Chapter 255 Air Battle (3)
A laser-guided 120mm artillery shell came off the tank. Soon, it broke into eight pieces and went into the middle inertial guidance state. With such a high trajectory artillery shell, it all depended on luck. The artillery shell could go very far, but nobody knew if it was going to hit the target!
Seven nautical miles was approximately thirteen kilometers. It was far more than the fire-controlled detection area of 'Abrams'. Even though it was within the shooting range, the chances of hitting the target were close to impossible.
Neither Butcher nor Mox knew the exact direction of the artillery shell's trajectory. They just roughly fired in the direction of the frigate. Right now, there was nothing else that could be done; it all depended on whether the laser guidance on the drone could bring the artillery shell back.
Nobody would know if the artillery shell actually hit the target. Zhou Qingfeng could only hope that the radar of that old and rusty frigate would fail to work due to the lack of maintenance. It might be the only chance for the patrol ship to run away. Otherwise, he would not even able to find Butcher and Mox's corpses.
Meanwhile, in the frigate, Santos was very happy with the current situation. In his opinion, even though it was not a good start for them, he thought everything was finally under his control. The air defense missiles worked on propeller airplanes, but not on the frigate. Of course, a helicopter without an anti-ship missile was not scary at all.
"Keep moving, hurry up, we need to get there as soon as possible. We can't let those two ships go. Victory's on our side this time! Don't bother about the patrol ship that was trying to ambush us, it'll soon be gone." Santos was very confident. Even though his frigate was old, he believed it could at least do something.
Right after he finished talking, a booming sound erupted and the frigate started shaking vigorously. Santos, who was sitting on the high chair, fell on the ground and his nose knocked on the floor.
General Santos stood up with blood flowing out of his nose and shouted, "What happened? Did we get hit by something?"
Soon, the officer on duty tried to figure it out but nobody could tell what exactly had happened. Santos came out of the captain's cabin and saw the place that was bombed. All sorts of wires were broken and the key thing was the fire-controlled radar. It was directly hit by the artillery shell. It was completely gone.
What the hell! How did this happen? There shouldn't be any warships around this area! There's a patrol ship but it shouldn't have any cannons on it!
General Santos realized something and was stunned — it's the only fire-controlled radar for the main cannon on the frigate! How are we supposed to survive without one? Argh, it's completely shattered. It can't even be fixed.
As soon as the radar stopped functioning, two of the 76mm main cannons on the frigate stopped firing. The gunners came out of the turrets and were astonished when they saw the destroyed radar.
Without the radar, the firing the cannon would totally depend on eyesight now. All of a sudden, they had returned to the dreadnought century! Firing a cannon would totally depend on luck. It would already be good enough to hit one or two out of a hundred shots. Unfortunately, the gunners under Santos sucked; they could not even fire the cannon properly.
While Santos was upset, Zhou Qingfeng was cheering. Ellie and Eileen who were in charge of guiding the artillery shell were extremely happy. They hugged each other and jumped excitedly. When Zhou Qingfeng saw the high trajectory artillery shell hit the target from so far away, he teased through the wireless radio, "Well Butcher, lucky you!"
Butcher and Mox were already in a desperate state because two of the enemies' cannons were extremely aggressive and they were getting more and more accurate. At that moment, they could have been killed at any time.
The moment they heard the artillery shell hit the most crucial fire-controlled radar, the two burly men that barely fit in the turret cried out, "Let's do this!"
After the two burly men lived through the moments of death, they felt the adrenaline rush and consecutively fired five artillery shells towards Santos's frigate.
However, these five shots were not as lucky as the first one. Due to the fact that the distance was too far, the sabots could be redirected back to the track even though the drone was providing laser guidance. Only one of the five shots hit the target. One of the 30mm secondary air defenses at the side of the frigate was destroyed.
Even so, Santos was terrified. While looking at the explosions in the sea beside the frigate, he instantly realized it had to be the patrol ship.
"Send all the speedboats and torpedo boats, we have to take it down!" Santos was aware that he needed to either chase away or destroy the patrol ship. Obviously, he knew the drone flying in the sky was guiding the artillery shells.
"Quino, get rid of that drone. It's guiding the artillery shells." Santos could only rely on his son now.
Quino gathered the propeller airplanes again. However, they were not coming as a group like before anymore. They were trying to attack from different directions and they knew Zhou Qingfeng was not going to handle all of them.
"We have to destroy this helicopter. Otherwise, my father will be killed and so will all of you." Quino forced his men to go and he continued watching from the back.
While facing the enemies from different directions, pilot Katrina was trying her best to dodge everything. However, the helicopter was so slow compared to the propeller airplanes. She had no choice; she was going to go all in, "Victor, hold your breath!"
Two 1,600-horse turboshaft engines running at the same time provided extremely high mobility for the HH-60H helicopter. With Katrina's unbelievable skills, the helicopter started to turn and showed its unbelievable movements.
Meanwhile, Zhou Qingfeng was still trying to shoot the propeller airplanes down with the 'Poison Sting'. He yelled at Katrina, "Katrina, can't you fly properly? I can't even aim!"
"If that were the case, both of us will be gone." Katrina was not going to give up. The helicopter was still traveling and dodging the propeller airplanes. At the same time, she was protecting the drone that was carrying the laser guidance.
Under such a situation, Zhou Qingfeng could not use 'Poison Sting'. He could only use the M134 Gatling machine gun. In the midst of the crossfire, both of them worked really well. They consecutively took down five of the propeller airplanes. Especially with Zhou Qingfeng's 'Awe-inspiring murderous' ability, his accuracy increased and he had more energy every time he killed one of them.
At the end, the rest of the propeller airplanes started running away in different directions. Meanwhile, Zhou Qingfeng was already exhausted. While he was catching his breath, he saw a monoplane 'Beech' rushing towards him.
Through the windows, Zhou Qingfeng saw the opponent. Zhou Qingfeng instantly recognized that it was the enemy who had shot him down earlier. He repositioned the M134 Gatling and said steadily, "Ready to die? Here you go!"
Chapter 256 Air Battle (4)
Whether someone was dead or alive depended on courage, boldness, and luck.
Looking at the propeller airplanes that were falling and escaping, the team leader, Quino, could not stay calm anymore. His father, Santos, was under attack and he was already out of men. He had no choice but to fight for himself.
On the other hand, it was not the end for Zhou Qingfeng yet. He could still use the 'As quick as lightning' ability to gain three extra seconds three times. When Zhou Qingfeng saw the monoplane with a machine gun rushing towards him aggressively, he immediately activated his skills.
Three seconds were enough for Zhou Qingfeng to fire three hundred shots; it could kill and destroy any target with no armor within a thousand meters. The monoplane, 'Beech', was directly hit by the bullets. It exploded and completely shattered!
The moment Quino charged towards Zhou Qingfeng, Santos had a bad feeling. He quickly looked through the window on the frigate. He barely saw anything a few thousand meters above the sky, but there was an explosion which meant that one of the airplanes was destroyed.
Looking at the fire and the broken parts of the airplane in the air, Santos felt that his son was on that plane. He was outraged and started screaming. Finally, he commanded, "Turn around! Attack the patrol ship! Tell the people in the control room to go at full speed!"
Santos had nowhere to release his anger. Thus, he decided to put the blame on the patrol ship. He could not be bothered anymore; he left the commander's job and went to be the shooter of the main cannon.
Meanwhile, Butcher was also panicking because there were too many enemies. There were more than twenty speedboats and almost half of them were torpedo boats traveling at speeds of fifty knots. How are we supposed to deal with all of them?!
"Which one first? The torpedo boats?" As the leader of the team, Butcher saw the boats coming through with the vision device.
Zhou Qingfeng finally cleared the sky and went immediately came to back Butcher up. He shouted into the wireless radio, "What do you mean which one? Get away from there! The enemy's primary weapon is down, it won't take long for me to take them down."
Other than the Poison Sting missiles, Zhou Qingfeng had the anti-tank missiles, Javelin. They could not reach the frigate because there was air defence at the frigate. However, they were perfect to deal with the speedboats.
Zhou Qingfeng locked a torpedo boat which was traveling at a high speed. Its speed was extremely fast despite it being heavy. Fortunately, the rescue helicopter, 'Rescue Eagar', was quicker than the torpedo boat!
Bang… The missile was launched and charged towards one of the torpedoes. After a few moments, the missile hit the target. It easily penetrated the boat and caused an explosion. The entire boat was gone.
Right after Zhou Qingfeng shot one of the boats down, the rest of the boats which tried to cover up 'Eagle' instantly spread out. Even so, they were still very organized and it was obvious that they were much better and tougher than the pilots from before.
Meanwhile, the frigate arrived and the helicopter could not stay because of the air defence team on it. Zhou Qingfeng was not going to taste the 30mm air defence cannon. He shouted into the wireless radio, "Butcher, leave the ship if there's no other way, I'll pick you and Mox up."
Bang… Another torpedo boat was destroyed by Zhou Qingfeng. The air defence cannon hit the enemy's frigate already and started firing at the helicopter. Katrina had no choice but to stay away from the frigate.
Eagle, the patrol ship was traveling away at its full speed of thirty-two knots. All of a sudden, it turned back. Butcher laughed at the tank, "How can a Russian be afraid of fighting? We'd die for honor!"
Bang…, both tanks and frigates fired at the same time. They were already five kilometers away from each other. Two artillery shells went past each other and into a different direction.
The firing rates of the main cannons on the frigate were extremely high. However, they were not accurate without the fire-controlled radar. In the rough seas, they would really need to have good luck. Whereas on the patrol ship, the laser-guided artillery shells were accurate. However, the frigate was indeed very tough. Only the exterior facilities were destroyed, the cannons were still working.
After dozens of shots, the 76mm cannon on the frigate finally hit the target. The artillery shell directly hit the bottom of the patrol ship and the engine room was demolished. Without an engine, Eagle could only float on the sea. All the sailors jumped into the sea one after another.
Meanwhile, 'Abrams', at the front of the patrol ship was still firing. After a few shots, Butcher realized the artillery shells were not working. One of the shells directly hit one of the turrets but it was still working.
At that critical moment, Mox snapped, "Change to armor-piercing bullets. Stop using laser guidance, we'll do it ourselves."
The Eagle stopped in the middle of the sea and the speedboats started to fire at it with the machine guns. After a few seconds, the ship was wrecked by the machine guns. In the meantime, the frigate was getting closer and closer; two of the 76mm main cannons were still firing non-stop.
On the other hand, Abrams quietened down. Sisters, Ellie and Eileen, kept on calling Butcher as they have already locked their target, but the two burly men in the tank were not replying at all.
"Please be accurate, I want revenge for my son, I must get rid of that ship." Behind one of the main cannons at the frigate, the mad Santos commanded the gunners to get more artillery shells from the storage in person. Two of the 76mm main cannons started to fire consecutively.
All the gunners recruited by Santos were retired Cuban navy members; they really respected Santos. While they were firing at the Eagle, the tank at the front of the patrol ship suddenly fired. An M8284A armor-piercing fin-stabilized discarding sabot charged towards them.
The slender, depleted uranium rod with the speed of sound went across two thousand meters and hit one of the main cannons on the frigate almost instantly. The turret blocked the explosion but it failed to withstand the armor-piercing warheads that could pierce through meters-thick of armor.
The depleted, self-sharpening uranium core instantly disintegrated into a hurricane and turned into a terribly high-speed one as soon as it hit the turret. The explosion occurred right in front of Santos. When Santos turned his head around, he saw the rest of the gunners lying in a blood pool.
As one of the gunners, Santos was lucky enough to avoid the armor-piercing sabot. However, his ears were bleeding and his brain was hurting. He barely stood up from the floor but he could not fire the cannon anymore.
"Goddamn b*stard, another blood debt! You'll pay the price!"