4 October 44 - U-877, a Type IXC40 departs Flensburg on first patrol for the Skagarrak via the Kaiser Wilhelm canal. Designated patrol area is inside the Gulf of Saint Lawrance BB51.
8 October 44 - Dived 13 times in 24-hours to avoid aircraft. 10 October 44 - While pursuing a lone merchant surpized by twin-engine aircraft suffering considerable damage and two dead. Attack periscope destroyed. Continue patrol after repairs. 21 October 44 - Contacted warship group while exiting the Denmark Straight in bad weather. Single shot with electric torpedo from Tube V missed a four-funnel destroyer. No counter attack but unable to re-target any of the task force. 29 October 44 - Entered the Straight of Belle Isle seperating Canada from Newfoundland. Dived and commenced submerged operations using snorkel twice daily for battery charging. 30 October 44 - Engaged small convoy in bad weather and high seas. Boat broached during a periscope observation and was located by escorts. Launched two FAT's at convoy, one hit with no known results. Depth charged to destruction in 90 metres of water over four hours of counter attacks. Unable to surface, boat lost with all hands from progressive flooding in square AH8732: 54 killed. |
January 12, 1940
Just returned to Wilhelmshaven and glad to be back. This patrol was exciting, but very long and incredibly stressful. It was our second consecutive patrol to the Western Approaches, to the same grid as last time. Encountered more warship activity throughout the Channel than expected, and plenty of merchants. My attempts to conserve our cache of torpedoes was mostly unsuccessful, although the English and the French are now short one destroyer apiece. Upon completing our patrol we scouted north into the Irish Sea, encountering numerous aircraft. Spent much of the daylight hours submerged. Perhaps 20 hours into our reconnaissance I realized that Bdu had contacted us the day before, reporting a possible task force well northwest of our position. Despite our best efforts to intercept, nearly four days had elapsed by the time we reached the area. We found only empty ocean. The Brits harried us with their aircraft all along the way, one encounter being so far from any shore that at first I thought perhaps the task force could be nearby. Spent an additional 48 hours scouring the surrounding ocean and found absolutely nothing. We steamed back home, passing north of Scotland. Again, more aircraft, but there was some moderate merchant activity east of the Scapa Flow area. Gave the gunners something to play with. My crew and I are exhausted beyond belief, and quite demoralized over missing the task force. Perhaps another day we will succeed, but for now it is a glass of Beck's, two plates of hot unspoiled food, and as much sleep as I am permitted. Note to self: The crew are overdue for rotation. Dismiss WO after next patrol, if it is possible to promote his subordinate. He has earned his own ship. |
U-53, Oblt. z. S. Jochen Luebke
Patrol 4: Departed Wilhelmshaven, December 21st, 1939. Patrolled AL38. While on the way, sank a coastal freighter off Lerwick. Sank a few assorted merchant vessels, in the AL and some of AM.working my way up to roughly 25,000 tons. Headed towards AM53, encountered a large freighter, and sank same for about 10,000 GRT. Noticing the smoke, 3 motor torpedo boats approached and opened fire as U-53 crash dove. 10 minutes later, a destroyer was overhead, dropping depth charges, all of which were avoided. Having exhausted all but one torpedo, U-53 abandoned her foray into the Irish Sea and headed back to Wilhelmshaven, torpedoing a medium cargo on the way for 5200GRT. Docked at Wilhelmshaven with roughly 41,000GRT sunk, January 21st, 1940. Patrol 5: Left Wilhelmshaven, February 13th, 1940. Assigned AN11. February 16th AN14 encountered one tugboat, and sank same with deck gun for 1100 tons. Heavy seas and overcast weather beginning February 16th at 14h00. February 18th AN11 Arrived on station. One ore carrier detected, extremely heavy fog. Nearly collided. Ordered emergency back and hard to starboard, fired one fast TI under her stack from 300 metres. Sank for 8500GRT. February 19th Concluded patrol of AN11. Heading towards Hebrides. February 20th Received contact report at 02h14, enemy slow convoy heading west between Scottish north coast and Scapa Flow. Aborted course and proceeded to intercept. Heavy fog, heavy precipitation, and heavy seas. Arrived ahead of projected convoy path and proceeded at 2/3 head-on towards it, performing frequent hydrophone checks. 20h15 Raising periscope at 13m depth, was shocked to see keel of approaching ship, despite darkness. Ship passed within 3 metres of conning tower without detecting U-53. This ship was a Flower class frigate. Lost visual contact with same less than a minute later, and surfaced. On surfacing, U-53 found herself in between two columns. Torpedoed one tramp steamer and one passenger cargo. Combed with searchlights. Seven starshells up within seconds, and 4km distant, muzzle flashes. Ordered crash dive and spent two hours evading. No damage. Tramp steamer sank at 22h13 and passenger cargo sank at 22h40. Surfaced and ran flank to overhaul convoy once more. Slipped in past a destroyer and made for a large cargo. Hit her with one torpedo to bow and another under her stack. She sank for 9,000+ GRT. Four starshells up, shellfire coming from distant destroyers. Crash dive. Evaded for two hours again. Four ships depth charging, sounded like two corvettes and two destroyers. Surfaced at 5h00 and overhauled again. Nearly collided with a medium cargo. Hit with two torpedoes and crash dove. Escorts must have been getting sick of U-53 at this point, as the depth charging was nearly constant. U-53 successfully evaded for one hour, after which point medium cargo succumbed to damage and sank for 5200+ GRT. In the two months I'd been playing, I'd never been HIT with depth charges in this game – they've bounced me around a bit, but never come close enough to do damage. That changed at 06h45, when, through carelessness, U-53 was caught in one of the non-stop patterns from the four angry escorts. I can attest to it being genuinely nerve-wracking and much more involving than any "horror" game I've played. Deck gun was destroyed, conning tower beaten up, and front end of boat flooding fast. Secured from silent running and went to flank speed while the damage control team worked their magic. Miraculously, we controlled the flooding, and were able to evade successfully for another four hours before surfacing. Few torpedoes left, so we made way for Wilhelmshaven. On the way, we nearly collided with another medium cargo. Sank it with remaining three torpedoes and headed for home. Docked in Wilhelmshaven with ca. 35,000GRT sunk, February 28th, 1940. Awarded Knight's Cross. |
Fun isn't it Bill? Never had my heart pounding so much when I had my damage control team working to save my boat from damage suffered from my stupidity (BB Rodney vs U 47 surface battle in GWX3.0. I nearly sank)
Never been hit by DC's though, always dove below 200m if I need to. 200m is about the reach of Allied sonar early in the war. Update to my patrol log. Made contact with a convoy in the BE's earlier. Scored a hit on a modern tanker, dove and reloaded my rear tubes due to my fronts being exhausted and my rear shot missed its victim (Although I'm pretty sure I shot too close. Arming distance for TI's is 400m isn't it?) No contact with 2 J&K class escorts. Tracked now damaged modern tanker for just over an hour (Convoy was less than 1/2 an hour away. Maneuvered to engage with deck gun. Put 20 rounds into his hull. 1 modern tanker down for one eel fired at it and a couple rounds of DG ammo. I high tailed it out of the area as my watch crew spotted a J&K class DD on its way back. Dove to 120m to avoid and vacated the area, now trying to overhaul the convoy due to some juicy meat in the convoy. |
Arming distances are usually 300 apart from the Falke which is 400. http://www.psionguild.org/forums/ima...s/thumbsup.gif
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PS: Patrol 6 – Left Wilhelmshaven for AN34, April 18th, 1940. No contacts. Sailed north and around the coast of Norway. No contacts. Sailed towards Scapa Flow. Encountered one ASW Trawler, ordered WO to engage with deck gun. Our newly-trained gunnery PO did a wonderful job, scoring three hits from close range (we had approached under cover of darkness to about 1000m off her stern). She stopped returning fire and began to nose down, so ordered cease fire. Off Dundee, encountered one coastal tanker. Sank with deck gun. Sailed down the eastern coast of England. No contacts for days on end. Encountered one medium cargo off Newcastle-on-Tyne and sank with two torpedoes. A measly 7000+ GRT when counting the other two boats. In my frustration, I decided to raid Hartlepool. I had done this once before and got away clean. I went in in very poor visibility. As I was punching information into the TDC, the WO screamed that we had been spotted. Those would be his last words, as one seconds later, a shell slammed into the conning tower, killing him outright. He had been awarded the Iron Crosses Second and First Class, as well as the Knight's Cross. I had promoted him to Leutnant z. S two patrols ago, and was getting ready to promote him off to commission his own boat. It was not to be. We dove to 17m too quickly to recover his body from the tower. We began picking our way out of the harbour with three ASW Trawlers and one destroyer above us. They had a hell of a time depth charging us, as the water was so shallow that they would wind up blowing themselves up. As a result, they weren't able to score any hits for the first three hours. At the top of the fourth, though, they caught us in a pattern – all four dropped depth charges within a few seconds of each other (I watched this underwater through the attack scope). Port diesel destroyed. Deck gun destroyed. Attack scope destroyed. Observation scope destroyed. Hydrophone damaged. Aft batteries damaged. Fuel tanks damaged. Fore batteries damaged. Heavy flooding. Went to flank and secured from silent running. Damage control worked their magic, though by the time they had, we were down to 10% of our diesel. Went to one knot and stayed at that speed for the remainder of evasion. Noticed that they were now only depth charging to our stern, and quite some distance away. Stayed down for another 7 hours before surfacing at night in the midst of a storm. Limped home with one engine. Docked at Wilhelmshaven with 7683 GRT sunk, 12 torpedoes left, hull integrity at 4.82%, and personal effects for Leutnant z. S. Heinz Giebler's wife and children. We'll be in port until August. Guess I'd better not let my frustration get the better of me. It was too reckless and irresponsible. I'm lucky only the one crewmember died. |
Okay just wrapped up patrol 9. Due to foolishly deleting a save after my last post I have to change my patrol log.
Nailed an empire type freighter in the BE's with a single torp. Split him. Then proceeded to waste 2 torps on a Tramp steamer which was bow heavy. One from 90 shot and one from a 0 shot. I pulled the plug after that, headed back to St Naz with 9 ships down. No lost hull integrity despite enduring a few DC patterns. So far U-207 has had a great start to its career under my command. Now to switch out my officers and get some new blood into the crew before I start Patrol 10 Ouch Bill. Looks like you had a heck of a time on that patrol. Shame you lost the crew member too. 9 patrols and no lost crew for me. That's going to change soon I think, Allied ASW is picking up. Heading into 41 in a patrol or two's time. After that I'm in for a ride if my boat survives that long. |
The WAW campain is into September of '43 and things are geting intresting. I was sent out to patrol just south of Ireland. After all preperations were made I cast off the lines and made for open water. All the suden I recived multipul radar warning signals over France coming out of the north. I moved to the watch deck and spun around to see what this was all about and saw a flight of bombers coming right to port.
Not about to let this stand I set my crew to the guns and added mine to the choris of flack and shells already rising from other ships. All in all we did fairly well, we hit two of the six bombers that came to play with us. Didn't get credit for any of the kills though we did cause signifigant damage. With the base safe we moved on. On our way up the French coast we saw a few more bombers but they never saw us. That is untill night fell. Out to the west I saw two AA guns puting ammo on target and was reciveing a radar warning. Not worried I didn't dive, figuring who ever was out there shooting would kill the bomber; it didn't. Who ever was shooting out there sunk, a nutral wreck apeared on the map and moments later the bomber shows up near me. I dive to parascope depth to keep safe from them. Moments later I was looking at damage reports and steming flooding. I poped up the Obs scope to check them out and saw that they had this big search light on their plain and some how knew where I was under the water. With no casualteis and nother broken perminantly I decided to press on. The only contact I have seen was an ore carier flying a British ensign. Two torpidos later it was a sinking ore carier. It was two easy shots but I was rather impressed with them, the ship was trying to evaid me and I still managed to nail him. Unfortunatly both the torpidos hit in about the same place, in the starbord-bow quarter. Don't know how they maid me though, I was a ways off and submerged. I did ping them a few times to get distance, can the merchants sence that? I am under the impresion that only the war ships are equiped with sound equipment. Eather way that is another 8k+ GRT for her Ady and the U-556. |
Cool post, Disarray. I'm looking forward to 1943, if the boat survives that long. Sounds a lot more exciting than early '40. :)
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Stalking to Ark Royal, but but... i have only one eel...
Where i supose to put her? Under with magnetic pistol or maybe impact near bow? 1940.12 North of the Scapa Flow,calm sea. |
If the calm seas persist to the time of attack I would go with magnetic right under the funnles or the same pistol right under her chin. Eather will put them in a world of hurt and may crack the keel and get you a very big kill.
I just had the most exciting attack in my WAW campain. I found a nice little hunter killer taskforce to play with. I scoped it out and found a target I have never killed befor, a cairer; a bouge class to be spacific. It had a light lookng cruser and two bucky class distroyers for freinds. I let them slip right past me and then fired on them. Four eels streeked out twards the target three were set to make a lader search paternin the direction the target was traveling, on a narow patern; the other was a dumb runner. All four missed the target and I almost fell into dispair. Then as I watched my attack screen trying to figure my next move out I saw three of them make a turn, just like I had programed them to but forgot in all the excitment. The first to strike must have hit amidship as it was right in line with the red hydraphone line and the second struk aft of the first. The third torpido missed the back end of the target but found a new friend in a bucky that was very much suprized. By this time I had evacuated the torpido rooms of all my men, seeing as I was going to catch hell for what I had done it was probly saifer for them in the middle of the boat. I knew that I had one kill beacouse my target sank shortly after I hit them and I was very much pleased with that. As the pissed off American ships started looking for me the other ship I hit very unintentaly sank. Now I only had to escape two ships, much more preferable to three I say. Unfortunatly I didn't escape unscathed. I lost my 1, 3 and fith torpido tubes, both my parascopes all of my radar and radardetection equipment my flack gun disapeared and my deck gun was damaged beond use. And that was in the space of two depth charge attacks that landed sucsesful blows, out of at least 10 attempts in around 5 game hours. In a third attack that was marjinaly sucsesful they damaged my port propeler but that was fixed. To my suprize I didn't lose a single man. There were several wounded but nothing my medic couldn't handle. I guess that was my lucky break. Now I just have to find a way to get my battered boat home in one peace. |
Patrol 4 U37 IX(A) 2. Flotilla
Assigned Patrol Grid DJ13 (Atlantic. WSW of Gibralter. NW of Afrika.)
D. 31.mar.40 til d. 3.jun.40. D. 31.mar.40 18.34. Underway from Wilhelmshaven. D. 3.apr.40 (SW of Bergen) 19.24. AN29. Ship Spotted. Periscope Depth. Norsk. D. 4.apr.40 (NW of Bergen) 18.51. AF87. ALARM! Aircraft. D. 5.apr.40 10.45. AF79. ALARM! Aircraft. Minor damage to Deck Gun. D. 9.apr.40 (NW of Shetlands) 15.35. AF77. Sound Contact. Merchant. Closing. 16.25 AF77. Submerged Daylight Attack. Light Fog. Wind 10. Course 089. Speed 7 Knots. 1 x G7A Torpedo. C2 Cargo (6.446 GRT) Sunk. D. 16.apr.40 13.43. AM29. Radio Report. Enemy Convoy. AM51. East. 7 Knots. Full Ahead for AM52. 21.40. AM52. ALARM! Aircraft. No D.C.s dropped. 22.20. AM52. Surface. Full Ahead. D. 17.apr.40 00.21. AM52. Dive for sound check. Convoy Detected. Already East of us. Surface. Full Ahead. Course 111 T. 00.55. AM52. Ship Sighted. Tanker. 4.300 Meters. 00.58. AM52. Ship Sighted. Meduim Range. Corvette coming at us. Dive! 102 Meters. V.C.S. through D.C. attack. 01.23. AM52. Corvette returning to Convoy. 01.52. AM52. Convoy heading into the shallows of NW AM53. Aprox Course 082. 03.20. AM52. Surface. Full Ahead. 05.29. AM52/AM53. ALARM! Aircraft. 05.49. AM52/AM53. Sound Contact. Warship. Closing. Abandon Convoy Persuit. D.18.apr.40 09.32. AM54. ALARM! Aircraft. D. 30.apr.40 23.10. DJ13. Arrive at Patrol Grid. D. 1.maj.40 22.04. DJ13. No ships sighted since d. 17.apr.40. Heading towards Gibralter. D. 3.maj.40 (200 Miles WSW of Gibralter). 10.15. CG89. Sound Contact. Merchant. V.C.S. (Variouse Courses and Speeds). 11.38. CG89. Little Merchant. Course 116. Speed 7. Greek/Greak(EN. SP?). Græsk! D. 6.maj.40 (60 Miles W of Gibralter). 03.44. CG95. Heavy Fog. Patrol Report Sent (1 Cargo - 6.446 GRT). Beginning Return Trip. 04.01. CG95. Radio Message Recieved. Keep up the good work. 04.54. CG95. Sound Contact. Merchant. Unattackable due to Heavy Fog. D. 18.maj.40 17.12. AM19. Radio Report. Convoy. AM17. East. 7 Knots. - Full Ahead! 20.44. AM17. Radio Report. Convoy. AM17. East. 7 Knots. 22.05. AM17. Sound Check. Convoy Detected WSW of us. - Surface. V.C.S. 22.20. AM17. Visual Contact with V Class DD & Convoy. - Periscope Depth. Moonlit Night. Clear. Wind Speed 0. 22.54. AM17. Convoy Course 084 (per me). Speed 7 Knots (per Radio Report). T2 Tanker - Tubes 1, 2, 4 (G7E) - Fire. C2 Cargo - Tube 3 (G7A) - Fire. All Torpedoes on U37 are set to 3 Meters. Impact Pistol. (No changing the pistol of a loaded torpedo. Can't be done while loaded.) New Depth - 103 Meters. New Course - 309. 22.56. AM17. Impact! (Seconds pass). Impact! Impact! T2 Tanker (10.872 GRT) Sunk. No information available on the separate impact. 23.16. AM17. DD returning to Convoy. No other Warships heard. 23.48. AM17. Begin Torpedo Reload. D. 19.maj.40 01.00. AM17. Surface. Full Ahead. 02.30. AM17. Convoy Sighted. V.C.S. 03.37. AM17. Convoy still on Course 084. Speed 7 Knots. Submerged Attack. Dawn's Light. Fog Light. Wind 7. T3 Tanker - Tubes 1,2, 4 (G7E9) - Fire. C2 Cargo - Tube 3 (G7A) - Fire. 03.39. AM17. New Depth 102 Meters. New Course 309. Impact! (Again, the seconds pass). Impact! Impact! Impact! T3 Tanker (11.673 GRT) Sunk. Again, the separate hit was inaffective. 06.01. AM17. Surface. Full Ahead. 07.36. AM18. Convoy Sighted. 08.09. AM18. Long Range Daylight Surface Attack (4.200 Meters). Convoy still on Course 084. 7 Knots. Light Fog. Wind 7. Own Speed 2 Knots. Coastal Merchant - Tube 5 (G7A) - Fire. Coastal Merchant (2.042 GRT) Sunk. Evade on surface. Undetected. No Warships spotted. 10.45. AM18. Submerged Attack. C2 Cargo - Tube 2 (G7E) - Fire. Impact. No Effect. V.C.S. Evading the DD. 13.40. AM18. Surface. Full Ahead. 15.42. AM18. Sound Check. Convoy Detected "Moving Away". Surface. Full Ahead. 16.20. AM18. Convoy Sighted. The Sound Man was mistaken. Convoy was NOT "Moving Away", but on it's original course. Problem! Turn and fire a snapshot with Tube 6 (G7A). Last torpedo. Miss. Run NW! No visual contact with the DD. 29.maj.40 (Near Bergen) 22.40. AF76. Pass Northbound Commerce Raider. 3.jun.40 Fuel Reserves 50%. Hull Integrity 100%. Dock at Wilhelmshaven. Patrol Results: 4 Ships Sunk - 31.033 GRT U37's Total Tonnage: 4 Patrols. 17 Ships - 108.774 GRT. (Highly successful in comparison to my past carreers, so far. Love my IX(A)! |
U-53, Oblt. z. See Jochen Lübke.
Patrol 7 – July 20, 1940 - August 5, 1940. Patrol Grid BF15 Sailed through the Channel from Wilhelmshaven without any problems. No contacts until 9 days into the patrol, when encountered two small freighters spaced 12 hours apart in BF13, sinking both. The following day, sank two coastal freighters seven hours apart in BF16. Sank a Nipiwan Park-type tanker on July 31st at 16:37 and a Granville-type freighter at 21:07 that same day. August 1st brought a passenger-cargo sunk... and a radio contact report of an enemy large convoy moving south from AM97. I picked my spot, cursing the bright sky and flat sea. But, as I overhauled them, I was blessed with fog, rain, and waves. Excellent. At flank speed, I sidled up on the port side of the convoy, picking out an Empire-class freighter. The escort was off to my port side, about 2 kilometres out, without any idea we were nearby. I was running parallel to the Empire and when I got so that she was at my 110º, I started my turn, with the tube already open and the speed (8knots) dialed in. Two torpedoes from 800 metres, and she sank like a stone. I was already at 35 metres into my crash dive, and by the time I hit 70 and went quiet, I could tell that the escorts were heading to the wrong area. They dropped four depth charges in total – no more... and I surfaced after half an hour to overhaul again. This time, I picked out an ore carrier. Because of dud torpedoes when trying to take out the Nipiwan Park tanker, I was down to just stern tubes. I overhauled the convoy and then cut across its front at flank, angling in to reach the ore carrier in the middle. One torpedo just ahead of midships, and down she went. After that, I was out, unless I wanted to load my external stern torpedo – impossible in rough seas. Started a course for home. On the way, we got into a gun duel (and rammed) at motor torpedo boat, sinking it. Later that same day, we sank a medium cargo with the deck gun. The two attacks on the convoy, the motor torpedo boat sinking, and the medium cargo sinking all took place on August 2nd. Headed back through the channel at standard and docked at Wilhelmshaven with 34600GRT sunk. My crew was awarded promotions and medals, and I now have a Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords. Total sunk after seven patrols: 222,202GRT. Too bad that Patrol 6 was such a horrible wash, with only a bit over 7000GRT sunk and one dead 1WO. |
U-99
Still picking them of as they come and go to and from the Med 200km west of Gib. |
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what date and which u-boat do you play? with my current type IXB I avoid that area at all due to the massive air-cover ...... |
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