I am heavy cruiser Des Moines.... and this is my weapon.
She weighs 1500 kilograms and fires 2000 dollar custom-tool cartridges at 11 salvos a minute. It costs 400,000 dollars to fire this weapon... for 12 seconds.
Her sister ship, USS Salem, played the German Armored Cruiser Graf Spee in the film Battle of the River Plate in 1956. We've thought about that a little bit. USS Salem , with those guns, easily outguns Graf Spee's six 11" guns in volume of fire against the three British cruisers that were there that day. Salem has a viable chance of beating the British ships even if she has lesser diameter guns than Graf Spee...she has more guns...that fire alot faster....than the British guns.
Never screw with a ship armed with Mark 16 8"/55 cal cannons. Fires more than twice as fast as the Mark 15 guns. Well over twice the weight of shell coming down on your heads.
