photo by Don Fisher
The Ring of Death
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| The 2002 IR/CWCC NATS returned to Greenbrier State Park in Hagerstown, Maryland, July 14-19. The stats favored the Axis this year, and it was suggested that the Italian boats be given to the Allies (Italy was Allied in WW1), but Italy stayed Axis and the war was declared. The battling was intense, but the big surprise was the influence Campaign had on the results. The four aircraft carriers and several more conventional convoy ships displayed unprecedented reliability, and the new campaign rules clearly made it much easier for convoy vessels to complete their runs. As you will see from the chart below, the two convoy battles accounted for nearly 45% of the total points!
In what has rapidly become a tradition, I've done a little write-up for Thursday at NATS.
But where are the photos? Well, I forgot my camera, but Bill Garthaffner, Lee McKinzie and Don Fisher agreed to allow me to post their photos as long as I added some captions. So those,
Oh, yeah, the Allies won, but we won't go into that too much ;-)
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| David Ricci prepares the North Carolina while behind him Marty Hayes deposits the Warspite.
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| Carl Camurati's Yamato cruises out near the "Hayes' Buoys".
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| Marty Hayes' Warspite cruises by.
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| The not yet finished Queen Elizabeth of Paul "Doc" Broring.
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| John Boyer's Vittorio Veneto.
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| A Veribus Unitis-class battleship awaits completion while in the background the quad sterns of Lee McKinzie's Queen Elizabeth get prepared for battle.
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| Ken Kelly's Derfflinger is the center of this photo, with Steve Andrew's California at the bottom of the photo. The California is probably the oldest ship still in active combat, having been built in the 1980's!
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| The VV maneuvers "Doc" Broring's QE toward an Axis welcoming committee.
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| "Doc" Broring's QE sits in the Axis "cradle of love" as Cameron Moury's Nassau rotates out, the Hindenburg nuzzles up, and the VV prepares to use her triple sterns. Alied Admiral Don Fisher's South Carolina moves in to assist.
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| Marty's Warspite sits in the middle of this action packed photo. Clockwise from the top are Dave Vogtman's North Carolina, Carl's Yamato, and Cameron's Nassau.
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| The VV, pumping heavily, tries to escape Don's SC while Cam moves to intercept.
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| Can you spot the Allied ship in this photo? An Axis squadron swarms the California. Front to back are the Hindenburg, Matt Moury's von der Tann (on the left), Cam's Nassau, the CA, and the Yamato in the rear.
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| Ships battle way out from shore. Even this far out the water is only waist deep! One sink out this far was easy to spot - it's masts were still out of the water. Sorry, I don't know who this is (Doc?).
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| My Hindenburg (front) and Ken's Derfflinger (deep) chase Dave Vogtman's NC.
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| Hindenburg chases Marty's Warspite.
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| What a way to start the week. Monday morning Marty recovers the sunken Warspite and
hands it off to Steve Andrews while Ken's Derfflinger drifts into frame. No, I didn't sink him,
I think his pump failed.
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| Steve A. points out a secondary barrel left in his ship during a close encounter with Ken's son Kieran running the Scharnhorst.
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| Hindenburg escorts the pumping Scharnhorst.
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| Paul Camurati recovers Nate Graham's von der Tann. Why? I don't remember.
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| Steve's CA had other close encounters this week. Steve and Axis "Most Feared" Matt Moury practice synchronized pumping while the von der Tann prepares to inflict a little pain.
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| A frequent sight during the week, the Derfflinger engages the NC.
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| The Yamato and the QE go their separate ways.
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| John Boyer brought a beautiful USS Lexington as well as his VV. He used it as an Axis convoy ship as the "Lexingtonia".
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| The other big Axis convoy ship was Dave Tuttle's Graf Zeppelin, another well done model.
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| Don Fisher won Convoy Best of Scale with his early war USS Hornet complete with Doolittle Raiders, the 16 B-25 bombers that struck Japan early in 1942. He even outfitted the hanger deck with F4F Wildcats.
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| Brandon Graham with the Axis Spirit Award. The award was handed out each day and an overall winner takes it home. Dave Tuttle won it this year.
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| While the big boats prepared for their Ring of Death battle Friday afternoon, Don Fisher prepares his destroyer Le Fantastique to battle "The Ship That Shall Not Be Named" (TSTSNBN).
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| With both ships sporting stern guns the battle became a test of maneuvering skill. Don shows off his patented "jump rope" attack against the TSTSNBN.
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| Don and I bring our boats off the water at the end of our battle. I think Don won.
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| The big boats still weren't ready and Orrill was feeling a little bored. So out came the paint ball gun. Someone said they'd love to see what happened if a paintball hit one of our ships so I said I was game. Just one rule - you only get 3 shots. Orrill got to fire first and got some strattles but no hits. Same for Cameron.
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| My turn, same results. All 3 rounds are misses. Stupid rule anyway. So I let fly rapid fire until I get some hits. Suprisingly even with this damage I was able to get the pump running and drive TSTSNBN to shore.
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| Here are a couple photos from the Ring of Death Battle.
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This page � Copyright 2002, Thomas L. Tanner, Jr. unless otherwise noted.
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