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Originally Posted by M21Sniper
The following says it all about the protection level and ability to withstand damage of all 20th century US battleships:
USS New York(launched Oct, 1912): " Here she prepared to serve as target ship in Operation Crossroads, the Bikini atomic tests, sailing 4 March 1946 for the West Coast. She left San Francisco 1 May, and after calls in Pearl Harbor and Kwajalein, reached Bikini 15 June. Surviving the surface blast 1 July and the underwater explosion 25 July, she was taken into Kwajalein and decommissioned there 29 August 1946. Later towed to Pearl Harbor, she was studied during the next two years, and on 8 July 1948 was towed out to sea some 40 miles and there sunk after an eight-hour pounding by ships and planes carrying out full-scale battle maneuvers with new weapons."
http://www.chinfo.navy.mil/navpalib/...k/bb34-ny.html
Survived two nuclear blasts, and took EIGHT HOURS of continuous air and naval combined arms POUNDING before she succombed and went down.
That is absolutely awe inspiring survivability.
The Iowas are substantially better protected(and oh yeah, armed) than the New York Class battleships. And much faster. With longer range.
During the 1980s reactivation the four Iowas even recieved some additional spall lining ballistic protection in mission critical areas.
Exocet my eye...  |
You make it sound like surviving the Atomic test was a big feat.
Able test:
5 ships sank :IJN SAKAWA., USS Lamson DD-367, USS Anderson DD-411,
USS Carlisle APA-69, USS Gilliam APA-57. Lamson capsized and took a few days to sink.
Baker test:
USS Saratoga CV-3 (took 7 1/2 hours), IJN Nagato (Took 5 days) USS Arkansas
Submarines Apogon, Pilotfish, Skipjack, LSM-60, LCT-1175, ARDC-13, YO-160, LCM-4 and LCVP-10
1 of 2 Carriers survived. (The Saratoga took 7 1/2 hours to sink)
3 of 5 BBs survived. of the 2 that sank Nagato took 5 days
3 of 4 Cruisers
11 of 13 Destroyers
5 of 8 Submarines
17 of 19 APAs
For a list of all ships in Operation Crosswinds see:
http://www.bikiniatoll.com/Ships.html
I see you gave "worse case" INS imput only accuracy for JDAM. GPS accuracy is 13 meters and PIP have a 3 meter accuracy. They dropped JDAMs into JDAM craters to disable the Baghdad runways. Nothing says lovin like a 40ft crater.