James Holland

It wasn't.

It's about 300 yards.

Can't possibly have been 30 yards.

No.

but because of Semkin's greater experience he's got one up the spout he's got a 75mm round armour piercing round he fires immediately as soon as he sees it he just says fire because he's got his head out of the turret yeah

and the shell hits the gun mantlet, which is the extra bit of armour where the barrel enters the turret of the Tiger tank, spalling little bits of hot metal, splay out and blinds or hits in the face the driver who sort of goes got on him all.

screams, doesn't know, can't see anything, stops.

In the next few seconds, Stemkin fires a further nine rounds, but all of high explosive.

And that's the advantage of the Sherman tank, because it's smaller shells, it's ergonomically laid out, so right-handed gunner can load it from this side.

Loading one after the other, boom, boom, boom, boom, just keeps firing, creates lots of smoke.

And of course, when you get hit, if you're a tank commander, the first thing you do is then retreat into the turret.

Yeah.

The moment you retreat in the turret, you're dependent on periscopes, but you've also got, in those first seconds, you've got to adjust and be able to get into change position, look at the periscope, and all you can see is smoke.

Yeah.

So it goes hit, hit, hit.

No one can see anything, so no one can fire.

So then they hand a hook, they come out and they surrender.

Amazing.

So they haven't actually knocked out, they haven't brewed up the tank.

No.