The terrifying explosion resounded in the sky, and the officers and men on both sides on the shore and at sea were shocked by it, and they all looked over there.

The ferocious shock wave spread to the heavens and the earth, and even overturned the flares that were slowly falling in midair.

"Oh! Oh, God! ”

"Maybe we hit its ammunition depot!"

The officers and men of the Australia cheered in unison, thinking that the round of salvo fire had destroyed the ammunition depot of the Yuanxing.

The explosion in the night caused both the Akemi and American armies to misunderstand the situation at the scene, and both sides felt that it was caused by the martyrdom of the Yuanxing, and they were afraid that there would be more than one luck.

"Sir! We did it! ”

"She's burning! I see it...... Fire, a lot of fire. ”

The bridge of the Quincy could be described as cheering, and the most calm and calm naval officers could not help but applaud at this moment.

Brigadier Admiral Richmond Turner, who was overjoyed, took a deep breath and ordered: "Turn on the identification lights, reorganize the formation, and then attack that cruiser (Qilianshan)." ”

Richmond felt the need to rein in the fleet, and after the fierce battle just now, the positions of the ships were now somewhat loosely deviated.

Given that the flagship of the Ming fleet had been heavily damaged, and the chances of winning this naval battle were a few points greater, it was perfectly okay to spend a few minutes regrouping the formation, and it would be better to prepare for the subsequent battle.

The TF-27 task force did not want to accept it as soon as it was good, because the Ming aircraft carriers were still intact and could fly carrier-based aircraft to attack as soon as it was dawn.

Therefore, Commodore Richmond's minimum expectation was to repel the Ming fleet, seize control of Iron Bottom Bay, and let the U.S. forces on Kuah Island seize the time to repair Richard's airfield, so as to cover the fleet from disaster and air raids.

One by one, the cruisers and destroyers turned on their identification lights and lowered their speeds, and the U.S. fleet began to gather its ranks in an orderly manner, while the heavily damaged Salt Lake City sailed due east alone away from the war zone.

At the same time, the nearby Ming warships inquired loudly in the radio frequency band, and continuously sent light messages to the Yuanxing, but there was no news.

Tang Xueji, the captain of the Qilianshan, immediately took over the command, and he gave the order to retreat.

"Order, all ships follow their own actions, turn to 315, and retreat."

The enemy's heavy cruiser has an overwhelming advantage over its own warships and must not be reckless.

Tang Xueji decided to lead the fleet to avoid the edge for the time being, first retreat to the northwest to regroup, and then kill the horse gun according to the situation, or simply wait for dawn to let the aircraft carrier teach this US fleet a hard lesson.

As everyone knows, the Yuanxing is fine at all.

The detonation of the ammunition supply ship not far away did affect the Yuanxing, and the ferocious shock wave shattered most of the bridge windshield and caused the power supply system to fail to trip, but this did not damage the armor box and the main structure.

As for the "blazing" seen by the officers and men of the Quincy, it was in fact purely caused by the ignition of aviation gasoline leaked from the carrier's seaplane, and although several anti-aircraft guns suffered as a result, the negative impact was not significant.

Xiong Zhuguo was shocked to the ground, documents, charts, telegrams and other debris fell all over his body, several wounds on his face were bleeding, and his right eye was also poked by a flying pencil.

"Report!" A captain rushed into the command tower in a row, "Chief soldier, it's coming!" ”

In the clicking sound, the lights in the internal compartment of the Yuanxing were turned on one after another, and the backup generator was immediately turned off and off the grid.

"Hit! Beat back to the special mother! ”

Xiong Zhuguo's face was covered with red blood, his hand covered his right eye, and the blood continued to flow down from his fingers, which was very hideous.

[Picture]

At 5:12, half an hour after being affected by the explosion, the No. 3 turret in the rear of the battle cruiser Yuanxing completed preparations for firing.

"Half a salvo ready, put!"

"Boom, boom!"

The muzzle flame illuminated the blue and black sea with a radius of several hundred meters, and three 320mm armor-piercing shells went straight to the Australia more than 4,000 meters away.

Over the next few tens of seconds, the available turrets No. 2 and No. 4 also opened fire.

Caught off guard, the Australia was hit directly by two shells in a short period of time, and a water bullet pierced the rear of the hull, and a large amount of seawater poured into the propeller spindle tunnel through the hole.

However, at this time, the Yuanxing also noticed the sudden change in the battle situation - many of its warships were turning to retreat to the west.

"His grandmother's!" Xiong Zhu stomped his feet angrily, "Tang Xueji's peony is home!" Play the piano around! ”

The order to retreat had been given by the acting commander, and the 42nd T-Flotilla was fighting and retreating in the direction of Savo Island.

It's not impossible to take back command and then change the order now, but there is a risk of chaos.

Therefore, Xiong Zhuguo could only go with the flow at this moment, and also turned the course, sending out light signals while continuing to shoot at the Australia.

To the south of the battlefield, the McCall and Landsdale, who had previously mistaken orders and attacked the Ming fleet without authorization, had now completed a major turn and intended to return to the TF-27 fleet.

As a result, the destroyer Drayton (DD-366) mistakenly thought that the two were Ming destroyers, and the nervous American sailors exclaimed, thinking that they were going to rush over and launch torpedoes.

"They're facing us!"

"Watch out for torpedoes!"

The Drayton began shelling friendly ships, and the usual shells fired from the 127mm guns flew head-on towards the bewildered Landsdale.

The officers and men of the latter were still rejoicing at the previous successful lightning strike on the Ming warship, but they turned around and were beaten by their own people.

The Landsdale hurriedly turned on the identification lights and chanted "friendly fire" over the radio. During this time, at least one shell hit the side of the front A turret, disabling the turret.

The Dutch seemed to be particularly fond of the fox, and when they saw the nearby American destroyers shelling the two unidentified ships suspected to be Ming destroyers, the Tromp also turned its guns and opened fire on them.

It wasn't until exactly four minutes later that the Drayton realized that she had done something wrong - it was a friendly ship!

For a time, all the officers and men of the ship were extremely embarrassed and hurriedly ceased fire.

At 5:20, the Drayton had ceased fire and rushed to inform the Tromp of the situation, but the latter continued to shell.

The power of the twin 150mm Bofors guns was not comparable to that of a single 127mm gun, and the unfortunate Landsdale was hit by four 150mm shells in a row, and the superstructure was unrecognizable.

She was forced to release the smoke screen and turn away, while the Dutchman fought more and more aggressively.

Aboard the Quincy at the front of the fleet, Richmond finally figured out what was going on in the firefight behind the fleet.

He roared angrily, "What are those Dutchmen doing? Let them cease fire, immediately! ”

A destroyer simply fired a flare, illuminating the sea, and the Tromp, who had just woken up from a dream, stopped firing.

The Landsdale had been badly damaged, with more than 200 tons of water ingress and several boiler steam lines leaking, and its speed was greatly reduced, with a rough count of 40 casualties.

An annoyed Richmond then asks another destroyer, the USS McCall, "Is your ship under friendly fire?"

The McCall was also attacked, but in small numbers and with minor damage, and then replied "yes".

At 5:31, another 320mm shell hit the Australia, detonating the ammunition depot under its two turrets, A and B, in its front.

The violent explosion instantly killed most of the people in the turret and forward compartments, the bow was blown off, and the Australia became a headless ship!

Fortunately, the fire caused by the explosion was extinguished by the massive influx of seawater, and the fire did not spread, and the Australia, which was completely incapacitated and had a speed of only 9 knots, had to slowly turn around.

The intelligence staff officer of the Quincy reported: "Sir, confirm that the Chinese fleet is still retreating, and observe about six or seven torpedo tracks. ”

The current situation was a dilemma for Brigadier General Richmond, who had mistakenly thought that the Yuanxing had been badly damaged, actually came back to life, and even fired a series of cannons to knock the Australian out of battle. In addition, the Ming fleet was retreating to the west, and one of the tactical goals of the TF-27 fleet had already been achieved.

It was only less than an hour before dawn, and the aircraft carrier in the Ming fleet would soon be able to release carrier-based aircraft.

He turned his head sideways and asked, "Can Richard airfield take off fighter jets to cover us?" ”

The US military on Kuah Island worked day and night to repair the runway of the airport, and yesterday evening, as soon as the Ming fleet stopped shelling, it rushed to repair it.

The commander of the air force immediately replied that yes, but there were only a dozen fighters capable of fighting, and it was not advisable to pin his hopes on them.

"The Chinese have advanced to the west of the airport, and they are only separated from the airport by the Lunga River."

"We should get out of here, the airport could fail at any moment."

The staff officers of the Quincy all felt that they should not stay here, and that it was better to get out of the way in time.

After weighing, Brigadier General Richmond gave the order to retreat.

At 5:45, the sparse shelling on both sides finally stopped, and the ripples caused by the last shell falling into the water gradually faded, and the naval battle was completely over.

The TF-27 fleet turned on the identification lights in unison, formed the formation, and then turned southeast and returned to New Caledonia at a speed of 21 knots.

As for the Australia, which was badly damaged and could not keep up with the pace of the fleet, it would have to fend for itself.

Amid sporadic shell explosions, the Kuah Island Air Force took off six P-36 fighters against the rising sun, and they were tasked with monitoring the movements of the Amaichi Ugaki Tank.

Discovering that his fleet had withdrawn westward to the waters near Cape Esparnes for reorganization, Zhou Changfeng hurriedly called the artillery command post and ordered Zhu Lishuo to immediately command the field artillery group of the 1st Marine Brigade to intensify the artillery bombardment of Richard's airfield.

The latter replied with great embarrassment: "Junza, you have to think clearly, there are almost two bases of artillery at hand, don't you keep it to support the front line?" ”

"Leave half of it, and the rest go out first!" Zhou Changfeng categorically ordered.

After hanging up the phone, he then said solemnly to the naval liaison officer on the side: "Leave the enemy's fleet alone, and ask the aircraft carrier to maintain air strikes on the airfield, do you hear?!" ”

In order to reduce the pressure on transportation, the landing operation has not been able to carry all the ammunition so far, which would be too bloated.

In a standard battle ammunition volume, the suppression artillery unit will be equipped with 20 base ammunition, in the case of 112mm howitzers, for example, each gun has a base of 80 shells, and 20 bases are up to 1600 rounds.

In actual combat, for the sake of the speed of the soldiers, they usually carry only a quarter of the shells - that is, five base 400 shells per gun, which is enough for three days of high-intensity combat or ten days of medium-intensity combat.

This standard was a bit extravagant and wasteful in Zhou's opinion, and it was not enough to consume so much if it was saved, and it must be known that when the firepower was prepared in the early stage of the Berlin Campaign, the average daily firing volume of Soviet field artillery was only more than 100 rounds.

"Boom-boom-boom-"

The number of bombing points, which had been sparse, and the sudden increase in the density of bombs, disrupted the plans of the air fleet at Richard Airport.

They had planned to launch eight to ten more dive bombers to bomb the landing area of the Ming ground forces, but the risk of forced take-off was too great due to artillery interception, and in the end only five SB2U defenders managed to take off.

The bombers made their way west, diving into the supply piles that had not had time to unload and were still piling up on the beachhead.

The move was met with an attack from the anti-aircraft battalion, and the 20.8mm anti-aircraft guns deployed in place began to fire at the incoming enemy aircraft.

"Five, one thousand two in height, two thousand in slant distance." The soldier with an optical rangefinder reported loudly.

Each team is responsible for their assigned objectives, and the light marks are like arrows piercing the blue sky, closely chasing the rapidly diving enemy planes.

"Boom!"

A 250-pound bomb whistled down, drowning a landing craft in smoke and flying dust, and splashing water.

Then another bomb fell, hitting a large pile of wooden crates full of food.

All of a sudden, cans of all kinds flew in the sky, the fluttering flour formed a large cloud of white smoke, and countless rice spilled like rain.

"Knock knock—"

Blazing empty shells flew out of the shell-throwing window, and the anti-aircraft artillery struggled to shake their handwheels and manipulate the expensive Type 34 20.8mm anti-aircraft guns to adjust the pitch angle and maneuver, and the fire whip followed the movement of the enemy planes closely.

The enemy plane, which was damaged by a tracer blasting projectile, burst into flames, dragging slender black smoke and falling into the sea in the distance, and two umbrella flowers bloomed in mid-air......

At the same time, the nine Type 37 ships belonging to the "Liang" squadron released by the Tianshi Youyuan discovered the slow-moving Australia while searching the waters east of Kuah Island.

They attacked, dropping bombs in turn, and the Australia used the remaining quadruple thump guns to fight back, but to no avail.

Such a warship, which is not even bowed and sails at a turtle speed, is not much different from a training target ship.

At 8:32 a.m. on March 24, the Australia, which had hit five more 250kg bombs, capsized.

Following the sinking of the Heavy Cruiser Canberra last year, the Royal Australian Navy has since lost all of its capital ships.

A little later, the second wave of aircraft released by the Amamichi Ugaki was tracking the TF-27 task force when it suddenly received an order from the torpedo planes to change their target.

Zhou Changfeng has been urging the fleet to maintain pressure on the US airfield on Kuah Island to prevent it from being used again.

However, Xiong Zhuguo believes that this is not a top priority, and he believes that the only mobile force available to the US military in the southwest Pacific is this fleet, and it is necessary to seize the time to weaken them, and when they run away tomorrow, they will not be able to conduct air strikes.

Moreover, the Salt Lake City Heavy Patrol had been wounded in the battle, and now was the right time to take advantage of his illness.

The two sides argued endlessly, and in the end, the captain of the Ugaki Amaichi was worried that the two would not be able to get off the stage, so he secretly changed the order - the dive bombers continued to track the American fleet, and the torpedo bombers returned to attack the airfield.

(End of chapter)