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ame a crucial element in their overall mining strategy aircraft had the advantage of speed and they would never get caught in their own minefields german mines held a large 450 kg 1 000 lb explosive charge from april to june 1940 the luftwaffe laid 1 000 mines in british waters soviet ports were mined as was the arctic convoy route to murmansk 68 the heinkel he 115 could carry two medium or one large mine while the heinkel he 59 dornier do 18 junkers ju 88 and heinkel he 111 could carry more soviet union edit the ussr was relatively ineffective in its use of naval mines in wwii in comparison with its record in previous wars 69 small mines were developed for use in rivers and lakes and special mines for shallow water a very large chemical mine was designed to sink through ice with the aid of a melting compound special aerial mine designs finally arrived in 1943 1944 the amd 500 and amd 1000 70 various soviet naval aviation torpedo bombers were pressed into the role of aerial mining in the baltic sea and the black sea including ilyushin db 3s il 4s and lend lease douglas boston iiis 71 united kingdom edit in september 1939 the uk announced the placement of extensive defensive minefields in waters surrounding the home islands offensive aerial mining operations began in april 1940 when 38 mines were laid at each of these locations the elbe river the port of lübeck and the german naval base at kiel in the next 20 months mines delivered by aircraft sank or damaged 164 axis ships with the loss of 94 aircraft by comparison direct aerial attacks on axis shipping had sunk or damaged 105 vessels at a cost of 373 aircraft lost the advantage of aerial mining became clear and the uk prepared for it a total of 48 000 aerial mines were laid by the royal air force raf in the european theatre during world war ii 72 united states edit a b 29 superfortress dropping sea mines over japanese home waters as early as 1942 american mining experts such as naval ordnance laboratory scientist dr ellis a johnson cdr usnr suggested massive aerial mining operations against japan s outer zone korea and northern china as well as the inner zone their home islands first aerial mines would have to be developed further and manufactured in large numbers second laying the mines would require a sizable air group the us army air forces had the carrying capacity but considered mining to be the navy s job the us navy lacked suitable aircraft johnson set about convincing general curtis lemay of the efficacy of heavy bombers laying aerial mines 73 b 24 liberators pby catalinas and other bomber aircraft took part in localized mining operations in the southwest pacific and the china burma india cbi theaters beginning with a successful attack on the yangon river in february 1943 aerial minelaying operations involved a coalition of british australian and american aircrews with the raf and the royal australian air force raaf carrying out 60 of the sorties and the usaaf and us navy covering 40 both british and american mines were used japanese merchant shipping suffered tremendous losses while japanese mine sweeping forces were spread too thin attending to far flung ports and extensive coastlines admiral thomas c kinkaid who directed nearly all raaf mining operations in cbi heartily endorsed aerial mining writing in july 1944 that aerial mining operations were of the order of 100 times as destructive to the enemy as an equal number of bombing missions against land targets 74 a single b 24 dropped three mines into haiphong harbour in october 1943 one of those mines sank a japanese freighter another b 24 dropped three more mines into the harbour in november and a second freighter was sunk by a mine the threat of the remaining mines prevented a convoy of ten ships from entering haiphong and six of those ships were sunk by attacks before they reached a safe harbour the japanese closed haiphong to all steel hulled ships for the remainder of the war after another small ship was sunk by one of the remaining mines although they may not have realized no more than three mines remained 4 using grumman tbf avenger torpedo bombers the us navy mounted a direct aerial mining attack on enemy shipping in palau on 30 march 1944 in concert with simultaneous conventional bombing and strafing attacks the dropping of 78 mines deterred 32 japanese ships from escaping koror harbour and 23 of those immobilized ships were sunk in a subsequent bombing raid 4 the combined operation sank or damaged 36 ships 75 two avengers were lost and their crews were recovered 76 the mines brought port usage to a halt for 20 days japanese mine sweeping was unsuccessful and the japanese abandoned palau as a base 74 when their first ship attempting to traverse the swept channel was damaged by a mine detonation 4 in march 1945 operation starvation began in earnest using 160 of lemay s b 29 superfortress bombers to attack japan s inner zone almost half of the mines were the us built mark 25 model carrying 570 kg 1 250 lb of explosives and weighing about 900 kg 2 000 lb other mines used included the smaller 500 kg 1 000 lb mark 26 74 fifteen b 29s were lost while 293 japanese merchant ships were sunk or damaged 77 twelve thousand aerial mines were laid a significant barrier to japan s access to outside resources prince fumimaro konoe said after the war that the aerial mining by b 29s had been equally as effective as the b 29 attacks on japanese industry at the closing stages of the war when all food supplies and critical material were prevented from reaching the japanese home islands 78 the united states strategic bombing survey pacific war concluded that it would have been more efficient to combine the united states s effective anti shipping submarine effort with land and carrier based air power to strike harder against merchant shipping and begin a more extensive aerial mining campaign earlier in the war survey analysts projected that this would have starved japan forcing an earlier end to the war 79 after the war dr johnson looked at the japan inner zone shipping results comparing the total economic cost of submarine delivered mines versus air dropped mines and found that though 1 in 12 submarine mines connected with the enemy as opposed to 1 in 21 for aircraft mines the aerial mining operation was about ten times less expensive per enemy ton sunk 80 clearing wwii aerial mines edit between 600 000 and 1 000 000 naval mines of all types were laid in wwii advancing military forces worked to clear mines from newly taken areas but extensive minefields remained in place after the war air dropped mines had an additional problem for mine sweeping operations they were not meticulously charted in japan much of the b 29 mine laying work had been performed at high altitude with the drifting on the wind of mines carried by parachute adding a randomizing factor to their placement generalized danger areas were identified with only the quantity of mines given in detail mines used in operation starvation were supposed to be self sterilizing but the circuit did not always work clearing the mines from japanese waters took so many years that the task was eventually given to the japan maritime self defense force 81 for the purpose of clearing all types of naval mines the royal navy employed german crews and minesweepers from june 1945 to january 1948 82 organised in the german mine sweeping administration gmsa which consisted of 27 000 members of the former kriegsmarine and 300 vessels 83 mine clearing was not always successful a number of ships were damaged or sunk by mines after the war two such examples were the liberty ships pierre gibault which was scrapped after hitting a mine in a previously cleared area off the greek island of kythira in june 1945 84 and nathaniel bacon which hit a minefield off civitavecchia italy in december 1945 caught fire was beached and broke in two 85 damage edit the damage that may be caused by a mine depends on the shock factor value a combination of the initial strength of the explosion and of the distance between the target and the detonation when taken in reference to ship hull plating the term hull shock factor hsf is used while keel damage is termed keel shock factor ksf if the explosion is directly underneath the keel then hsf is equal to ksf but explosions that are not directly underneath the ship will have a lower value of ksf 86 direct damage edit usually only created by contact mines direct damage is a hole blown in the ship among the crew fragmentation wounds are the most common form of damage flooding typically occurs in one or two main watertight compartments which can sink smaller ships or disable larger ones contact mine damage often occurs at or close to the waterline near the bow 86 but depending on circumstances a ship could be hit anywhere on its outer hull surface the uss samuel b roberts mine attack being a good example of a contact mine detonating amidships and underneath the ship bubble jet effect edit the bubble jet effect occurs when a mine or torpedo detonates in the water a short distance away from the targeted ship the explosion creates a bubble in the water and due to the difference in pressure the bubble will collapse from the bottom the bubble is buoyant and so it rises towards the surface if the bubble reaches the surface as it collapses it can create a pillar of water that can go over a hundred meters into the air a columnar plume if conditions are right and the bubble collapses onto the ship s hull the damage to the ship can be extremely serious the collapsing bubble forms a high energy jet similar to a shaped charge that can break a metre wide hole straight through the ship flooding one or more compartments and is capable of breaking smaller ships apart the crew in the areas hit by the pillar are usually killed instantly other damage is usually limited 86 the baengnyeong incident in which the roks cheonan broke in half and sank off the coast of south korea in 2010 was caused by the bubble jet effect according to an international investigation 87 88 shock effect edit if the mine detonates at a distance from the ship the change in water pressure causes the ship to resonate this is frequently the most deadly type of explosion if it is strong enough 89 the whole ship is dangerously shaken and everything on board is tossed around engines rip from their beds cables from their holders etc clarification needed a badly shaken ship usually sinks quickly with hundreds or even thousands example needed of small leaks all over the ship and no way to power the pumps the crew fare no better as the violent shaking tosses them around 86 this shaking is powerful enough to cause disabling injury to knees and other joints in the body particularly if the affected person stands on surfaces connected directly to the hull such as steel decks the resulting gas cavitation and shock front differential over the width of the human body is sufficient to stun or kill divers 90 countermeasures edit a bottlenose dolphin of the united states navy marine mammal program during mine clearance operations in the persian gulf weapons are frequently a few steps ahead of countermeasures and mines are no exception in this field the british with their large seagoing navy have had the bulk of world experience and most anti mine developments such as degaussing and the double l sweep were british inventions when on operational missions such as the invasion of iraq the us still relies on british and canadian minesweeping services the us has worked on some innovative mine hunting countermeasures such as the use of military dolphins to detect and flag mines mines in nearshore environments remain a particular challenge they are small and as technology has developed they can have anechoic coatings be non metallic and oddly shaped to resist detection 91 18 further oceanic conditions and the sea bottoms of the area of operations can degrade sweeping and hunting efforts 91 18 mining countermeasures are far more expensive and time consuming than mining operations and that gap is only growing with new technologies 91 18 passive countermeasures edit designers can make ships difficult for mines to detect to avoid detonating them this is especially true for minesweepers and mine hunters that work in minefields where a minimal signature outweighs the need for armour and speed these ships have hulls of glass fibre or wood instead of steel to avoid magnetic signatures these ships may use special propulsion systems with low magnetic electric motors to reduce magnetic signature and voith schneider propellers to limit the acoustic signature they are built with hulls that produce a minimal pressure signature these measures create other problems they are expensive slow and vulnerable to enemy fire many modern ships have a mine warning sonar a simple sonar looking forward and warning the crew if it detects possible mines ahead it is only effective when the ship is moving slowly see also sqq 32 mine hunting sonar a steel hulled ship can be degaussed more correctly de oerstedted or depermed using a special degaussing station that contains many large coils and induces a magnetic field in the hull with alternating current to demagnetize the hull this is a rather problematic solution as magnetic compasses need recalibration and all metal objects must be kept in exactly the same place ships slowly regain their magnetic field as they travel through the earth s magnetic field so the process has to be repeated every six months 92 during the second world war charles f goodeve developed a simpler variation of this technique for the british admiralty his wiping saved time and resources between 1941 and 1943 the us naval gun factory a division of the naval ordnance laboratory in washington d c built physical models of all us naval ships three kinds of steel were used in shipbuilding mild steel for bulkheads a mixture of mild steel and high tensile steel for the hull and special treatment steel for armor plate the models were placed within coils which could simulate the earth s magnetic field at any location the magnetic signatures were measured with degaussing coils the objective was to reduce the vertical component of the combination of the earth s field and the ship s field at the usual depth of german mines from the measurements coils were placed and coil currents were determined to minimize the chance of detonation for any ship at any heading at any latitude 93 some ships are built with magnetic inductors large coils placed along the ship to counter the ship s magnetic field using magnetic probes in strategic parts of the ship the strength of the current in the coils can be adjusted to minimize the total magnetic field this is a heavy and clumsy solution suited only to small to medium sized ships boats typically lack the generators and space for the solution while the amount of power needed to overcome the magnetic field of a large shi...