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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 6095254" data-attributes="member: 4937">A couple of points of structural damage per rock.&nbsp; You'd need hundreds of such bombs to wreck a large fortified stone building to the point of collapse.&nbsp; If your goal is to just do damage, maybe kill a few people inside, then yeah, couple of dozen bombs should be adequate to cause some annoyance.Flight time would be one issue.&nbsp;&nbsp; It would take rather a long time for anything but a perfect manuevarability class flier to ascend to 10000', and then descend again.&nbsp; The higher up you go, the longer between trips, and the longer your bombardment.&nbsp;&nbsp; Also, from 10000', you would as you note have accuracy penalties.If the protectile is easily deformable, a greater percentage of the energy of impact will go to deforming the projectile rather than being transferred to the building.&nbsp; Most carrier decks in WWII were wooden.&nbsp; Steel decks weren't the norm except on the big US fast carriers.&nbsp; A 500lb bomb isn't made of rock, which probably would end up shattering on a steel deck, losing a lot of energy in the deformation.&nbsp;&nbsp; The main energy transfer of a 500lb bomb is in the explosive payload.&nbsp;&nbsp; Fifty pounds of squash head plastic explosive would do a lot more damage than a 50 lb rock.&nbsp;&nbsp; That said, 'carrier killers' were generally 1000lb or 2000lb bombs.&nbsp; Five hundred pound bombs were barely adequate versus capital ships, and would require essentially 'critical hits'.&nbsp;&nbsp; Consider the attempts to sink the Yamamoto.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 6095254, member: 4937"] A couple of points of structural damage per rock. You'd need hundreds of such bombs to wreck a large fortified stone building to the point of collapse. If your goal is to just do damage, maybe kill a few people inside, then yeah, couple of dozen bombs should be adequate to cause some annoyance. Flight time would be one issue. It would take rather a long time for anything but a perfect manuevarability class flier to ascend to 10000', and then descend again. The higher up you go, the longer between trips, and the longer your bombardment. Also, from 10000', you would as you note have accuracy penalties. If the protectile is easily deformable, a greater percentage of the energy of impact will go to deforming the projectile rather than being transferred to the building. Most carrier decks in WWII were wooden. Steel decks weren't the norm except on the big US fast carriers. A 500lb bomb isn't made of rock, which probably would end up shattering on a steel deck, losing a lot of energy in the deformation. The main energy transfer of a 500lb bomb is in the explosive payload. Fifty pounds of squash head plastic explosive would do a lot more damage than a 50 lb rock. That said, 'carrier killers' were generally 1000lb or 2000lb bombs. Five hundred pound bombs were barely adequate versus capital ships, and would require essentially 'critical hits'. Consider the attempts to sink the Yamamoto. [/QUOTE]

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