[Ronin]

OK Ivan! Grab that round, tuck it under your arm, shimmy up that tube, and drop it in the hole on top!

Seriously... how do you load that sumbeech?

[PIF]

Lower tube slowly, insert round, raise tube slowly, fire ...

[jonascord]

It's a breech loader. One round per minute. The trunnions are at the balance point, and the tube is rocked to a horizontal, loaded from a carriage, into the breech, and then rocked back into battery.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/240_mm_mortar_M240

Sort of interesting, dates back to 1973 deployment, by the Syrians, in the Yom Kipper War...

It takes 25 minutes to deploy, so radar guided counter battery fire is going to clean it's clock. Note that it's only deployed in Third World toilets, against enemies in sandals, with AKs.