How does a battleship defend itself against torpedo dropping airplanes?

Question

even if the battleship shoots down the enemy aircraft with anti-aircraft guns, how does it stop the torpedo?

Answer 1

there are no battleships to speak of ,anymore

Answer 2

some ships have machine guns that can take out the torpedo as well

Answer 3

You're speaking of WW2 I assume as there are no "battleships" anymore, and the preferred method of air/ship is via Harpoon.

By Anti-aircraft fire, primarily.  You don't have to shoot down the aircraft; if the ship can make the torpedo bomber maneuver, it will upset it's run (torpedo bombers had to fly very level, low and slow to successfully drop).  The torpedo only needs to miss.

Anti-torpedo bulges which were what the name implies:  extra beam built across crucial spaces just above and below the waterline.  That was a WW1 technology.

Answer 4

Battleships were made obsolete by torpedo-dropping airplanes and bomb-dropping airplanes.  And by submarines.  Battleships have been replaced by submarines themselves, and aircraft carriers.  Our aircraft carriers are surrounded by other ships that protect them, using missiles, guns, depth charges, etc.  In fact we can't use aircraft carriers in the Gulf because there's not room for all the other ships to deploy at the proper distance.

In the next war (US vs Iran, if that happens) we may well see aircraft carriers themselves become obsolete.  The Iranians have supersonic cruise missiles that we possible could not defend against.  Can you imagine them sinking a US aircraft carrier? 8^O  Google 'Sunburn Missile' and read about them.

Answer 5

There really no way to defende its self that why the battle ship is no longer used....and to that guy that says the Sunburn missle can hit one of our carries read this.... http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news...

Answer 6

Once the torpedoes were dropped the battleship could not stop them.  WWII torpedoes had to be aimed, and once launched ran a straight course.  A ship's captain might order a course change, to try to "comb the wakes" of the torpedoes.  The ship would turn toward the torpedoes and hope to pass between them.  At any rate this would present the narrowest aspect of the ship to the oncoming torpedoes.

The best protection against torpedoes and mines was in construction.  US battleships were built with triple bottoms.  This meant three layers of metal with voids between.  These voids might hold fuel oil, or sea water, or be empty, as necessary to keep the ship in trim.  The impact of the torpedo on the outside of the ship would cause it to detonate, and the force of the explosion would be released into these void spaces.  The only one of the new "fast battleships" to take a torpedo hit in WWII was the USS North Carolina (BB 55), and it was able to actually increase speed immediately after, and took on only a small list.

The entire hull of a battleship was not armored, as the armor was extremely heavy.  There was a belt of armor down each side, which did not extend the entire height of the side of the ship - it started below the weather deck level and stopped well above the bottom.  There were transverse armor bulkheads in front of the forward main battery and aft of the rear main battery.  The engines and steering gear would be within this armored area, as well as the magazines.  Torpedoes running shallowly enough to strike the armor would cause no harm, and below there was the triple bottom.

The "anti-torpedo bulges" mentioned by a previous answer basically amount to adding a "double bottom" over the outside of the existing side of the ship, to achieve the same effect.

Answer 7

Simple, layered protection.  The Battleship is not alone, it has several ships in it's task force, each has a job, for example a sub would be used to conduct forward scouting and antisubmarine detection.  Destroyers would form an outtter screen as an early warning and would also hunt down and destroy enemy subs.  Cruisers would be an antiaircraft platform.  If nessecary, they would "jump"  in front of any incoming torpedo.

  Next comes the battleship itself.  It has long range antiaircraft systems and short range systems in large quantities that would put up enough "lead" that it would be almost like diving into a wall, all supported by an electronics package.  Next, the ship itself, heavy armor and compartmentalized to isolate flooding and a highly trained Damage Control crew (Navy version of firefighters).

  This system seemed to work pretty well for the US (except for Pearl Harbor, but even then only one main battleship and one obsolete were the only ones not to fight again.)