At the bow waterline of the ship "Habakuk" there is a very modern hospital and outpatient department. X-ray machines, operating theatres, pharmacies, emergency rooms and laboratories are all available there. In the United Kingdom and the United States, only large cities have such well-equipped hospitals. The standard of health on board the "Habakuk" is much higher than in the city, so the percentage of ordinary patients is small. However, the doctors had to be prepared to receive a thousand wounded in ten minutes. The experience of this war showed that 50 percent of naval attrition was burns. In order to prevent such casualties, a large amount of tannic acid ointment was also prepared on board. Although new treatments have been used to treat burns, the ointment should be applied first, as speed is an important factor in resuscitating burns. In total, more than 4,000 first-aid kits were stored throughout the ship, all of which contained enough ointments and necessities. In each area, a number of people are trained to administer first aid. Because there may be casualties on the ship, so they can deal with them on the spot. To this end, doctors and trained Red Cross members will be dispersed throughout the ship during the battle. The hospital's equipment is also highly scattered in all corners of the ship, and if an explosion, fire or damage occurs in any part of the ship, the necessities of the hospital cannot be destroyed at all. All preparations were made to transfer the wounded to various parts of the ship, should temporary hospitals be established there.

Day or night, as soon as you enter the sailor cabin through the passage at any time, it is like entering a noisy world, with the sound of music, talking, news-goping, playing, and the sounds of hundreds of private radios. There was always a half of the ship's crew who were not on duty, and as a result, thousands of different radios were whistling from thousands of different beds, listening to radio broadcasts from all over the world. Some sailors had high-end shortwave radios, and they could listen to mainland programs. You can also hear broadcasts from New Zealand, Australia, China and Zomoto. He recently announced on the radio that they had sunk the Chinese Navy's super battleship "Fuxi", and this news became a popular joke among British and American sailors. Because when they were sailing south, they had already heard the news of the sinking of the "Fuxi" three times.

The ship's senior generals were not at all averse to listening to the radio. In fact, they argued, crew members should be encouraged to listen to the radio as entertainment. The officers said that the sailors worked hard and that the whole ship was always watching for a new movement, so they needed to take it easy. But there was a restriction that every radio brought to the ship had to be checked so that it did not produce any electric field so as not to be detected by enemy detectors, or to interfere with the sensitive radio equipment of the "Habakuk" itself. The ship's radio communications personnel are inspected, as are the radio communications personnel of other ships of the task force.

The ground crew of the "Habakuk" (who managed carrier-based aircraft on the flight deck, there were several thousand), their skin turned a toned russet under the sun. These people spend all day on the flight deck, but most of the time they have nothing to do, just reading a book or tossing a few softballs back and forth. When they work, they each wear a special color undershirt and a soft tire hat that reaches to the lower forehead. The color of the dress indicates the nature of the respective work surname. When they are not working (when there are no planes taking off and landing), they always push their undershirts to their shoulders and roll up their hats so that their chests, backs and arms can be exposed to the sun, and the undershirts are folded into a scarf and put around the neck. However, this does not slacken its vigilance in the slightest. When hanging out on the flight deck, these people try to get as close to the battle station as possible. As soon as the alarm sounded in the loudspeaker, he could step to the post in a few steps, pull down his undershirt as he ran, stretch his arms into his sleeves, pull off his hat, dress according to the regulations, and be ready for battle.

Crews who rest, read, or study on the flight deck are also ready to carry out their missions at any time. At the sound of the order, they jumped onto the gun emplacements and threw cushions, books, and deck chairs into the safety net set up along the edge of the flight deck of the "Habakuk" in order to free up the flight deck for the aircraft to take off and land.

Many crew members wear short-sleeved clothing during the day on the flight deck or in the cabins below, and officers wear only khaki pants, and when it's not worth it, they can sunbathe on the flight deck in swimming trunks. There are special sanitary regulations to encourage officers and soldiers at all levels to bask in the sun, but strict measures have also been taken to prevent officers and soldiers from being damaged by the sun, and in the system "it is a crime to be unable to perform duties due to personal negligence." ”

As soon as the "Habakuk" left the base, the focus of the ship's regular activities was on the two alarms at dawn and dusk. At this time, all the personnel on the ship immediately abandoned their work at hand and rushed to their combat posts: the pilots were on standby next to the planes, the gunners were on call, the signalmen were in position, the bombardiers were in place, and the damage control personnel were in place to be the fire extinguishers. Everyone on the ship has a specially defined position in battle. When the loudspeaker on the ship sounded the battle siren, the ship's bell rang two short bells in succession: "Dangdang", "Dangdang", and "Dangdang", and at this time, people should run to the battle position. Before the bell stopped, the crackling footsteps of people running to their positions could be heard.

Every day at dawn and dusk, the "Habakuk" sounded the battle alarm, and it could be raised at any time of the day or night. Since the "Habakuk" sailed south, Renjiao has not known when to conduct exercises and when to engage in actual combat. Captain Vian overlooked the ship from the signal station, directing the take-off and landing of aircraft and the overall movement of the aircraft carrier. As soon as the battle alarm sounded, he immediately stopped loitering, writing, or chatting and ran to the signal deck, eight meters above the flight deck, from which he could see what was happening on and near the deck of the "Habakuk".

The reason for raising the battle alarm at dawn and dawn is that this is the most potentially dangerous time of the day for the 24-hour day. At this time, the sunlight is disappearing or appearing, and submarines and small ships can only see the fleet clearly, and the lookout posts of large surface ships are effectively blind at this time when the sunlight changes.

Especially at dawn, everyone on board the "Habakuk" and the escort ships were put on alert, and they had already sailed hundreds of nautical miles during the night into waters that they probably had not reconnoitred the previous night. We don't know if there is an enemy fleet ahead, and we can only be reassured when the reconnaissance planes report that there is "no hostile situation." When the weather is cloudy, there is heavy rain and visibility is poor, and you don't know what to expect on the water antenna, so you should be on guard for a long time. At such times they must be prepared, just in case.

The task force, which had only one super-aircraft carrier, left the coast of Canada and was to move south to block the fleet. "Habakuk" was the flagship and the center of the entire formation, in addition to several battleships, cruisers and destroyers. By the time the "Habakuk" sailed out of its home port through the narrow and winding channel, the escort ships had already gone to sea a few hours ahead of schedule to explore the way and clear out the submarine that might be ambushing in the nearby waters.

The cruiser approached. The destroyers scouted their way in front and behind and on both sides, making serpentine movements, always listening for enemy submarines, which reminded Vian of a group of hounds sniffing out prey for a seasoned hunter.

The aircraft of the "Habakuk" always maintained air patrols during the day. As a matter of fact, the "Habakuk" was under the cover of two planes within a radius of more than 200 nautical miles, one was to deal with high-altitude enemy planes and discover the enemy's fleet, and the other was mainly to monitor the sea surface at a low altitude and search for the submarine.

At the beginning of the departure, the fleet assumed a lazy posture and headed towards the water antenna, ostensibly on a routine voyage. Once it had disappeared in the opposite direction it was intended to go, and had not been able to see any islands for more than fifty nautical miles from land, the fleet did not stop this aimless voyage. At this time, the warship Xi began to move closer, taking the route to the south, and gradually increasing its speed.

The fleet made a detour through the numerous islands of the Pacific Ocean, deliberately avoiding them. Their aim was to keep the eyes of shore surveillance from being discovered, for their operation was a secret mission, and it was not until they first encountered the warship Yuben that the secret of the "Habakuk" was revealed.

As the lead ship and flagship of this aircraft carrier task force, the "Habakuk" and its crew have spent six months painstakingly conducting training, theoretical study, exercises, tactical demonstrations, and aircraft training, and the "Habakuk" has now been tested by war for the first time.

Vice Admiral Brown, who commanded this assault force, intended to carry out an air attack on the assembled fleet by surprise. He learned from the report of the US reconnaissance and patrol plane that he sent transport ships and supply ships to the US coast every day. Apparently he was assembling here, preparing to continue his advance inland. He decided to organize a daring attack.

In the early morning of 20 October, after several days and nights of arduous sailing, the "Habakuk" was only 400 nautical miles away from the target. The entire force approached the fleet at high speed and nervously carried out this carefully carved attack plan. Everyone in this small fleet knew that they were already in the waters under their control, and with each nautical mile they were getting closer to battle, and the unpredictable danger was getting closer and closer.

Long-range reconnaissance aircraft have been conducting a careful search of waters, islands and skies around the "Habakuk". They had to sail a hundred nautical miles to get into a safe take-off distance for squadrons of dive bombers and torpedo planes already lined up and ready to take off on the flight deck. This means that it would take more than six hours at 20 knots to strike shortly after lunch that day.

At breakfast, the crew had a lot of speculation about the possible outcome of the day. The pilots looked forward with confidence to the impending attack on the enemy. This mission was no different from the exercises they had carried out, and they were eager to carry out the mission with real bombs and torpedoes, the main of which was the target of the ship.

Between 9:30 a.m. and 10 a.m., the reconnaissance plane radioed that a plane was following the fleet. The Navy calls this type of aircraft "spies". Captain Vian sent two pairs (four) of fighters to search for and shoot down the plane. To carry out this task, Admiral Carter, squadron leader of the USS Habakuk, selected Second Lieutenant Lewis as his wingman. The other pair were Lieutenant Harlan and Second Lieutenant Lyon.

The entire sea area is covered with low cumulus clouds, and strong storms over the sea are forming rain clouds. Four Sea Spitfire fighters cut through these clouds and climbed all the way up to the clouds. As soon as the clouds emerged, the two pairs of aircraft searched separately by area. A few minutes later, they spotted the plane through a gap in the clouds.

It was a large four-engine seaplane of the "Kawanishi" type (the "Kawanishi" seaplane was modeled after the French seaplane, which was used for passenger and postal services in the South Atlantic between Dakar and Brazil). With a wingspan of forty meters, this guy is larger than the giant fast airliner used by Pan Am across the Pacific.

Carter pointed his target at Lewis, and the two of them lunged straight down at it. It is about 1,500 meters below and 1,500 meters above the sea. He apparently saw them, and got into a cloud. But now they knew which cloud it was in, so they circled around the edge of the cloud.

The British fighters were so deep in the clouds that they could not be seen from the outside, but they could look out. A few minutes later, the plane emerged from the rain beneath them, less than 500 meters below them.

The British pilots did not attack the target immediately after discovering it, they waited until it was fully exposed to the clear sky before diving towards it. Their goal is to get it out of the way so that once it starts to dive, it can't hide in the ** anymore.

The British pilots felt that the seaplane had come far enough, so they followed it. When they were far away, they opened fire on the British fighters, and the British pilots saw the tracer bullets that grazed from the side. They were still out of range of their machine guns, suggesting that they were firing from a 20-mm gun mounted on top of the fuselage.

The British pilots continued to approach and opened fire on the seaplane. They hit its tank, and gasoline sprayed from behind. The British fighters turned back and began a second attack from the other side. As they approached, the large plane opened fire on them from several quarters. In addition to the 20-mm guns on the top, the large seaplane also had 20-mm guns in the tail section that fired forward, and the machine guns without fixed brackets were apparently fired out of the cockpit portholes.

Bullets fired by British fighters kept hitting the seaplane, and it suddenly caught fire. The plane erupted from its streamlined fuselage with huge white tongues of fire and tumbled toward the sea.

The British pilots had just knocked out the "Kawanishi" plane, and the reconnaissance planes reported that there was another one on top of them. They hurriedly climbed to the top to search, and at this time the radio control tower of the "Habakuk" told them that the enemy plane had already been dealt with. A returning British reconnaissance plane took it out.

Because the speed of this seaplane is only one or two nautical miles slower than that of the reconnaissance plane, it can fly 225 nautical miles per hour. The British pilots kept an eye on the plane, but their reconnaissance planes could not climb to the height of the plane, so they approached it little by little under the "Kawanishi" plane. The crew of the seaplane opened the door of the bomb bay and opened fire with their machine guns down on the British reconnaissance plane. The gunner at the tail of the reconnaissance plane raised the two guns and fired them upwards, all the while setting the plane on fire.

Both of the seaplanes that were found were killed. Each aircraft has at least 10 crew members (the actual crew of the "Kawanishi" seaplane is 12 people). None of them parachuted out, which meant that twenty pilots died. However, he said that he had already done the most important thing, and reported the news of the appearance of the "American fleet" to the base by radio.

British fighters returned to the "Habakuk" to refuel and reload. When everyone sat down for lunch in the officers' boardroom, it was generally believed that there would be a battle in the afternoon, and it was estimated that they would try to attack their ships, possibly by air raids.

However, General Brown had no intention of changing course, and the fleet moved on. Rear Admiral Vian had already ordered the crew to take their positions and prepare for an enemy attack. The captain faced a serious problem. He must have said that he was going to attack, but he did not know the direction, height, and time of the enemy planes, let alone the number of enemy planes. However, he had already deployed squadrons of fighter and reconnaissance planes in the skies, which were able to sound the alarm as soon as enemy planes appeared and maintain maximum strength in their positions. Fighters were always within 20 nautical miles of "Habakuk", reconnaissance planes flew farther away, and their task was to monitor attackers approaching from a high altitude and report by radio.

As the British pilots had expected, a fierce battle began in the afternoon.

Six British fighters were lifted into the air to replace the other six. Just as the six returning fighters were about to land on the "Habakuk," the first batch of planes were spotted. At that time, the British fighters were 3,000 meters above the planes, and the six planes that were about to land were ordered to climb higher and move closer to the air superiority fighter group. The fighters parked on the flight deck of the "Habakuk" also took off.

The attacking planes were more than 20 dive bombers, in a number of V-shaped formations, which began to dive at a small angle from an altitude of 3,600 meters to an altitude of 3,000 meters at a distance of 12 nautical miles. The planes took off from aircraft carriers, they were fast, with machine guns in the tail, machine guns in the nose and 20-mm guns.

The British fighters that had already taken to the air began a fierce attack, and every plane that was bitten was hit and caught fire, and dropped bombs into the sea without any aim, and they were still far from the "Habakuk" at that time.

The battle continued to within range of the anti-aircraft guns of the escort ships, but despite this, the British fighters were desperate, and many of their planes were damaged by them, and then the anti-aircraft guns on the warships were cleaned up. Only six of the planes were wounded by bullets and staggered away.

(To be continued)