Fights of Topolobampo

Naval engagement delivered the April 14th 1914 in the port of Topolobampo, in the state of Sinaloa, during the Mexican Revolution (1910-1920).

After having caused the fall of the president Francisco Madero, whom it made shoot, the general Victoriano Huerta seized the capacity to the Mexico. Its coup d'etat caused the opposition of the general Venustiano Carranza who took the head of the movement constitutionnalist and engaged the armed struggle against the usurper.

April 14th, 1914, the general Álvaro Obregón, one of the principal officers constitutionnalists, who was with his troops with Topolobampo, went up on board the Canonnière Tampico , ordered by lieutenant Hilario Rodriguez Malpica. In accordance with the protocol, Malpica hoisted its house with the most mast of its ship, thus announcing the presence of an important personality.

That did not escape the captain from the enemy drain-hole Guerrero , which decided to attack.

Wedged in a port, without any possibility of operation or escape, the Tampico was in a desperate plight when the biplane Sonora , controlled by the captain Gustavo Salinas, assisted of the mechanic Teodoro Madariaga, emerges opportunely and attacked the Guerrero by throwing bombs to him, thus delivering one of the first air and sea combat of the history (the very first one took place in 1913 during the Bataille of Lemnos at the time which a Greek pilot threw four bombs on a Turkish ship).

Deprived, and due, of any anti-aircraft equipment, the Guerrero was unable to push back this attack completely new and constrained with the escape, to avoid the destruction.

The Tampico was however to find the Guerrero on June 16th, 1914. This time there was no providential intervention and it was burnt at the conclusion of a keen battle while lieutenant Malpica committed suicide to avoid the captivity.

External bonds

http://www.semar.gob.mx/historia/barcos.htm

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