Hey so what is the deal between these two? Was it a case of friendly fire?
South Dakota didn't exactly do well in Guadalcanal. Because of her electrical malfunction, she lost communication with the fleet. Washington hesitated to fire on Kirishima because she couldn't confirm that the big radar contact wasn't South Dakota until they had visual confirmation of Kirishima firing on South Dakota. After the battle they regrouped, and an oil slick from South Dakota fouled Washington's evaporators, killing her supply of fresh water. Washington's crew was pretty pissed off with South Dakota at this point and started calling her Shitty Dick.
Hey so what is the deal between these two? Was it a case of friendly fire?
nerple said:
South Dakota didn't exactly do well in Guadalcanal. Because of her electrical malfunction, she lost communication with the fleet. Washington hesitated to fire on Kirishima because she couldn't confirm that the big radar contact wasn't South Dakota until they had visual confirmation of Kirishima firing on South Dakota. After the battle they regrouped, and an oil slick from South Dakota fouled Washington's evaporators, killing her supply of fresh water. Washington's crew was pretty pissed off with South Dakota at this point and started calling her Shitty Dick.
Not helped by how SD got the credit in the media when she went to the states for repairs.
The end result was that the navy actually had to schedule their patrols so that neither ship was in port at the same time, lest they risk a fight between the crews. And when your crew counts for battleships is in the four-digits, a 'fight' quickly becomes indistinguishable from a riot.
