The torpedo boat fleet quickly completed the adjustment of the torpedo depth, and then the eight speedboats rushed towards the Saikyo Maru III ship again. At this time, the Amagi was already in flames. Compared with its opponents, the two speedboats had no protection performance at all.
In contrast, this wooden cruiser of more than 1,000 tons is withdrawing from the battlefield to find a place to put out the fire.
Such a lone sheep is naturally the best delicacy for a torpedo boat. The smallest Ding Ding'er and Zhen'er immediately pounced on it. The shape of this whole-body-wrapped boat has a sense of science fiction, and of course it is of this era.
Although the speed is not fast, it is enough for the Amagi that is outcropping in Shikaku. Under the horrified eyes of the Japanese sailors, Sadaji, who was the first to rush to the position of 50 meters, fired two torpedoes at it at the same time, and then turned around and retreated.
, before it could complete its turn! A loud noise suddenly came from behind, and the explosion so close at hand even made it swing violently.
The explosion of the blackhead torpedo replaced Tiancheng's shell with steel, which was also fatal with one blow. What's more, the wooden cruiser was already scarred, and a huge gap more than ten meters long was torn directly in the middle of the ship, and the sea water surged in.
When Ding Er turned back, it had already started to sink.
After completing the mission, Seiji quickly escaped. It had no torpedoes now, and it was time to watch the excitement. Seiichi and Seiji reluctantly retreated, and then rushed towards Saikyo Maru and Oshima. In fact, at this time Oshima
It has been hit by two torpedoes from the second right, but unfortunately none of them exploded, and even the second torpedo was in vain. However, the torpedoes of this era are like this. Whether they can explode depends on luck, and torpedo boat attacks are like gambling.
But Big Island is not having it easy either. This steel-hulled gunboat has a small tonnage, slow speed, and weak firepower. The 152 rapid-fire cannon in Pingyuan uses nitrocellulose shells, and its pitifully thin shell has its own disadvantages.
The penetrating ability, coupled with the power of shells of this caliber, is a bit harsh for a small gunboat. Now that the power system has been seriously damaged, it can be said that it is ridiculously lucky to escape this disaster. But good luck will not
It has been accompanying it, and then the second one from the left rushed to a range of tens of meters, and fired two salvos again. This time Oshima was not able to escape even one. The explosion of the two torpedoes was too terrifying for it. This ship
One side of the poor gunboat's hull was almost blown off, and it disappeared from the sea in just a few minutes.
How dare the Nishikyo Maru, which was alone and alone, dare to continue the fight? Huayama Shiki quickly ordered to speed up and escape. With its speed, it was easy to overtake Pingyuan, but it was impossible to overtake the five torpedo boats.
Seeing the five torpedo boats rushing towards the Minister like hungry wolves, Li He on the Pingyuan shook his head helplessly. The Pingyuan was too slow, only less than ten knots, and he definitely couldn't compete with these.
Delicious guys than ever.
He turned his attention to the main battlefield to see if he could make some gains, but he saw the Itsukushima, a large ship that originally had a speed of over sixteen knots, and had to withdraw from the battlefield because it had taken in too much water.
The protected cruiser, because its stomach is full of seawater, can't speed more than ten knots at most. It is looking for a safe place to stop and drain water. When Li He saw this situation, he smiled.
The captain of Itsukushima, Arima, really didn't expect that he would be defeated by Pingyang. Looking at Pingyuan slowly approaching at a speed similar to his own, let alone the sadness and anger in his heart, even though it had a 320
It has huge cannons and eleven 120 rapid-fire cannons, but now it seems to have no advantage over this small battleship that only has one 152 rapid-fire cannon and two 150 old-style retractable cannons, because its cannon
The cannon has been damaged, and the rudder has also been damaged. There are still three usable 120 secondary guns, and Pingyuan is cutting in from the port side where there is only one 120 rapid-fire gun left.
In fact, what he didn't know was that Li He only had one front main gun left, and the other two 150mm Krupp cannons were damaged in the battle. The next scene was quite funny. The two
Each battleship held its only cannon and began to exchange bombardments like two dueling ancient knights. But it was not possible to play with Itsukushima. Pingyuan was much thicker than its armor.
Itsukushima himself was not the only one to withdraw from the battlefield. Tsukushi and Hirobei, who were both injured, also withdrew from the battlefield at the same time. In addition to the previously sunk Hiroyi and the completely destroyed Hirojia, by now the Sanguang army that Li Hanzhang had assisted his brother had been completely wiped out.
However, its opponent, Tsukushi, has also lost its combat effectiveness. Although this super brave and powerful sibling has two 254 cannons and four 120 cannons, its firepower is obviously more than Guangbing, but the rate of fire problem of these two ships is
The ship changed a lot. Because Guangbing had three domestically produced rapid-fire cannons, while Tsukushi had old-fashioned cannons. As a result, the two sides met their opponents, and in the end they both lost their combat effectiveness. However, Guangbing's loss of combat effectiveness was not a big deal, and Tsukushi's loss of combat effectiveness was equivalent to the death penalty for treason.
Zuo Yi, who had been wandering around the periphery, immediately pounced on it and used two torpedoes to send the Rendall gunboat into the bottom of the sea.
At this time, Dongxiang and his First Guerrilla Fleet also suffered a heavy blow. Chiyoda fell behind. Because of the 305 shell in Zhenyuan, its transmission system was damaged. At first, it could barely keep up with the speed of the three ships in front.
, but as time went by, the problem became apparent. The original speed of close to eighteen knots has now dropped to less than thirteen knots. It is no longer possible to keep up with the Yoshino three ships at this speed, and almost half of the artillery has been lost, so we have to
Withdrew from the formation and turned around to rescue Itsudao who was in trouble. But unfortunately, the two destroyers would not miss this opportunity. The bounty offered by Li Hongzhang to these guys was one thousand tons and ten thousand taels of silver. The nearest
The Cobra immediately rushed up from the fire blind spot at the stern at a high speed of thirty-six knots, and it was not until about two kilometers away that it fired two torpedoes in succession.
Two steam gas torpedoes, trailing obvious wakes, accurately hit the stern of the Chiyoda in the horrified eyes of the Japanese sailors on board the Chiyoda. The huge explosion power of 360 kilograms of antimony and antimony knocked the 2,000-ton ship into pieces.
The entire stern of the armored cruiser was blown away, and soon it sank to the bottom of the sea together with the more than 300 sailors on board.
So far in this naval battle, the Beiyang Navy has sunk and destroyed two ships, but none of them are capital ships. Four ships of the Combined Fleet have sunk, two of which should be included in the list of capital ships. Ito Hiroshi on the Matsushima cannot hold on anymore
, Itsukushima had no hope. During the bombardment of Pingyuan, Fulong and Zuo Yi rushed up again. Although they were temporarily forced back due to the crazy shooting of small-caliber cannons, Pingyuan relied on perfect armor.
For protection, when the Songdao 120 rapid-fire cannons were attacked, they also aimed their muzzles at those small-caliber rapid-fire cannons. Obviously, its goal was to clear these obstacles and then let the torpedo boats go up to deal the damage.
As of now, it is impossible for the combined fleet to win this naval battle. Looking at the sea, Ito Gensuke found that he only had six battleships left. Although all the ships of the Beiyang Navy on the opposite side were seriously injured, because of the basic
All of them were external explosions, causing no fatal damage at all. Even Zhiyuan, who was engulfed in fire, was still able to continue fighting.
"Retreat!" He ordered through gritted teeth. The combined fleet has lost its offensive capabilities. In this war, there is no hope of annihilating the Beiyang Navy. However, it must leave the force to defend the homeland. If they are all exhausted,
Here, Japan is a lamb to the slaughter.
After receiving his order, the five combined fleets Yoshino, Naniwa, Takachiho, Matsushima, and Hashidate immediately withdrew from the battlefield, but the slowest old antique Fuso could not retreat no matter what. The design speed of this outdated ironclad ship
It only has 13 knots, and it has been almost twenty years now. Even if the Japanese take good care of them, it will be good if they can run 11 or 2 knots. No matter how slow the Beiyang Navy is, there is still no pressure to stop it.
Just when the five Matsushima ships withdrew from the battlefield, the Itsukushima also fought to the last moment. Under the cover of the Pingyuan's artillery fire, Fulong and Zuoyi rushed at him at the same time and fired torpedoes. Although only one exploded,
This was enough to send it to the bottom of the sea. The Itsukushima, which had already filled its stomach with more than 500 tons of seawater, slowly sank to the bottom of the sea.
Ito Heyou almost cried and left, looking back with painful eyes, seeing Itsukushima sinking and Fuso being attacked by seven enemies. Only then did he remember where the minister had gone.
The Minister is now considering whether he should commit suicide or become a prisoner. His Saikyo Maru has been stranded. Although it is basically impossible for torpedoes to attack high-speed moving targets these days, if the opponent blocks a target twenty or thirty meters away,
It is very difficult to fire from a certain position without hitting the target. The three small-caliber rapid-fire cannons of the Saikyo Maru were all destroyed in the bombardment of Hepingyuan. In addition, one 120-zero rapid-fire cannon was destroyed. Its total firepower was only
There are three 120 rapid-fire guns. It is somewhat difficult for this kind of artillery to attack small torpedo boats. If five torpedo boats attack from both sides at the same time, it will not be difficult to describe.
So after sinking a torpedo boat, it also suffered an exploding torpedo. This was already a shallow water area. As the water inflow increased, it finally ran aground. Fortunately, its firepower was not damaged, so it is now fixed.
The fort sat sunk on the sea, using three 120 rapid-fire guns to confront the remaining four torpedo boats. Among the four torpedo boats, only two had torpedoes. The enemy could no longer escape anyway, and they did not want to risk coming up to attack.
, the two sides faced off like this until the four Songdo ships appeared in the distance.
His Excellency the Minister of Information and Discipline in Huashan was overjoyed and quickly sent a flag to request rescue.
Ito Heyou is also very confused. Logically speaking, he should not not save it. After all, it is Minister Huashan. But if he can save it, first of all, because of the draft problem, the five warships under his command now have a draft of five to six meters, and it is impossible to get on them.
The only option was to put down the small boat and let the sailors paddle across. However, two of the four torpedo boats wandering nearby were equipped with revolving cannons. The sailors would simply die if they went down. Besides, this would take a long time. The Beiyang Navy pursued them.
It's going to be troublesome coming up.
Looking at the semaphores played over and over again in the distance, Commander Ito fell into a dilemma.