ok…i was in the army during desert storm…i saw the abrams in all its glory…right now on the news they are showing a usmc abrams burning and the crew injured (one severely) from a lousy R.P.G. round! is it just me or am i missing something? the abrams and all it “tough” armor that had iraqi tank rounds bouncing off of it some 12 plus years ago (supposedly) and a single R.P.G. round damn near kills the crew? how can this happen? how did it “puncture” the armor? thanks for letting me vent but also anyone’s knowledge on this would be informative. (the round hit the side turrent) thanks[:(!]
While I do not consider myself an expert, I too was an Abrams crewman during DS/DS and have been messing around with them since 1987 (still own four today). The Chobham armor is in the front slope of the hull and turret with several side skirts also comprised of the same material. The frontal arc also has depleted uranium mesh added for extra hard surface. That the part that enemy tanks tend to hit during battle.
The current forces are dealing with NCF (non-conformal forces) that are popping the tank where any tank is most vulnerable, the rear and the sides. If you look at Israeli tanks, they add steel balls and chains and reactive armor to these areas to protect against shoulder fired anti tank weapons.
The RPGs have become more deadly in the past 13 years. Many nations were still supplying Iraq with better weapons since Desert Storm.
I too saw the story and film on CNN. From what I can tell, it looks like the crew was out of the hatches and the RPG hit the turret top or rear (the gear on top was burning). I don’t think it penetrated the hull or turret. Looked like a lucky shot and an unlucky crewman. I saw a few M1s get hit by RPGs when I was over there and none had any penetration. The RPG round mainly pissed the crew off.
That’s the Communist News Network for you. As long as it’s a bad impression…
Okay,
I crewed,tested and finally built the Abrams at Lima Ohio when I got out. Here’s the deal on the RPG situation. The vehicle was penetrated through the rear grille doors. The reason the bags in the bustle were burning is because the hot gas from the rocket warhead vented up through the top deck doors. During prototype testing in the late 70’s, the XM1 (PV14) was subjected to point blank (100 meters) fire into the armor packages to test the obvious. When this test was complete, PV14 (prototype vehicle #14) was towed to the range (hull only) and used for a hard target, (special armor removed of course). One day, while testing some new APDS rounds, we had about 2000 rnds of armor piercing .50 cal to burn up. You never want to bring this stuff back to the ammo dump and turn it in. During our “mad minute” when shooting up this .50 cal ammo, I noticed that at 1000 meters, I was seeing the tell tale sparking on the rear end of PV14 that usually denotes the armor piercing ammo is acheiving penetration. Upon closer inspection, sure enough, armor piercing .50 cal had penetrated the Rear Grille Door louvers on this hull! I was shocked, and subsequently sworn to secrecy. We noted to the powers that be in a debriefing session that the tank had a soft “ass” and we wanted something done about it. We were told it was too late in the program to add value in design changes. Then some bull about US doctrine always provides infantry protection on the flank, and finally that “research has shown that 99% of all threats come form the front”, it’s that tricky 1% that gets you everytime. The LIma Tank plant came out with an add on armor pack for the rear of the tank, too late in the war to implement.
Interesting stuff Crockett, thanks for sharing it.
Wow. Thanks for clarifying that, Crockett. Now do you have to kill us to keep all these a secret? LOL. Just kidding.
Also what happened to some of 3rd IDs tanks, was that they crew didn’t follow the loading plan. They carried flammables on the outside of their tanks on the storage racks. They items were hit and they subsequently caught fire. The flames debris then dripped down into the engine and caught that on fire.
There is also the “Mystery RPG” and punched a pencil-sized hole through the side of an Abrams and it went all the way through. I read about it in the Army Times.
If anyone is interested I have the PowerPoint slide show for the M1-After Action Report from Iraq. It has some great pictures of the damaged and knocked out M1s and how they were disabled. If anyone wants it, just let me know and I can send it out.
so crockett what you are telling me is that if i put some AP rounds in a 50 cal. i would have a fully automatic weapong that could take out m1s?!! Your not the only one to leak information, Rob Gronovius told us what armour type was on it. “jane’s tank reconition guide” says it is classified. [;)]
Gentlemen,
Read “Thunder Run”, it just came out at B&N and details the 3rd ID’s drive on Baghdad. Of particular note is the fate of “Cojone Eh?”, Charlie 1-2 which was one of the 3ID Abrams knocked out from TF1-64. There were photos of it “destroyed” with a bunch of Iraqis climbing on it taken after the tank was abandoned because the crew couldn’t put out the engine fire. We hit it with a ton of ordnance, including a pointblank hit from a HEAT round in the aft of the turret. The Iraqis didn’t penetrate the armor, they got lucky and ruptured a fuel line, which poured onto the hot engine, starting a fire that couldn’t be put out. It was really frustrating reading the account, I can only imagine the frustration of the crew having to abandon their tank.
As far as the mystery RPG, supposedly it was an RPG-18. I got that bit of info from a tanker from 3/7 Cav who was there. There’s a lot of stuff the Russkies sold em well after weapons trading with Iraq was a no-no.
Oh well… [2c]
Please try to keep the political commentary out of it. It’s distracting.
Chechen rebels fired volleys of RPG’s into the T-72’s and T-80’s in Grozny and other cities. They just pelted the tanks. They literally dug the armor away inch by inch, and were eventually able to achieve a penetration. The Russian tank platoons would laager in a situation like this, but it only delayed the inevitable.
Of course, the Chechens could do this because they would strip away the tanks’ infantry support supposedly coming from the sluggish, not very capable Russian conscripts. This, needless to say, is a whole different ballgame when fighting against the USMC.
Hey guys-
I don’t feel I “leaked” anything. I kept my mouth shut until these incidents were documented, but it is frustrating for me to see these things happen, particularly when we could have done something about it during development. I lived and breathed the XM1 project and I feel for my brother tankers. T3488g- I don’t think we’re on the same page here. Rear Grille Louvers are high carbon flame cut armor plate (no classified armor here). The rear grille doors are not assembled in Lima Ohio, but Scranton PA I believe, they are shipped as assemblies. No one will get the composition of the special armor out of me. By the way, Gronovious has no idea. The armor has evolved with technology and believe me, it works. As to the “mystery RPG” that acheived penetration, I can’t reveal a lot of detail, but I will say that if it did happen, all the planets were aligned and the guy firing it was the luckiest Gomer on the planet. I hope he got an extra helping of coax for his trouble. Good point about stowing flammables in the bustle rack. Any tank on earth is succeptable to infantry attack, if they close on you, and have the right weapons, you will be knocked out. The loading plan is drawn up for a reason, discipline means survival. I wish they would have listened to my recommendation that the loaders 240 mount needed re design, namely so he could shoot to the rear of the turret. The only way to accomplish this is to unpin the thing and go freestyle. A 360 slide mount would have been the cure for grunts on the back deck!
Good point about the 360 slide mount… I know there were light infantry guys from the 101st, who actually were in the prone on the back decks of the tanks in 3ID, who were engaging targets as the tank crew engaged theirs. Quite frankly… as an infantry guy… there are places I would MUCH rather be then in the prone, on the back of a tank, in an ambush.
Though that would make for a cool Diorama.
I hope those guys on that back deck had plenty of something between them and the deck, exhaust temp of the AGT 1500 is 800 deg.F, and in the desert, standing on the back deck in my issue LPC’s (leather personnel carriers, for you civilians) the soles got tacky! I’m sure those tankers were glad to have the ground pounders around when it counted.