be easy. I pop up the observation scope to look up at the surface without breaking the surface of the water... sure enough there is the milky white outline of searchlights scanning in our direction but not exactly. Odd I thought, they must of seen us just before we dove perhaps? Undeterred I order all stop and bring the scope to the surface. Sure enough the destroyers are lit up like a Christmas tree but not moving... I zoom in and see movement of the crew on deck and what looks to be mechanics scurring about. Perhaps that's why they are still here, they can't move! I drop scope and order ahead one third. The constant pining in stereo by the two V&W's is maddening but they make no move from port. Do they not have the crew or they don't have the orders? Perhaps they are just luring me in? 500 meters and they start firing intermittently at the water, like fish in a barrel and we are the fish. The crew firing must be too green or too nervous because they scatter shot everywhere, a few rounds strike home on the conning tower... so much for the new paint job. Nothing a few wackes of the hammer won't fix thou. 350 meters. We start to turn to face the broadside of the destroyers and set to ahead slow. Feels like an eternity as the pinging only gets louder and louder and it's so bright underwater with the floodlights and the rounds from the destroyers violently tearing into the water in and around my boat. At this range I forget to set the eels and order the door open to the #1 tube. I just want that pinging to stop! What if they fire up the engines? I take one more look through the attack scope this time to get the shot lined up. I want to use the boat as the gyro and make sure they are dead set in front of me. Fire 1! Whoosh! I drop the scope, more rounds splash around my scope and ping against my hull. They can't miss me now, but neither can I miss them. Tick... tock. I cross my fingers and hope it doesn't dud them KABLAM! It strikes home! I check for damage, she broke her back clean in two!!! I give her a three count and fire #2! It's a gamble, it might hit the hull of the sinking hull but she was split wide and fore and aft are jutting high. The next torp hits home and this VW was packed with powder and blows sky high. Less then a minute she is below the shallow waters to a cresendo of secondary explosions. Down scope! Surface the boat! Open tube 5! I hope smartly to the bridge and as soon as I do the two tramp steamers snap on their lights. Los! WHAM! Another hit!?!? And all magnetic triggers at that! I can't believe my luck. Not a single dud! I order the deck crew to man the gun and put to use that round I chambered. The tramp was already on fire and just two more rounds set her already lit cargo to explode! The last Tramp is too hard to get a shot at between peirs so I bring my boat along side and let my crew go nuts on her with the deck gun while I man the Flack to take out the glaring lights. Dam Tramp was made to last, must of taken nearly 40 shells to sink her! Was almost impossible to hit the waterline on her but she went after she was paid sufficient attention. We look longingly at the neutral tanker but head to sea... next time perhaps. Now off to the coast of Ireland and some high seas targets! |
Patrol 19
U-66, U-Flotilla Saltzwedel Left at: March 22, 1941, 15:09 From: Lorient Mission Orders: Patrol grid DT98 Headed down the coast hoping to pick up something coming out of the Med. As luck would have it we run into a convoy. Mainly small merchants. We managed to take out the only worthwhile targets and escape with minor damage.
Finished our 24hr patrol with not even a sound contact. Needed to make a decision whether to head towards the convoy route or closer to the coast on the single ship route. Decided to head towards the coast and lucky we did as we run into a large convoy. Weather was on our side with flat seas and reduced visibility. After a few calculations we managed to get in good position but found most of the good targets were on the other side including a large tanker, first we have seen and we really wanted it. Escort was coming up, we were moving at 1kt, silent running when I accidentally clicked on ahead full and before it could be rectified the escort was after us. Took a bit of a pounding but crept away, surfaced and planned the next attack. I'm down in the control room having a bit of a relax when I hear the sound of shells whistling overhead. Rush up to the conning tower and there's an escort steaming out of the fog about 2k away guns blazing and my lookouts are all looking the wrong way or scratching their chins in thoughtful repose, bastards.:o Another bloody crash dive, sneak away and try to make up lost ground. Well bugger me if the same bloody thing doesn't happen an hour later.:damn: From then on I've had to be up there myself because they can't see sh#t. Got into position but could not sight the tanker. Decided to go with what we could see.
I don't suppose anybody's figured out a way to submerge while your lookouts are still up top.:hmmm: |
Otto Van Graf lost on of his best warrent officers by a partisan attack (in 1939!!!), apparently celebrating one night, he said some things about the poles and Danzig, and some Polish national stabbed him in the back alley. :nope:
Used some of my pull by being a top captain to grab a good warrent officer. cought a pair of frighters in the passage between Scapa and the island north of Scapa, and did the long passage around Ireland and now hunting in the western Approches. |
End Feb '43 near Tunis, Med
I attack a small merchant escorted by one of these new DDs; one torpedo right under the keel and the ship slows down. I was waiting quietly for the ship to sunk and suddenly two Regia Aeronautca dive bombers attack and sunk the crippled steamer, stealing me the kill :cry: |
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