U-47, after a refit of two months was finally out to sea again. Unfortunately the previous Chief Engineer, dscruffy1, was still recovering by the time the ship was ready to go underway: unable to wait, he had unfortunately been replaced by OfzS Spaced God. He had arrived at the ship mentioning to the Kaleun that his mission 'had been done'. No-one else was really sure what he meant, however.

Instead of being assigned to the british isles, this time U-47 had been assigned to the western spanish coast, which apparently was filled with allied shipping: this would mean that U-47 had to go through the Channel, but Lichtenstein set out so that they would reach it by night and hopefully be able to slip through without issue. The transit journey went exactly as planned, with U-47 arriving at the mouth of the Channel in the dead of the night. Although a few sound contacts were spotted, no destroyer approached close enough to pose a threat: everyone was visibly relieved once they had gotten past the Pas de Calais.



Almost a week passed: although the crew enjoyed the milder weather in comparison to the patrols near the British Isles, there seemed to be a dearth of targets. Finally LtzS Pierzak spotted something on the horizon, the 7k tanker I.C. White. Approaching at close range, Lichtenstein ordered for two torpedoes to be fired at the ship. One of them was a dud, but the other lifted the boat up as it striked just near the keel, breaking the ship in half. The tanker quickly sank.

A few days later, LtzS ManfredTheGreat reported yet another contact on the horizon, this time a huge 13.9k ton tanker called the New Sevilla.



Ordering three torpedoes to be fired at the huge tanker, all three tubes launched in succession. The first torpedo missed, but the other two were on targets and slammed into the tanker near the midriff of the ship. Substantially damaged, the tanker was still not out for the count, so Lichtenstein ordered a further 50 shots from the 8.8 cm cannon to be fired. Aiming at the waterline, the shots created a huge explosion and soon the tanker was sinking into the Atlantic.

With fuel running relatively low and the trip back through the channel still needing to be done, Lichtenstein set course for home, happy about the two tanker kills that he had managed to get.

The trip back through the channel was taken just as deliberately and carefully as the forward journey and yet again was completely uncontested. Soon, U-47 arrived at the entrance of the Kiel canal: they had arrived back home, safe and sound.

Tekopo fucked around with this message at 13:58 on Feb 15, 2014

May had been a truly interesting month to have a month off for the crew of the U-47. With the invasion of france and the almost total collapse of the French Army and the BEF, the latter weeks of the month had almost been one of constant partying. Everyone had felt like they could truly win the war, with only the British left to beat. The partying had been spoiled by the fact that soon U-47, after a month's refit, would soon need to hit the water again, but almost everyone felt like they could drive the final nail into the british coffin all by themselves.

This time, U-47 had been tasked with patrolling the area near the Pas de Calais: there were still some ships attempting to evacuate and U-47 needed to intercept them and sink them before they could go back home.



The journey through the Kiel canal and into the North Sea was uneventful, but it didn't take long for U-47 to find a target once inside the patrol zone. The 3.6k ton Aenos had been spotted by LtzS ManfredTheGreat, heading away from France back towards England: it was night by the time that U-47 caught up and soon the night sky was filled with flashes of light as the 8.8 cm cannon fired again and again.

The men seemed to have perfected their markmanship as only a few rounds were needed to sink the ship: although the freighter took a long time to disappear beneath the waves, its fate was sealed.



The patrol continued and soon another target presented itself, this time spotted by LtzS Pierzak. The target this time was the 4.4k Nicolas Pateras: it was clear the British were using the smaller freighters to carry their troops off. Once again, night provided the ideal situation for U-47's crew to test their cannon marksmanship. This time, the marksmanship was not as good as before and thus, in order to prevent any time being wasted, the Kaleun decided to fire a single torpedo to finish off the freighter. Unfortunately, the single torpedo fired proved to be a dud.

Coming around for another pass, Lichtenstein ordered another 25 rounds fired at the unusually resilient freighter, but once again the firing was way off. Getting impatient and worried about the threat of the RAF, Lichtenstein ordered another torpedo fired. Another hit, another dud. This freighter seemed to have a charmed life.

Suddenly, a parachute flare lighted up the skies. A sudden shell struck close to U-47 and Lichtenstein immediately called the alarm. A Flower Corvette had come to save the freighter.



U-47 just had time to submerge before the Corvette was almost on top of it, avoiding getting rammed by a very slim margin. Depth charges hit the water. The explosions were extremely close, shaking the crew and making them crash against the bulkheads. Damage reports soon came in: an explosion near the electrical engines had taken them both out of commission, as well as causing flooding within the compartment. Fortunately, Chief Engineer Spaced God was able to stop any further flooding, but the boat was still dead in the water, unable to evade using its now-damaged engines.

Lichtenstein immediately ordered the boat to exceed test depth: with engines dead, there was no other alternative in order to evade the Corvette. Fortunately, this seemed to have done the trick, as the next batch of depth charges was nowhere near as accurate and soon U-47 was able to slip out altogether.

Still night by the time that U-47 finally surfaced, Spaced God reported that Electrical Engine 1 had been fixed, but 2 was down for the count.



Still not willing to let the freighter go, but with the Corvette still hanging around to escort it back home, Lichtenstein decided on a night surface attack, electing to fire two torpedoes this time: even if one was a dud, hopefully the other would work. Both torpedoes hit the freighter dead on, finally exploding and quickly sinking the Nicolas Pateras.

Quickly submerging to avoid detection, U-47 attempted to avoid detection once again but, like before, the Corvette was soon able to locate the submarine. A clutch of depth charges, on target but not as accurate as before, rocked the ship, The fore torpedo room was hit especially badly and Doctor Veloxyll rushed to that compartment, where many had been reported killed or wounded. Damage was also reported to one of the diesel engines.



The Corvette came around for another go, but once again the depth charges were off target and soon she had given up on the hunt altogether. Waiting for the sound of the Corvette screws to recede into the distance, Lichtenstein waited. Reports from the forward torpedo room were grim: many of the men had died instantly and others were seriously injured. Unfortunately, Spaced God reported that the diesel engine was out of commission: U-47 would be forced to abort and head back home, since they couldn't risk losing another diesel. The progress would be slow: with only one engine in operation, the cruise speed would be dramatically decreased.

Fortunately, the trip back home proved to be uneventful, but even then the crew was disappointed that they had been forced to abort so early into the patrol.

Tekopo fucked around with this message at 01:19 on Feb 19, 2014