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Deck Parking on Aircraft Carriers
- Thread starter Daelyn75
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When you think damage control think US Navy 
Not sure if it was written before, but that's also one of the main reason the US went with open/semi-open hangars with sliding doors instead of fully enclosed. To be able to also easily dispose of bombs or airplanes near a fire (or even airplanes on fire), by throwing them off the sides.
It meant the hangar floor had to be well above the waterline though so water couldn't get in, and thus they could only have a single hangar level unlike the Japanese with 2-3 levels.
Not sure if it was written before, but that's also one of the main reason the US went with open/semi-open hangars with sliding doors instead of fully enclosed. To be able to also easily dispose of bombs or airplanes near a fire (or even airplanes on fire), by throwing them off the sides.
It meant the hangar floor had to be well above the waterline though so water couldn't get in, and thus they could only have a single hangar level unlike the Japanese with 2-3 levels.
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That is an interesting and smart plan. These sort of things aren't common knowledge even on the HOI boards.When you think damage control think US Navy
Not sure if it was written before, but that's also one of the main reason the US went with open/semi-open hangars with sliding doors instead of fully enclosed. To be able to also easily dispose of bombs or airplanes near a fire (or even airplanes on fire), by throwing them off the sides.
It meant the hangar floor had to be well above the waterline though so water couldn't get in, and thus they could only have a single hangar level unlike the Japanese with 2-3 levels.
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When you think damage control think US Navy
Not sure if it was written before, but that's also one of the main reason the US went with open/semi-open hangars with sliding doors instead of fully enclosed. To be able to also easily dispose of bombs or airplanes near a fire (or even airplanes on fire), by throwing them off the sides.
It meant the hangar floor had to be well above the waterline though so water couldn't get in, and thus they could only have a single hangar level unlike the Japanese with 2-3 levels.
No question about it, the US did some great damage control - USS Franklin comes to mind as a highlight
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Japan planned on a short war won by a corps of highly trained air crews with enough replacements for expected losses. The US planned on a long war won by training large numbers of air crews to hugely expand the number of air assets. Those assumptions were made in the 1920s; when Japan got into the war, their initial successes confirmed their assumption and initial disasters confirmed US assumptions. Post-Midway Japan tried to address the issue but... materials shortages, fuel shortages, loss of experienced pilots for training cadre, the lost just goes on.
US Navy did put a very high priority on damage control, at least in theory. Practice was seriously lacking until after they examined the Savo Island action and lost Lexington. That's when they got serious about repainting with non-flammables, scraping out linoleum and woodwork, dumping floatplanes before surface action, filling gas lines with inert during air attacks, etc. US damage control saved Yorktown once and almost twice, did save Saratoga and North Carolina and any number of cruisers and destroyers that got parts blown off. They could even have re-used Franklin if it had been desperate, but it was easier to just push the copy button and make another.
Damage in war is funny - little things like a cracked gas line can sink a big carrier (Lexington, Taiho) while other ships take incredible pounding and keep going.
Yes, Franklin is one of the great heroic stories of the war. Enterprise got used like a Great Dane's chew-toy; there were patches on patches on that ship.
The original US carrier plan included using catapults in the side-openings of the hangar. Those didn't work, but they found they liked the open light and air for the work space. Japan built workshops along the sides where the US had openings. Part of the Midway catastrophe was gas fumes in the big enclosed hangars (fuel/air bomb), plus all the ordinance they took off the planes and left laying in the hangar while they tried to get the strike off. Another consideration - US carrier planes had folding wings to maximize storage and elevator space, and later designs put the elevators on the edges so the planes could hang over if needed. Despite the handicaps, Japan was much better at assembling a tight strike in 42-43 and better at coordinating planes from multiple carriers.
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Something else to consider modeling is that older carriers might not be able to sustain newer aircraft... ala Enterprise or Ranger not being enough to either keep up with the fleet or being able to have enough space for the newer heavier planes by 1943/4. Why wasn't the Ranger in the Pacific? Because it just couldn't handle the F6Fs, Avengers or SB4Cs
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This would also explain why the escort carriers still used only the upgraded F4F Wildcats to the end of the war.
This thread actually tells me why there were two anomalies in the Pacific War game from SSI back in 1994.
In 1943 The British Carriers suddenly gain 50% more aircraft - Because of deck parking.
The escorts never get the F6F, or F4U fighters - Because of space. I had thought they just weren't meant to be used as front line carriers, and the US just wanted to conserve their top fighters for the fleet and light carriers.
I've already mentioned this, but I think aircraft should all have a size rating, and carriers should get a total capacity by overall room accommodation, not just a number of aircraft. This could also help when it comes to airfield size, since smaller airfields shouldn't be able to be used by strategic bombers or even medium bombers without some penalty, like efficiency decrease. Or just not allowing the largest planes to use the lower airfield sizes.
I was trying to find something on the CVE/CVLs because I was fairly certain that loads of them (especially 1944 onwards) were usually offshore providing the CAS for the amphibious operations when I found this:
Typical air group composition aboard the Yorktown Class carriers, at the beginning of World War II, consisted of approximately 72 aircraft:
By the end of WWII, a typical Essex air group was over 100 aircraft, consisting of :
Typical air group composition aboard the Yorktown Class carriers, at the beginning of World War II, consisted of approximately 72 aircraft:
- 1 fighter squadron (VF) composed of 18 Grumman F4F Wildcats
- 1 bombing squadron (VB) composed of 18 Douglas SBD Dauntless dive bombers
- 1 scouting squadron (VS) composed of 18 Douglas SBD Dauntless dive bombers
- 1 torpedo squadron (VT) composed of 18 Douglas TBD Devastator, TBF or TBM torpedo bombers
By the end of WWII, a typical Essex air group was over 100 aircraft, consisting of :
- 1 squadron of 18 F6F fighters
- 4 squadrons of 72 F4U fighter/bombers
- 1 squadron of 12 TBM Avenger torpedo bombers[9]
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Just found a nifty photo of a Corsair taking off from USS Altamaha in 1944 - using RATO (rocket assisted takeoff). British escorts used this trick also - Nairana.
http://www.navsource.org/archives/03/018.htm
One other thing to keep in mind - any carrier leaving the US West Coast would be overloaded with aircraft for ferry purposes, and in fact a number of the escort carriers were built/used to ferry aircraft.
It is harder to get a bird off a deck without a catapult than to net it in a controlled crash.
http://www.navsource.org/archives/03/018.htm
One other thing to keep in mind - any carrier leaving the US West Coast would be overloaded with aircraft for ferry purposes, and in fact a number of the escort carriers were built/used to ferry aircraft.
It is harder to get a bird off a deck without a catapult than to net it in a controlled crash.
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Yes. This is something that was really remarkable and a huge difference early in the war.
During the Battle of Midway the Japanese 4 Carriers launched their morning strike at dawn consisting of 110 planes + 11 CAP planes in full coordination. Akagi began launching at 04:26 and less then 5 minutes later all four Carriers were launching planes. In only 10 minutes the entire strike + CAP was in the air and their strike headed in unison towards Midway, stayed together, assembled after the attack and headed back in a single formation all the time.
The same procedure of launching a prepared strike on the American Carriers, despite them not launching until later in the morning starting at 07:00, took until after 09:00 before all 3 Carriers had launched their strikes, and resulted in no less then 6 different strike packages fanning out in various directions in search of the Japanese fleet. Hornets strike especially was a complete disaster where torpedo bombers deviated from plan on purpose, managed to find the Japanese alone and get slaughtered by CAP, while it's dive bombers missed, got lost and didn't even manage to find their way back home to their own Carriers most having to ditch into the sea. Hornet lost 50% of it's planes without anyone getting near hitting a Japanese Carrier.
When returning home from Midway the Japanese single still coordinated strike couldn't land because their Carriers were under attack, but once it was time for recovery the entire strike was recovered in no more then 10-20 minutes per Carrier.
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Orderly and efficient. I'm sure the Americans became better at it, as I think Midway was an example of one of their worst muckup air coordinations, yet they still managed to win the battle. Funny that.
I also find it extremely lucky or an act of god I suppose, that the one spotting floatplane that was set to go into the sector that the US fleet was in, was delayed by half an hour due to mechanical problems. That I think cost the Japanese the battle, but then it could also be said that Nagumo's hesitance - he chose to land everything after the first strike on Midway while knowing where the US fleet was, and get them all rearmed and sent off also delayed them. So both I suppose.
Exactly.
The uncoordinated US strikes turned out to be a big stroke of luck, because the Japanese CAP or defensive measures was equally uncoordinated! The US strikes showed up from 3 different totally directions almost at the same time with first torpedo bombers and then divebombers and the rest is history.
Also two myths actually.
Edited with added info:
The floatplane that covered the US sector was not delayed, it launched on time but missed finding it despite going directly over them. Only conclusion is they flew over the clouds and the pilot was to "lazy" to pop down and check more then a few times, All Japanese "knew" there were no US fleet waiting for them anyway and that the search was only a formality...
The floatplane that did find the US fleet was indeed the delayed one, but it found it because it returned earlier exactly because it had been delayed, so it decided to cut the course shorter. Had it been on time and flown according to plan it would funnily enough not have detected the US fleet until even later, and potentially not at all!
And there really was no delay from the attempt/hesitance by Nagumo to re-arm everything. But he did have to bring down the strike from Midway that had been in the air for over 4 hours and were running low on fuel, before he could spot the other half of his planes ( that were being prepared and armed back for anti-ship ). The Japanese Fleet was almost under constant attack the entire morning and also had to recover and reinforce the CAP several times, so there was simply no time to spot and launch their first naval strike until they were hit.
Wikipedia has a pretty good timeline and the sheer amount of different attacks keeping the Japanese fleet busy was pretty staggering:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Midway#Initial_air_attacks
( I count 7 different attacks in 3 hours time, before the two fatal divebomber attacks started )
When under attack the Carriers could naturally neither land their own planes nor spot a strike ( due to evasive turning maneuvers ).
The uncoordinated US strikes turned out to be a big stroke of luck, because the Japanese CAP or defensive measures was equally uncoordinated! The US strikes showed up from 3 different totally directions almost at the same time with first torpedo bombers and then divebombers and the rest is history.
Also two myths actually.
Edited with added info:
The floatplane that covered the US sector was not delayed, it launched on time but missed finding it despite going directly over them. Only conclusion is they flew over the clouds and the pilot was to "lazy" to pop down and check more then a few times, All Japanese "knew" there were no US fleet waiting for them anyway and that the search was only a formality...
The floatplane that did find the US fleet was indeed the delayed one, but it found it because it returned earlier exactly because it had been delayed, so it decided to cut the course shorter. Had it been on time and flown according to plan it would funnily enough not have detected the US fleet until even later, and potentially not at all!
And there really was no delay from the attempt/hesitance by Nagumo to re-arm everything. But he did have to bring down the strike from Midway that had been in the air for over 4 hours and were running low on fuel, before he could spot the other half of his planes ( that were being prepared and armed back for anti-ship ). The Japanese Fleet was almost under constant attack the entire morning and also had to recover and reinforce the CAP several times, so there was simply no time to spot and launch their first naval strike until they were hit.
Wikipedia has a pretty good timeline and the sheer amount of different attacks keeping the Japanese fleet busy was pretty staggering:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Midway#Initial_air_attacks
( I count 7 different attacks in 3 hours time, before the two fatal divebomber attacks started )
When under attack the Carriers could naturally neither land their own planes nor spot a strike ( due to evasive turning maneuvers ).
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True. The Japanese CAP was too low to intercept the dive bombers when they came. What was incorrect about those the scout plane, and Nagumo? You've been reading a lot of revisionist history I take it. I know the basics, and quite a lot of detail from the war on up to about 1990. Maybe some new facts were uncovered since then.Exactly.
The uncoordinated US strikes turned out to be a big stroke of luck, because the Japanese CAP or defensive measures was equally uncoordinated! The US strikes showed up from 3 different totally directions almost at the same time with first torpedo bombers and then divebombers and the rest is history.
Also two myths actually.
Yes, alot new facts uncovered unknown in the west before. That's why I recommend Shattered Sword (2005):
http://www.shatteredswordbook.com/myths.htm
( See edits in above post for details regarding those two specifics ).
British on the other hand went for closed, hermetically sealed hangars with dividing fire-curtains for reasons of safety. In contrast to Japanese (and even US) they also had extreme fuel safety, Brown makes convincing case that this was the main reason for low petrol stowages on British carriers. As in, it cost lot for them in terms of weight and possibly space. Less obviously, the British hangars were actually encased within ship's load-bearing structure, rather like engine room, the hangars in USN and IJN ships generally being deadwight. This made USN style openings diffcult as they would have weakened the hull. When the British did choose to build US style carrier with Malta (meaning, open deadweight hangar) they though the ability to warm up planes for a strike in the hangar as being the most important factor.
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Yes, but it makes much more sense with a closed hangar when you also have armored flight decks, since the intention is for enemy bombs to not be able to get in there in the first place, rather then get stopped and detonated by the hangar floor
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That practise was adopted before the armoured flight decks (and hangar sides) became a thing. IIRC, it applies for Furious already at least. And Ark Royal, of course.
What I find strange is that Japanese didn't go for similar structural practise, since a hangar situated within the hull resulted in lighter hull stucture overall (less deadweight). Instead, until Taiho, they had the strength deck at upper or lower hangar deck (flight deck for British) and then built one or two levels of closed deadweight hangar on top of it. It seems like a worst-of-both kind of arrangement to me, as British recognized the fact that deadweight hangar could be easily made open the sole reason to go for it.
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Japan didn't think much of damage control at all. Their only focus in ship design was an almost destructive strive to make up for fewer numbers / tonnage from treaties with ships packed full of more and heavier weapons, and carriers packed full of as many airplanes they could fit. Many Japanese Carriers were top heavy or unstable in rough seas, and as we have seen they could have as much as 3 hangar decks and alot of hangar area.
If Japanese ship designers saw the Lexington they would probably say it was mostly useless waste of tonnage since they would only be able to fit a small amount of airplanes in it's hangar. But they would have loved the long flight deck which allowed a large strike (probably the entire hangar) to be launched at the same time.
If Japanese ship designers saw the Lexington they would probably say it was mostly useless waste of tonnage since they would only be able to fit a small amount of airplanes in it's hangar. But they would have loved the long flight deck which allowed a large strike (probably the entire hangar) to be launched at the same time.
Quick question if easy - am thinking about the Japanese 'no deck park, but very good at getting a coordinated strike off quickly' thing (from a modding perspective) - maybe have the choice early on to be between deck parking and launching a strike quickly, where the Japanese AI (player can do what they like) goes for the quick strike, and the US goes for the deck park (and the Brits have the option further down their doctrine tree, so have to wait)? Will depend on what stats aircraft operating from a carrier have, and whether there's any time taken to deploy them (if everyone can launch instantly, then that's probably the end of that idea...)?
So you are thinking that the deck parking was what slowed down the US coordination of their air units? I suppose not having to shuffle planes around would be a pain, but if set up right, I can see them launching the planes faster. Problem is that setting up on the deck probably takes time. I've seen a picture in my West Point book that shows an entire deck with planes with their engines running and ready to take off. I suppose if you just launch them all however they are on the deck if you need them all for a big strike, then there would be a lot of planes waiting to get the rest of their units up while they fly around the fleet, because some other air group had their planes in the way of the rest of yours.
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