Everytime I visit the US Weather Bureau web site I see all kinds of warnings about hot weather in the midWest and NE.

It sure hasn't happened here; it's felt like late March for the last month or so: overcast with intermittent rain and highs in the upper 60's. Last couple of days we finally got into April. (It's supposed to hit 85 today.) The problem is the jet stream has been south of us:

So while all of you are getting your weather blowing north from Mexico and the Caribbean, our weather has been coming down from Alaska.

About a month and a half ago we got 3 days of scorching heat. Well, "scorching" for us anyway; highs in the upper 90's. But then the weather turned cold and it's been cold ever since. I even had to turn on my apartment heat one time.

Oh, well; such is life.

I've become addicted to Haifuri. I've watched it something like 5 times now, and it just keeps getting better. The blatant idiocy of the concept is still evident but the characters are growing on me, and damn it can get exciting during the combat sequences.

A good sign that a series has gotten under my skin is when I start thinking "What comes next?" after the show is over, and so:

Harekaze sank in shallow water next to a dock, and obviously they can't leave it there. It will be refloated, just to get it out of the way if for no other reason. And I suspect they will move it to a drydock and repair it. The damage is substantial but it's also localized; there's a huge dent port-side bow from where it collided with Musashi but repairing that takes steel plate and a lot of welding. Worse damage than that has been repaired many times. And under the circumstances the feeling will be "Repair it if at all possible".

It will take a lot of time; this isn't a 2-week job. Probably more like a year. But Harekaze definitely will return to active duty. And tales of its glory will be told and retold, and students assigned to it will know what they have to uphold.

As to the crew, they were originally expecting a routine 2 week training voyage. It turned into a 4 week shooting war with live ammo. Harekaze's crew performed superbly considering they were rank rookies when they first boarded the ship. If the school gives decorations, certainly every member of the crew will get decorated at least once. (Even the cooks. It isn't a glamorous job but it's a damned important one.) Captain Misaki, in particular, was awesome and the powers that be had already recognized that by the time Harekaze took on Hiei, which was a tremendous achievement in its own right. Add to that rescueing Graf Spee and then stopping Musashi and saving its crew and that would be an impressive record of achievement even for a seasoned skipper. For a brand new student on her first training voyage it's stupendous. Misaki is obviously headed for high rank.

If Misaki was amazing, the 12 year old doctor surpassed even that. She, too, is headed for great things, and if they're passing out decorations she's definitely on the list to get one.

Also, it isn't a fan-service show, but they did give us a little.

When I watch some of the battle scenes which involved larger ships, one thing I noticed is about the ships with 3-gun turrets like Graf Spee and Musashi: when they fire the guns don't all fire at once; they go bababoom.

Is that historically accurate? I've never seen anything like that before. I've seen film of American battleships firing at night and it looked to me like all three barrels fired simultaneously.

Staggered firing would make sense in terms of reducing wear on the turret bearing. Staggered firing would reduce gunnery accuracy by spreading the shells out. Which would be considered more important? In this show we see it from Hiei, Musashi, and Graf Spee, so they're making it both Japanese and German ships doing that.

UPDATE: Another thing that took me a long time to notice:

Two of these ships are under tow. Hiei and Graf Spee are towing Musashi, and Tenjin is towing Harekaze backwards. The tow line is attached to Harekaze's stern.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste in General Anime at 12:16 PM | Comments (8) | Add Comment
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