Russia and Ukraine

[Thumpalumpacus]

I'm reading that the Ukrainians are stating 452 of the Moskva's 510-man crew were killed, including the captain. If that number is accurate, whatever sank that ship did so very quickly.

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You know what sailors say about renaming a ship ...

It’s possible that more people were killed in the explosion than were lost when the ship sank. Whether it was a missile or the onboard munitions went up on their own (it was a missile), a blast that could sink a ship of that size would have taken more than a few sailors with it.

Boru

Exactly what I'm thinking. And if Russian reports are true that it capsized in a squall, that too can happen very quickly for a badly-damaged ship.

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I'm reading that the Ukrainians are stating 452 of the Moskva's 510-man crew were killed, including the captain. If that number is accurate, whatever sank that ship did so very quickly.

I'm giving Ukrainian reports as much credit as I do with Russian reports: None.

Hence my qualifier "If that report is accurate [...]".

By all accounts, the ship didn't go down instantly, as the Hood or the Bismarck did. So there seems to have been time to evacuate.

Yes, it clearly survived for some time after the blast, which is why I give some credence to the Russian report that it sank in a squall after being damaged.

Here's a similar incident, closer to home, in my case, and one of the rare footages showing the actual sinking of a large warship. It's the Austro-Hungarian battleship Szent Istvan. It was hit by two torpedoes in June 1918 and kept floating for a number of hours. They also, if the Russians speak the truth, that is, tried to tow it to port, but it capsized on the way. Mind the seemingly calm sailors walking the deck, while the ship already shows an extreme list. Of the 1050 men manning the ship, only 88 perished.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pSiCjfhUUw

And here's one of the HMS Barham, exploding about four minutes after being torpedoed, and taking down over 850 sailors.





We don't know anything. I'm just reporting what I've read in the news, and qualifying what I'm writing with that in mind.