Sword of Light: Humanoid Self-Propelled Artillery

Chapter 174 Deep-water Salvage
Just after Wang Gensheng and the others came up, Duan Peng said:
"It's all that old medaka's fault for starting a war! The ships we just bombed were carrying grain! Now they're all going to be fish food. It's terrible!"

Wang Gensheng agreed with Duan Peng's words, after all, these grains were grown by the people with great effort, but even so, they had no choice but to do so.

If we don't do this, it's tantamount to increasing the enemy's morale, and you have to understand that the morale of the old medaka soldiers isn't very high to begin with.

So if they go hungry again due to a lack of food, even the most elite and experienced soldiers will have no choice but to surrender.

But it would be a waste to just throw all that grain into the seawater of this harbor to feed the fish.

Therefore, after thinking for a moment, Wang Gensheng said:
"How about this? I'll wait until it's light and the visibility is better, then I'll check how deep the water is. If it's not deep, then we can retrieve the food from the water."

However, Li Xiu, who was standing to the side, hesitated upon hearing this:
"But Commander, while visibility is better during the day, the port garrison's visibility is also better! Besides, our diving tubes aren't that long!"

Li Xiu's words naturally made Wang Gensheng think deeply. Although the rubber diving tube was simple and convenient, it also had a drawback: it couldn't be used for deep diving.

Because once you dive deep, the powerful water pressure will flatten the rubber hose, making it impossible for the person underwater to breathe.

Therefore, there is no way to increase the diving depth by lengthening the rubber hose.

Therefore, the most crucial thing is to get a diving bottle like the one used before the crossing. Special forces like frogmen naturally need to have professional equipment.

However, given the current industrial capabilities, it's difficult to produce even a seamless steel pipe, let alone a high-pressure gas cylinder.

That's right, the oxygen tanks carried by divers don't actually contain oxygen; they contain compressed air. Breathing pure oxygen directly can cause oxygen toxicity, which can be life-threatening in severe cases.

However, it is clear that there are no conditions to use high-pressure steel cylinders at present, so Wang Gensheng has to find a substitute.

However, Wang Gensheng quickly found a substitute, which was the inner tube of a car tire.

Unlike the tubeless tires that were popular before Wang Gensheng's time travel, in this era, due to substandard manufacturing processes, all tires had inner tubes.

More importantly, these tires with inner tubes can withstand relatively high air pressures.

Of course, it can't compare to the 30 MPa pressure of a compressed air cylinder used for diving, but it can easily reach a pressure of over 1 MPa.

Of course, since the density is not as high as the air pressure in a steel cylinder, there is no other way but to tie stones to the inside of a car to make it sink.

Otherwise, there would be no way to bring the car tires into the water! As for the car tires, they were obtained by Wang Gensheng leading his cavalry regiment to attack Lao Jing's car transport team, thus acquiring a large number of tires.

Of course, Wang Gensheng also understood that the solution of using car tire liners to replace diving cylinders was only temporary. After all, compared with the pressure of over thirty megapascals in high-pressure cylinders, the pressure of only one megapascal in car tire liners was negligible.

Putting everything else aside, the volume alone is a major issue, because 30 megapascals of air pressure is equivalent to 1 megapascal of air pressure, which is equivalent to a 30-fold concentration in volume.

Therefore, this is equivalent to a 30-fold reduction in range. However, fortunately, the inner tube of a car tire is relatively large, so the actual range is roughly four to five times longer. After acquiring the diving airbags, Wang Gensheng led a group of divers to begin the salvage operation.

Although the grains had been soaked in water for many days, they were packed in burlap sacks, so they were not eaten by the fish. And even though they had been soaked in seawater, they were still edible after being dried in the sun.

Another unexpected find was the weapons and ammunition. Although they had been submerged in seawater for many days, they were still 90% effective and usable after being retrieved from the sea.

Duan Peng ate the salty, bitter grains soaked in seawater and said:
"Ugh! These ships soaked in seawater are no good. If only our frogman special forces could capture enemy ships like they do when raiding cities, that would save us from wasting food and ships. After all, we're only bombing our own ships anyway!"

At this moment, Li Xiu also chimed in:
"Yeah! We can't just keep thinking about blowing up ships and warships! If only we could capture warships like we did when we attacked the city!"

Wang Gensheng nodded in agreement with Duan Peng and Li Xiu's words, but capturing ships is different from capturing cities. You should know that when capturing cities, the special forces team members are all wearing bulletproof helmets and vests, as well as all their weapons.

However, it is not an easy task to swim close to a ship while carrying bulletproof equipment and weapons and then board the ship.

First of all, when swimming, or rather, when underwater, since the density of the human body is similar to that of water, there is nothing to worry about.

Even later underwater bombs were similar; their density was similar to water, so they were not difficult to carry. However, with bulletproof equipment and weapons, things were different.

The bulletproof helmet and vest together weigh 20 kilograms. Moreover, the density of the bulletproof vest and helmet, which are made of steel, is much greater than that of water, so they are naturally very heavy, not to mention the weapons and ammunition.

The combined weight exceeds fifty pounds, which is equivalent to swimming while carrying a huge rock. Even if you can swim, it will be extremely physically demanding, and you will be exhausted in no time.

As for boarding the ship without bulletproof equipment and only carrying weapons, Wang Gensheng would naturally not do that.

After all, the soldiers in the special cavalry regiment were all handpicked by Wang Gensheng and had undergone long-term training.

Therefore, Wang Gensheng would never treat it as a consumable. After all, without bulletproof equipment, even though the soldiers of Wang Gensheng's special cavalry regiment were all highly skilled marksmen, they would still be killed by a hail of bullets.

After Wang Gensheng voiced his concerns, Duan Peng and Li Xiu, who had proposed to forcibly seize the boat, fell silent.

After all, even if Duan Peng faced bullets, he would still die without the protection of bulletproof equipment.

However, at this moment, Baili Xiu, the sharpshooter under Wang Gensheng, spoke up:

"Actually, we can use a float! For example, if our bulletproof gear is too heavy and makes it impossible for us to swim in the sea, we can equip it with a corresponding float! For example, we can use the inner tube of a car tire as a float, or use some wood as a float, which would balance the weight of the bulletproof gear!"

Baili Xiu's words were like a wake-up call, pulling Wang Gensheng back from a dead end.

(End of this chapter)