UKDIVING TRAVELSPECIAL
Woz inspects the empty cockpit of an aircraft wreck
Coral adorns the fighter wreck , its gun still in place
Gauges inside the Unkai Maru
2 . Cargo
The wrecks in the Fleet Anchorage have holds stuffed with a wide variety of cargo . Tanks and trucks , whole Mitsubishi Zero fighter planes , tractors , plane wings and propellers , radial aero engines , drop tanks , 55-gallon drums of aviation fuel , millions of machine gun bullets and all sorts of larger munitions such as shells for the ship mounted guns , mines and big 14-inch shells for the battleships . They even have spare periscopes for submarines stored in the companionways , and whole holds full of 24-inch torpedoes standing to attention on end . Gas masks , medical kits , bricks and every wreck had thousands of bottles of sake in the holds .
3 . Sinking
Operation Hailstone was deployed from six US carrier groups , with the first wave knocking out the airfields and groundbased fighters to give the US complete air superiority . They were followed in by dive bombers and torpedo-carrying aircraft with devastating effect .
Military ships are built with thick armour to withstand a degree of attack and are bristling with armaments to defend themselves . Merchant ships were not armoured , and while many had deck-mounted guns , the majority were old , single shot ( commonly British ) field guns which weren ’ t at all useful against attacking aircraft . A few had 25mm auto-
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