Superguns Helped Defeat the Spanish Armada

Hugh Pickens writes "With the discovery last year of the first wreck of an Elizabethan fighting ship off Alderney in the Channel Islands, thought to date from around 1592, marine archaeologists are revising their ideas on how the English defeated the Spanish Armada. Replicas of two cannon recovered from the Alderney wreck were recreated in a modern foundry, and tests carried out showed that the Elizabethans were throwing shot at almost the speed of sound. Elizabeth's 'supergun,' although relatively small, could hit a target a mile away. At a ship-to-ship fighting distance of about 100 yards, the ball would have sufficient punch to penetrate the oak planks of a galleon, travel across the deck, and emerge out the other side. Tests on cannon recovered from the Alderney wreck also suggest that the ship carried guns of uniform size, firing standard ammunition. 'Elizabeth's navy created the first ever set of uniform cannon, capable of firing the same size shot in a deadly barrage,' says marine archaeologist Mensun Bound from Oxford University, adding that that navy had worked out that a lot of small guns, all the same, all firing at once, were more effective than a few big guns. '[Elizabeth's] navy made a giant leap forward in the way men fought at sea, years ahead of England's enemies, and which was still being used to devastating effect by Nelson 200 years later.'"

Comments

Benefits of Standardization

[DNS-and-BIND]

Here we have a perfect example how open standards help everyone. Although it is quite unfortunate that this situation was a war, and diplomacy was not given enough time to work, the benefits of open standards have to be obvious. What if one cannon was made by Microsoft and one by Apple...they couldn't use each other's ammunition, and the English would have lost. Of course, the whole situation could have been avoided by dialogue and communication, listening to the voices of the people, and building peace instead of building guns.

Yeah... just ask the Irish.

[leftie]

The British sure made a bloody mess of Ireland.

what defeat?

[crodrigu1]

Sorry boys the reason the armada failed was because the idiots in command, the went in winter where the seas destroyed the armada There was minimal contact between the English and Spanish P.S the same idiots are running my country (Spain)