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By the late 19th century, fishermen were increasingly wary of kraken attack and were arming their trawlers appropriately.
Indeed, concern about Kraken attacks rose to such a degree that the Royal Navy was compelled to act.
Knowing that science-fiction monsters always attack the coolest ship in the vicinity, ironclad HMS Hotspur was kitted out with nets and sent into the Atlantic as bait.
Knowing that science-fiction monsters always attack the coolest ship in the vicinity, ironclad HMS Hotspur was kitted out with nets and sent into the Atlantic as bait.
Oh all right...
When I posted this image of SMS Prinz Eugen I was surprised to get a few questions about what was going on at the side of the ship here.
When I posted this image of SMS Prinz Eugen I was surprised to get a few questions about what was going on at the side of the ship here.
To cut a long story short, those are torpedo nets, and as the name suggests the idea is to catch torpedoes.
Most captains prefer to keep the water outside their ship, and sticking great big holes in the hull is considered unhelpful in this ambition.
Most captains prefer to keep the water outside their ship, and sticking great big holes in the hull is considered unhelpful in this ambition.
It might seem weird that a net was enough to protect a ship against torpedoes, but early models were distinctly underpowered. My favourite along these lines is the Lay torpedo, powered by carbon dioxide.
The only time one of those was fired in anger, by Peruvian ironclad Huáscar, it immediately reversed direction and came straight back at the Huáscar itself.
This must have caused some awkward conversations with its designer in the debrief.
This must have caused some awkward conversations with its designer in the debrief.
Fortunately a quick-witted officer (or equally likely a spectacularly stupid one) jumped overboard and steered the slow-moving torpedo away from the ship.
Huáscar itself is still afloat today.
Huáscar itself is still afloat today.
Torpedoes rapidly improved in performance, notably with further development of the Whitehead torpedo, and by the 1900s everyone was paranoid about them.
In the case of the Russians this paranoia was not helped by Kamchatka constantly asking "Do you see torpedo boats?"
In the case of the Russians this paranoia was not helped by Kamchatka constantly asking "Do you see torpedo boats?"
Aiming torpedoes - especially against moving targets - was still more luck than science, and the biggest risk to ships was at anchor. In this context, torpedo nets were an obvious and sensible counter-measure, and their booms are a common sight on battleships of the period.
The obvious counter-counter-measure was to add net-cutting devices to the torpedoes themselves. This had the happy effect of making them look far more metal.
Cutters were significantly less than 100% effective though and nets were still useful - so why did they disappear?
The reason was the invention of the torpedo bulge. These still worked when the ship was moving, didn't need to be stowed and unfurled, contained any damage, and finally they pleased Sir Mix-A-Lot, who liked big butts and could not lie.
In a double win, the torpedo bulge also aided stability - which helps answer another recent question that got asked a lot: how the hell Fuso here didn't spend its entire career capsizing
PS - somewhere in the edit the reason HMS Hotspur was cool got left out.
It was a primarily designed as a ram, intended to poke itself into unfriendly ships. What it was supposed to do after impaling itself in its now-sinking victim remains unexplained.
It was a primarily designed as a ram, intended to poke itself into unfriendly ships. What it was supposed to do after impaling itself in its now-sinking victim remains unexplained.
HMS Hotspur wasn't as cool as a TORPEDO RAM, mind.
Torpedo rams were not designed to fight kraken, but did turn out to be handy against [checks notes] invading Martians. https://twitter.com/TheDreadShips/status/1144365560551084043?s=20
Torpedo rams were not designed to fight kraken, but did turn out to be handy against [checks notes] invading Martians. https://twitter.com/TheDreadShips/status/1144365560551084043?s=20
