Torpedo bomber
Nonetheless, as an airborne torpedo could weigh as much as 2,000 pounds (910 kg), more than twice the bomb load of contemporary single-engined bombers, the aircraft carrying it usually needed to be specially designed for the purpose.
When the prototype built by J. Samuel White from the Isle of Wight first flew in June 1916, it was found to be too heavy and its float struts too weak for operations.
[6] On 12 August 1915, a Royal Naval Air Service Short 184 floatplane torpedo bomber sank a Turkish merchantman in the Sea of Marmara.
Of the major maritime nations, only Britain, Japan and the United States developed carrier-borne torpedo bombers after hostilities ceased in Europe.
[9] Even before the outbreak of the Second World War, the Royal Navy had studied the threat in the Mediterranean posed by the Italian fleet, which had its advance base in the new port of Taranto in the "heel" of Italy.
Captain Lumley Lyster of the aircraft carrier HMS Glorious proposed that his Fairey Swordfish torpedo bombers could launch a night attack against Taranto.
The Swordfish, a three-seat biplane, looked outmoded, but its low stall speed made it an ideal platform for launching torpedoes into the shallow waters of Taranto.
The torpedoes were adapted with wire cables attached to their nose and wooden fins at their tail to slow their fall and make a shallow impact with the water, which was only 39 ft (12 m) deep.
[10] On 6 April 1941, a single Bristol Beaufort piloted by Flying Officer Kenneth Campbell attacked the German battleship Gneisenau in Brest harbour in Brittany, where she and her sister ship, Scharnhorst, were sheltering beneath a massive array of anti-aircraft guns.
In the attack on Pearl Harbor, Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto's fleet of six carriers launched 40 Nakajima B5N2 Kate torpedo bombers on Sunday, 7 December 1941.
The Japanese had studied the attack on Taranto and had practiced dropping specially modified Type 91 torpedoes in the shallow waters of Japan's Inland Sea.
Three days after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Admiral Sir Tom Phillips was returning to Singapore on board the new battleship HMS Prince of Wales after an unsuccessful attempt to impede Japanese landings in Malaya.
The battleship listed 12 degrees to port preventing the starboard side 5.25 inch anti-aircraft guns from depressing low enough to deter more torpedo bombers.
In a new RAF tactic, the Blenheims acted as decoys, making pretense torpedo runs, while the Beaufighters, a development of the Beaufort fitted with four 20mm cannon, shot up the anti-aircraft gunners.
[11] The United States Navy's standard torpedo bomber in 1942 was the Douglas TBD Devastator, first flown in 1935 and embarked on carriers of the Pacific Fleet in 1937.
[16] At the Battle of Midway on 4 June 1942, 41 Devastators launched from three American carriers failed to score a single torpedo hit, and only six aircraft returned, as the rest fell to the Mitsubishi A6M Zero combat air patrols and ships' anti-aircraft fire.
At Guadalcanal, Avengers from the Navy and Marine Corps helped to finish off the battleship Hiei, which had lost steering after being damaged the prior night.
Flying Officer Arthur Aldridge discovered a convoy guarded by the heavy cruiser Trento early on 14 June 1942 some 200 miles (320 km) east of Malta.
As in the attack on Lützow, the Beaufort was mistaken for a Junkers Ju 88, and Aldridge hit Trento with his torpedo; the ship was eventually finished off by the submarine HMS Umbra (P35), which was close by.
Her mission was to run aground on Okinawa to provide floating heavy artillery for the defending troops in the expected Allied seaborne invasion.
The squadron led by Lieutenant Tom Stetson found the cruiser, which was the prime target, already sinking, so six planes were detached to attack the Yamato instead.
The crew referred the decision to the skipper, who deftly dodged anti-aircraft fire and 18-inch shell splashes from the Yamato's big guns to release their torpedo.
Multi-role designs were often adapted from either: single-engined, carrier-based dive-bombers like the Aichi B7A Ryusei, Curtiss SB2C Helldiver and Fairey Barracuda, or; land-based twin-engined light bombers/attack aircraft, such as the Bristol Beaufighter, Douglas A-20C (Boston IIIA), Junkers Ju 88, and Tupolev Tu-2.
Conversely, the naval air services of the UK and other Commonwealth countries, persisted with specialised torpedo bombers such as the Grumman Avenger until the early 1960s.
While the importance of air-launched torpedoes declined, relative to anti-ship missiles, during the Cold War and subsequently, they were retained by many air services and are now generally delivered by anti-submarine warfare and maritime patrol aircraft.
For instance, during the attack on the battleship Yamato, fighter planes strafed the ship with machine guns to suppress its anti-aircraft gun fire, while dive bombers tried to cause havoc and inflict topside damage, thus leaving the torpedo bombers unmolested in their attack runs, In total she took 12 torpedoes and 8 bombs to destroy the pride of the imperial Japanese Navy.
[22] Torpedo Squadron 8 (VT-8, from Hornet), led by Lieutenant Commander John C. Waldron, sighted the enemy carriers and attacked without any coordination with dive bombers or fighter cover.
The Japanese combat air patrol, flying the much faster Mitsubishi A6M2 "Zeros", made short work of the unescorted, slow, under-armed TBD torpedo bombers.
At the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands in 1942, the Nakajima B5N Kate, despite being in service since 1935,[9] played a key role in sinking USS Hornet, while the new Grumman TBF Avenger torpedo bombers failed to hit a fleet carrier.
When the targets were ships able to maneuver at high speed and hence much harder to hit, torpedoes proved less effective, except in cases when the crews launching them were especially well trained.
