The visibility in this sea area is good, and the height of scattered clouds is about 2,000 meters, which provides good shade conditions for Austrian and Chinese fighters to prepare for attack in the air.

The Japanese aircraft carrier was urgently taking off fighters, and on the bridge of the flagship "Kaga", Nagumo looked nervous, the captain waved a small white flag, and a Zero fighter flew off the flight deck at full power. The entire aircraft carrier had just taken off with three fighters, and suddenly, a loud shout from the lookout post was heard: "Dive bombers!" ”

The roar of motors resounded over the warship, and Masuda Shaosa, who was directing the fighters to take off on the deck, looked up and saw three black fighters diving vertically down the "Kaga" through the clouds. The anti-aircraft artillery on the warship began to fire heavily at enemy aircraft, but it was already too late.

The dark shadows of these Sea Harrier dive bombers of the Austrian Navy grew larger and larger, and suddenly, several black objects fell from under the wings and shook violently. The bomb flew straight down towards the aircraft carrier that was moving at high speed, followed by a violent explosion after a direct hit. Then there was another dazzling flash, followed by another loud explosion. After that, there was another shock, but it sounded a little lighter, and apparently the bomb was thrown into the sea next to the warship and did not hit.

Masuda got up and looked around, the enormous damage the fighter plane had done to the aircraft carrier in a matter of seconds made him creepy. A large hole was blown in the back of the elevator in the middle of the flight deck, and the elevator was blown up like a piece of burnt cowhide and collapsed into the hangar. The steel plates of the flight deck rolled upwards in a strange shape, and a large hole exploded in the middle. On deck, more than a dozen planes were damaged by the blast wave of the explosion, the fuselage was broken, and the tail was upturned.

From the hangar on the lower level of the flight deck, blue-blue flames appeared, smoke was rising everywhere, and the fire was spreading.

In just a few seconds, this heavy aircraft carrier with a displacement of more than 38,000 tons has lost its combat capability, and at this time, the "Akagi" and "Soryu" of the mobile fleet were also shot, and the hull of the ship has been wrapped in thick black smoke, and the entire sea surface is full of miserable scenes.

"Akagi" directly hit two bombs, one at the rear of the central elevator, and the other on the aft section of the port side of the flight deck. Under normal circumstances, the two bombs would not have caused fatal damage to the huge aircraft carrier, but the resulting explosion of gasoline and ammunition destroyed several entire sections of the ship, shook the bridge, and sent deadly debris flying everywhere in space. As the fire spread through the planes lined up on the flight deck, the torpedoes on the planes began to explode, making the fire even more uncontrollable. The entire hangar area became a sea of fire, and the flames quickly burned towards the bridge.

Beginning at 8:20 a.m., the dive bombers of the Austrian-Chinese fleet were divided into four groups, each with one squadron of dive bombers, and attacked the "Akagi," the "Soryu" in the northeast, and the "Kaga" and "Fengxiang" in the back.

As a result of the spread of the fire, the combat capability of the "Kaga" was completely lost, the special communication antenna was blown up, and communication with the outside world was also interrupted.

Rear Admiral Hiroki Abe, commander of the 8th Cruiser Squadron, who served as the escort, immediately took over from Nagumo and became the commander of the entire fleet, and Abe's flagship was the heavy cruiser "Tone". At the same time, the commander of the 2nd Aircraft Carrier Squadron, Rear Admiral Tabun Yamaguchi, took over the command of air operations.

Now only Yamaguchi's flagship "Flying Dragon" was left by the Japanese, because it was far from the fleet, so it was not attacked.

Rear Admiral Tabun Yamaguchi decided to launch a counterattack against the incoming aircraft carriers immediately.

At 8:40 a.m., an attack team consisting of 18 dive bombers, 9 torpedo planes, and 12 Zero fighters took off under the leadership of Captain Michio Kobayashi, commander of the "Flying Dragon" flight detachment. Michio Kobayashi signaled the Japanese pilots to follow behind the Austrian-Chinese bomber fuselage who had returned from the bombing and quietly approached the enemy's fleet.

At this time, the second wave of attack formations sent by Yankel also arrived over the battlefield, and this time the "Flying Dragon," which had narrowly escaped in the first wave of bombing, was in danger of being attacked and became the target of the key attack. A group of 12 torpedo planes, including 24 dive bombers and a squadron, began to lay siege to the Wyvern, while the rest of the bombers began to freely search for valuable targets on the surface or continue to "mend their knives" on the four Japanese aircraft carriers that had already been heavily damaged.

The light aircraft carrier "Fengxiang" was first unable to withstand the attack, and a violent explosion occurred inside the hull, and the entire warship was broken in two and soon sank.

At this time, the Nagumo fleet had completely lost its ability to attack, and the crews of the three aircraft carriers that had been shot continued to work hard to control the fire. However, the fire on the aircraft carrier became more and more intense, and soon the power compartment of the "Akagi" also exploded, and the aircraft carrier completely lost power. As the generators stopped working, the water pumps used to extinguish the fire on the ship were also unusable, the fire doors of the hangar had been burned, and the foam fire extinguishers were useless in this terrible situation.

The flames continued to spread, the flames grew more and more intense, the casualties continued to mount, and the fires became more and more uncontrollable.

Vice Admiral Nagumo was already forced to transfer to the cruiser "Nagara", and he witnessed the sinking of the "Soryu" while standing on the new flagship.

Due to the tonnage restrictions of the Washington Naval Treaty, the displacement of the "Soryu" was nearly half that of the "Kaga" when designed, and the hull structure was criticized for its weak defense and stability in bad sea conditions, although the hull structure adopted a cruiser-type structure with weak protection.

Now, the consequences are finally being revealed, and although it hits one less bomb than the Kaga, it has been damaged even more severely. The "Soryu" was hit by three bombs in succession within a few minutes, the first bomb hit the flight deck in front of the front elevator of the ship, and the last two bombs hit the middle elevator, completely destroying the deck, and the fire quickly burned to the oil and ammunition depots. At 9:20 a.m., the "Canglong" completely turned into a sea of smoke and fire, followed by bursts of explosions caused by the fire inside the hull.

Ten minutes later, the main engine stopped, the rudder system stopped operating, and the fire protection system was also severely damaged. Due to the fire, the crew had to leave their positions, but when they hid on the deck, a huge explosion threw quite a few people into the sea at once. Due to the fierceness of the fire, the captain of the ship, Yanagimoto Yanagisaku Daisaku, had to order the ship to be abandoned, and he ordered the crew to evacuate, while he himself prepared to die on the ship. In order to escape the scorching flames, many people immediately jumped into the sea, and were rescued by the destroyers "Hamakaze" and "Isokaze", while others moved to the two destroyers in an orderly manner.

At 10:13 a.m., the surviving crew of the "Soryu" watched from several nearby destroyers as the "Soryu" finally disappeared from the sea, and the captain Yanagimoto and 718 other people sank along with the warship.

The flagship, Kaga, which had suffered heavy damage in the first wave, was attacked by six more dive bombers, with the result that three bombs hit the front, middle and rear sections of the Kaga flight deck. The bomb closest to the bow of the ship landed right next to the bridge, hitting a small fuel truck parked there, and the entire bridge and the surrounding deck area were immediately engulfed in flames, and the captain of the ship, Admiral Jisaku Okada, and the rest of the personnel at the command center of the warship were killed on the spot, and the flight captain Takahisa Amaya, who was spared in the catastrophe, took over the command of the ship.

There was fire almost everywhere. In the next few hours, the damage control personnel tried desperately to stop the spread of the fire, but basically failed, and there was hardly a place to hide on the entire warship. Most of the personnel, including Nakasa of the Amagya Navy, had to retreat to the deck of the dinghy on the starboard side for shelter. It looks like the aircraft carrier is about to be destroyed. R1152