MASTERS OF THE AIR (Parts 1-2) | FIRST TIME WATCHING | REACTION
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- Опубликовано: 19 май 2024
- Enjoy my reaction as I watch "Masters of the Air (1-2)" for the first time!
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00:00 - Intro
02:03 - Reaction
35:34 - Review 
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My Uncle, Archie V. Benner, Jr., after earning a degree in Architectural Engineering from Texas A&M (Class of 1938), joined the Army Air Corps where he received his commission as a 1LT, and became a member of the 8th US Army Air Force. He was a B-17 bomber pilot in the 549th Bombardment Squadron, also known as " The Bombing Devils". He was one of the original "kindergarten pilots" because, as squadron commander, he led numerous missions over France and Germany before his twenty-fifth birthday. For his valiant service to his country, including missions flown during the Battle of Normandy, he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, Air Medal with three Oak Leaf Clusters, Presidential Unit Citation, and EAME Theater Ribbon with three Bronze Service Stars. He was one heck of an Uncle and he is missed.
Your uncle is absolutely inspiring! My great uncle was also a pilot in WWII, and he was awarded a rusty pair of dog tags that barely identified his plane crash dug out of a farm field in France in 2022.
Salute!
It is incredible how young in age, but not in spirit, heroes such as your Uncle were. Trained quickly & tossed together; given one harrowing mission after another…my deepest love to all our courageous, esteemed military members, heroic vets and supportive families-far too much would be lost without their sacrifices.🫡🎖️🕊️
My father went through the Air Cadets program and arrived in Thurleigh England in November '44 as a replacement pilot in the 306th Bomb Group, 367th Bomb Squadron. He was a month shy of 21 years old. His B-17 was named "Punchy' (44-8197). He was a co-pilot for his first few missions and later was promoted to pilot. He was involved in some of the "1000 plane" missions over Berlin. Combat missions ended in mid April of '45 and when the war ended he ferried aircraft and then went to North Africa taking his B-17 on missions with cartographers so we could have more accurate maps of Morocco and other areas there. After the war he was a pilot for a major airline and retired from that after 33 years. He never talked much about his time in the war, but he had a sudden illness and in his last couple of months he opened up to me about those days. I was very proud of his participation in the war and when I was young I must have built two dozen models of B-17s, When I was in my thirties I took him to see a B-17 that travelled all over the country participating in air shows. He had not been inside a B-17 since the war and the crew of the B-17 invited him to sit in the pilot's seat. He was hesitant at first but accepted the invitation. He put his hands on the yoke and sat there lost in thought. (very Dana Andrews in that famous scene in "The Best Years of Our Lives") I have his flight jacket, medals and photos. He lived a long and happy life.
That’s beautiful man. Thank you for sharing it! My grandpa was a copilot in the 388th bg, 563rd sqdrn out of knettishall July-October 44. Very proud of him and so glad they made this series so I could know a little bit more. These were real people. What they fought for, the values of democracy and freedom over fascism/totalitarianism is our legacy to carry on. May we with God’s help meet that mission. Let’s not forget what they and our country fought for. It was the best of us.
@@gat569 Thanks for your reply. There is a guy who does architectural renderings of B-17's - here is the link to my father's plane "Punchy," www.markstyling.com/1ADJPEG/B171ADCu-100.jpg
The only thing this show is missing is the real guys telling their story documentary style like BoB and The Pacific. It's sad the reason they probably aren't in the show is that they're essentially all gone
Yeah. I think the only time I ever had the chance to talk to them (the few that would talk, anyway) was because I was an aviation geek, and hung around WW2 antiques at air shows. One of 'em who'd actually seen "Band of Brothers" said, "..up there, there wasn't anywhere to hide."
They aint in the show because this show is recent and they have all left us, But they all did tell their stories! around 2005 the hisory channels all interviewed them and the fighter pilots and their stories are unbeleiveable
Reminder that the Allies fought for the wrong side in WWII.
next week there is an episode 10 next week which is a documentary. so kinda like the interviews at BoB
They're doing a final 10th episode just with all that.
ruclips.net/video/ZkYOtyp3hKU/видео.htmlsi=trShW9cP2-2Rz2Jt
The Norden Bombsight was an early computer. It would calculate air and wind speed altitude etc. and improve the accuracy of bombs hitting a target when dropped. It was patched in to the plane's auto pilot system! When the Bombardier turned it on, he had flight control of the plane! The term Bombs Away meant that the pilot and co pilot had flight control again when the bombs were dropped. The technology was so closely guarded that before a mission, the Bombardier with armed escort would go to a building and sign out the bombsight and then go to the plane.
The pilot activated the autopilot so aircraft would experience no accelerations during final approach. The Norden got airspeed from the connection.
This video ruclips.net/video/U6D5rXbMBKo/видео.html about the Norden bombsight is really interesting.
TLDR; In reality, it sucked.
It was pretty ingenious engineering. But, in reality, there were factors that affected accuracy that the bombardiers had no way of measuring during the mission. Their actual accuracy was worse than half a mile. When you're trying to hit a particular collection of buildings, a half mile is a complete miss. The common phrase at the time was, "The Norden bombsight can drop the bombs in a pickle barrel." Not so much.
The orders to keep the bombsight out of enemy hands was pure marketing BS. The company got the military to insist on that level of secrecy. It turns out, the Norden company tried to sell the same bombsight to Germany prior to the war. So, they already had a couple of working copies and knew how it worked. The German government decided that it wasn't useful and didn't place an order for their air force.
To this day, the Norden bombsight still has an aura of mystique about it. Most people who have heard of it accept that it's capabilities are nearly magical. Until I watched that video, I was under the impression that it really was amazing for its time.
Again, it certainly was very clever. But, it never lived up to the hype.
@@MightyDrakeC they couldn’t calculate their ground speed.
My dad was a navigator and bomb operator in B-17s in WW2. From the photos he had and the stories he told, this series is quite accurate. On his last mission, the regular tail gunner was ill and was replaced by a new airman, whom the rest of the crew never met. Over Belgium, their B-17 was hit by flak and the tail of the plane took a direct hit, along with the engines. Photos of the plane, taken by the Belgian resistance, show essentially half of the rudder and the tail gunner position were missing. My dad took a piece of shrapnel in his leg and was seriously injured. The medical care he needed was beyond what the resistance could provide, so they reluctantly turned him over to the Germans. He spent the rest of the war in German hospitals and prison camps along with the rest of the crew. The pilot and copilot escaped capture and made it back to England via Spain. Many years after the war, the Belgian village who hid the crew, erected a monument at the site of the crash, and the surviving crewmembers returned.
My grandfather was a tail gunner on a B-17 during WW2. Two of his brothers were infantry, and they used to tell me that my granddad had it the toughest. I always thought they were just saying that to make him look good in front of his grandson, but now I know that they were just being honest.
Thanks and respect, to your family's service to our nation!
My late uncle did 35 missions in the Ball Turret of a B-17G, he was with the 381st BG, 535th Squadron at Ridgewell. Heard many stories over the years. One night my uncle and I were sitting having a drink and he was smoking one his favorite cigars and he was talking about one of the worst missions. At the end of that talk, he went silent, stared into the dark hallway across the room an in a low voice said: "God Almighty". I will never forget the look in his eyes, mentally he wasn't in the room, he was in that B-17G over Germany. 0I was at the Crew's first reunion after the War (held in 1977). They were such a great bunch of guys despite living through hell. They were only ages 18 to 25 during their time of service. Imagine kids that age now having the same skill and responsibility as these men? To be fair, there are some now who are capable but anyone will say that their Generation (WW2) were the Greatest.
deepest respect and thanks for your Uncles service to our nation
Believe it or not, the ball turret was (statistically) the safest position on a B-17, with the lowest fatality rate among crews in which some men survived. The waist gunners had the highest casualty rate.
“Imagine kids that age now” - I see comments like that constantly. Guess what? That’s exactly what people, WW1 vets for example, said back then about THESE guys. They said the kids were too soft and spoiled to fight in a war. And look what they accomplished! ❤ I miss the greatest gen a lot, they were so kind to me and always had fascinating stories to tell.
@@falsenostalgia-shannon Not to try and say some WW1 Vets didn't say that but the younger WW2 Vets went through the harshness of the Great Depression which was exactly what hardened most of them when the War came. My point was that with some exceptions, the more recent generations clearly have had things far easier than those guys did as did my generation (I am 58). Their mindset was more resolute than young generations in the last 20+ years. I do agree, there are exceptions and I'd hazard to say those young people have learned from them and the Vietnam generation (themselves being children of the WW2 generation) were also great people who deserve more recognition than they have. There are always selfless individuals in every generation.
Thanks Cassie. I'm an old man now, but my father was Air Force in the 60's and I can remember sitting at the knee of these guys at the end of their careers listing to their stories of the greatest Air War in history. The memories of these gentlemen flood into my mind. Thanks again. A lot of the series is taken from the book by Harry Crosby the Navigator. Another hint: Crosby was in the squadron called the "Bloody 100th" it was considered a hard luck group. Prepare yourself.
My uncle was a bomber pilot like these guys. Made it through all his missions and got transferred home. 2 weeks after being back in the States he had plane problems crash and was killed. Unbelievable he made it through all that only to come back to the States and die
So sorry to hear that.
Per your point after the first episode about rather being in the air than the ground; more men died in the 8th Airforce (which is the subject of this series,) than in the entire Marine Corps (the subject of The Pacific,) during WWII.
Holy shit -
25,000
To the ARMY AF’s: 76,000(ish, rough numbers) not that it’s a numbers game, but that we didn’t hear about the Army AF losses, like we do about other ground units.
I say that as a grunt myself.
@@Yeraveragemoron Yeah this is something I just learned recently myself. It really boggles the mind the scale of WWII.
And RAF Bomber Command was even higher. 55,000 dead out of 125,000 crew. A fatality rate of 45%, which was second highest of WW2, only behind German U-boat crews.
@@lyndoncmp5751 that’s insanity -
@@Yeraveragemoron
Sure was. 🤯
These bomber crews had a higher casualty rate than the Marines in the Pacific, believe it or not.
In 1943 they had about a 10x higher casualty rate than the Marines in the Pacific, the early daylight bombing campaign was brutal.
Aye, there's a reason the RAF turned to night bombing early on in the war.
You know what's crazy, though? The German u-boat crews had a higher casualty rate than the Kamikaze.
@@jakubfabisiak9810 yup, roughly 75% for the war.
in %s A-hole!
My late father in law enlisted right after Pearl Harbor and mustered out in November 1945. He was a waist gunner on a B-24 Liberator. He fought in Africa, Italy, and Europe. Most of what I know about him I got from his wife Ann. The only thing he ever said to me was, "Thank God you never have to see what a 20 mm cannon from a 109 can do to a man." He managed to get through the war without a scratch and apparently didn't suffer from PTSD. Ann told me that after he came home he had some bad dreams but they went away with time. So he came home adopted a brother and sister, my wife, and had 1 daughter. He was a kind and gentle person, never spanking his kids. My wife said he would punish them by talking to them first then making them sit in a corner to think about what they had done. Ann told me that their son's death in a car accident was harder on Jim than the war. Actually, her death was the hardest thing Jim ever dealt with. My wife and I made it a point to visit with him 4 or 5 times a week. Every time Ann came up he would tear up. They were married 67 years. Don't get wrong, Jim was a tough man's man. He worked cutting wood during the depression to help support his family. He boxed while in the Army and only lost 1 fight. He took down trees using a lineman's belt and spikes to get to the top then taking the tree down piece by piece. He did this until a stoke stopped him at age 78. It was a whole generation of Jims and Anns that won the war against the Nazis and Imperial Japan. We still have those type of people with us but I fear they are becoming outnumbered by those that do not love America.
That's a very nice, thoughtful addition to this thread. My Dad was a B24 tailgunner who also survived to live a full life, albeit after being a POW in WWII.
My grandfather’s cousin was a Navigator on Sterling bomber with RCAF Bomber Command. His Sterling was shot down over the Netherlands in the autumn of 1944, coincidentally my grandfather was on the ground in the Netherlands a few dozen miles away taking part in the battle featured in the Netflix movie The Forgotten Battle. The whole crew were buried together in the community cemetery of the nearby Dutch town in a nice prominent location across from the cemetery’s entrance.
Lest We Forget
When my dad (Korean war vet, Army) and I took our oldest son to a CAF fly in at a local airport and there was a B-17 there. We were under the aircraft wing enjoying the shade when an old-timer walked up and squatted down next to the ball turret and said "That was my office for 25 missions in WWII." Needless to say, we thanked him for his service and were thrilled to meet and speak with him.
The airfield was recreated at RAF Abingdon (now Dalton Barracks) In Oxfordshire a few miles from me. Fascinating to see the base buildings in the distance and a full scale B-17 crashed in the middle of the airfield during filming of the scenes in this episode. Amazing people and they seem to have done an excellent job showing us this period in time just like with Band of Brothers and The Pacific.
I was also lucky enough to be at Uni in Hertfordshire whilst they filmed Saving Private Ryan on the old Hatfield Aerodrome and we could see the town sets in the middle of the airfield and met some of the crew and stars in the Fighting Cocks pub in St Albans. Great to see the finished Movies and Series after seeing them being made.
I'm super stoaked to see you started watching masters of the air. This hits home for me as an Airmen, these men were the giants who shoulders we stood on. I get to volunteer at the Museum of Flight with one of those giants. Pilot Dick Nelms flew B-17s with the 447th Bomb Group from England and flew 35 missions over Europe including attacks on Berlin and in support of D-Day. We just celebrated his 101st birthday and he's always looking forward to voluteering at the museum in front of our B-17. He wrote a poem for the special day.
No longer waiting for that day to arrive.
I’m 101 and still alive!
I think I know just what to do
To stay in shape for 102
And then there’s no stopping me.
The new target will be 103.
By Dick Nelms
WW2 missions required 15-40 bombers because aiming from high altitude was so poor. The Norden bombsight, the best of the war, only put half of the bombs within 1,200 feet of the target, which meant half landed more than 1,200 off target. Mathematically that meant 100 bombs needed to be dropped to ensure that one actually hit the target.
The shot of the 2 Fortresses nearly colliding in cloud, was unfortunately a very common occurence. There were so many USAAF bases in Eastern England that when the aircraft took off for a mission, the chances of collision were extremely high, expecially in poor/low visibility. Many crew and bombers were lost due to mid-air collisions in poor weather. I read an autobiograthy of a B-17 Flight Engineer (I think it was Combat Crew by John Comer) who took off over the burning remains of 2 of his Groups planes who had crashed at the end of the runway with full fuel and bomb loads in thick fog, due to not reaching full take-off speed before the runway ran out. Men were lost even before they reached the enemy coast.
The losses of aircrew was horrific, at the America museum at Duxford in the UK they have a very very long glass panel, on each panel is hundreds of engravings of an aircraft, each engraving depicts an airman lost, the panels must be at least 100yrds long, really brings it home.
The B17 had a crew of 10 & carried 7 tons of Bombs, the British heavy bomber was the Lancaster, it had a crew of 7 & carried 10 tons of Bombs, Aircrews did not have the room to wear parachutes, they were hanging up near each work station, when ordered to bail out crews would have to put them on, in most cases the aircraft was out of control & the G forces so great the crew were pinned & couldn't move, the bravery of these young boys was at another level.
Lest we forget
The war in the air was just a different animal entirely. Each part of combat had its own unique horrors, but being a bomber crew, especially in the first half of the bombing campaign, was particularly deadly. At one point, new aircrewmen in these bombers had an average life expectancy of around 6 weeks. As you'll see throughout the series, many of these raids suffered insane loss rates, some cases more than 10%. It might not seem like a high number, but remember that you are flying these missions over and over and over again, being required to complete 25 before you can be done. Every time you get in that plane, there could be a 1 in 10 chance of you not coming back, and you've got to roll that dice at least 25 times and get lucky every time. Many didn't make it.
0.9 ^ 25 = 7.2% chance of going home
My grandpa was a gunner on a b17 in WW2… he survived thankfully, but never spoke about it.
I am a retired Air Force pilot. When in pilot training, we were taught to speak calmly and distinctly, especially during emergencies. We were told it helps us to think and reassures the crew. Most problems in the air have established procedures and responses. We studied hard to know the more likely ones by rote memory. That helped keep us calm. I guess it did, but every time my aircraft suffered a malfunction or other emergency, I always thought my voice went up an octave or two. Nobody mentioned it. In fact, I had crewmen tell me I sounded calm when the stuff hit the fan. Go figure.
Thank you for your service
I am retired AF as well. 3000 hours in AWACS and ABCCC. I love MOTA. Kind of messes with my head some.
Most problems in the air have established procedures and responses that were written in blood by guys like those portrayed on this show
Heck, I flew EC-121s, the forerunner of the AWACS. During the transition, we sometimes flew missions with the AWACS, testing our combat-experoenced controllers with the new guys. Of course, we were at 10 - 12 thousand feet and the AWACS was way above us! @@jimandaud
I'm telling you, this going be crazy ride in the air! "Band of Brothers" and "The Pacific" were amazing reaction on PiB. It was intense, emotional, and all around the series! HERE WE GO!!
Wonder what her reaction to Generation Kill would be like? Haha.
Except this series has none of that, was not expecting much but i barely wanna continue watching. Huge BoB fan, but this series has none of what made that show good.
Except this show sucks in comparison.
@@yourlifeisagreatstoryshe’d be horrified lmao
@@NecramoniumVideo you can't compare both of them, it's different
Crosby actually navigated the norway mission so well he inadvertently got a medal for it what he called a medal from pure luck.
His delayed turn and responses meant they hit the Uboat pens at Lunchtime. So the Norwegian workers were mostly off the site and the germams going through a big shift change were on the site.
The Norwegian resistance thought the americans had deliberately timed it perfectly, and the message got all the way back to the 100th
Fun fact, while the B-17 is indeed a big girl, the F-14 from Top Gun is only 10’ shorter and weighed almost 10,000lbs more
A lot of people don't realize the US Air Force was founded in 1947 after the war. The US Army Air Corps was the predecessor to the Air Force.
True, but the Air Corps became the Army Air Force right before the war started.
Fun fact: Remember the A-4 Skyhawk? The little planes the instructors used in Top Gun? One of those, can carry a heavier bombload, than a B-17.
Not quite. The Skyhawk can carry an equal payload of 8,000 lbs, not more.
Today the F-15E Strike Eagle is being tested to carry fifteen 500-pound JDAMs under the Agile Combat Eagle Program. That’s a payload of 7,500 lbs.
The actor that plays Lemmons (the main mechanic) is Jude law's son. Kid looks just like his dad and I can't unsee it after I found out. He's good in this show and I hope this launches him a nice career.
Ahhh I did think 'god that guy looks like Jude Law'. Now I know why lol
The height the bombers didn't matter to avoid anti-aircraft flak as the cannon shells had timers on them so they would explode at the right height, the flak crews could work out how high they were flying & set the timer on the shells. Later in the war the shells were equipped with proximity detonators that would detonate when the shells close to an aircraft. While aircrews had a lower survival rate than other services they did have the luxury of returning home base after their missions & having a warm dry bed to sleep in & hot meals.
Cassie, air breathing machines can only fly so high. That's why the Germans set their flak guns for that altitude. Interrogation is basically debriefing after a mission.
At this point in technology, they aren’t flying at the air breathing ceiling. A more efficient engine can provide enough to fly higher.
I was under the impression the Flak gunners were able to estimate their elevation and try to shoot to that elevation. But it wasn’t a very good science.
My dad was a waist gunner on a B17, with the 390th BG, stationed in England. Nothing but praise for all those guys.
I had three great grandfathers who served in WWII. One was a dental hygienist for the navy, one served in the field artillery and was in the unit that liberated Dachau, and one was in the Army Air Corps stationed in Burma.
@@lucasgrey9794 I think you are the one who was lied to.
The alternative to slowing down to stick with Curts crew would have been to keep flying at their normal speed, which would mean Curts plane would fall behind and almost certainly get picked off by German fighters. The whole point of them flying in formation is all of the other planes around you theoretically help protect you and cover each other with their machine guns.
That’s right. An individual airplane will often be approached by a fighter from an angle that only one gun can shoot at it. Two more planes nearby can can triple if not more the number of guns that hit a fighter plane, and they can usually get even better angles on the attacking plane.
There is an annual summer festival of aeroplanes in Oshkosh, Wisconsin called Airventure. You'd be able to see, walk into B17s and even take a joy flight in one. You would get a better appreciation of these amazing aircraft when you can see them in person. If you do, please take us on your excursion. I would love to see your reaction to it.
Or she could tour a Lancaster Bomber in her home province in Canada at Nanton or in Hamilton Ontario where there are numerous Second World War 2 aircraft to tour and fly in.
The flak cannons were rather versatile. They were used for antiaircraft fire like this, indirect fire like the guns at Brecourt in Band of Brothers, and for direct fire like in Bastogne. A truly devious technology of the time.
They could kill bombers 25,000 feet in the air, and tanks 2,000+ yards away on the ground.
@@adamscott7354 6000 flak rounds were cheaper than a ball bearing factory. More easily replaced as well, I imagine.
The Tiger tank's main armament was developed from the well-known 8.8 cm FlaK 36/37 anti-aircraft gun. So yes, these cannons were indeed very versatile.
@@robderich8533 I believe it was after the Battle of France, where they discovered that there standard anti tank guns couldn't knock out French Tanks, Rommel pressed some 88s he had in service to knock them out, so an anti tank version was developed, as well as the main Gun on the Tiger and KonigsTiger (Tiger II).
Flak weapons had timed fuses, so they could be adjusted to the height window of the bomber group. Germans had rudimentary radar to help but fighters would also relay altitude info so they could be hit outbound from the drop. My dad (B24 tailgunner in the 15th AF) even wrote in his memoir of a ghost B24 flying under their group on a mission. In that case, the German plane was under a USAAF 24 when they dropped bombs and was destroyed.
With regard to your comment about them being calm during the wheel's up landing; there is a saying amongst pilots in an emergency that the three priorities are Aviate, Navigate, Communicate. Meaning fly the plane and stay in control, Find the safest place to put down, and contact others/authorities that can be of assistance. You execute these activities rather than losing your cool to ensure the best outcome.
My neighbor flew an F4F Wildcat (Navy) fighter, and a family friend was a B-24 navigator (both now deceased). Sadly, and rarely talked about, they were both largely deaf because the engines and guns were incredibly loud and the planes weren't sealed or pressurized so changing altitudes sometimes injured the crew's eardrums.
"Flak" came into English as an abbreviation for the German word Flugabwehrkanone (anti-aircraft cannon / aircraft-defense cannon). They fired explosive shells which were set to explode at a predetermined altitude and throw off large chunks of shrapnel (=pieces of metal). The shrapnel would then impact the aircraft and damage it enough to bring it down.
I love this series for its authentic details like the pre flight checks, the burning of oil on the runways and the post flight "interrrogations", i.e. debriefings, and hands stuck to the frozen guns. These are details not usually shown in previous films. It gives me a much better idea of what it was like. About those bombs dropped in the Channel. There are 500,000 unexploded "items" on its sea bottom including dropped bombs and mines from WWI and WWII. An unexploded Nazi bomb was found in an English garden just a month ago. The evacuation of 3000 people from Plymouth, and along the route taken to destroy the bomb safely, was their largest civilian evacuation since WWII. My father served in the Army Air Corp but had to lie about his age to join in 1946. He served in Korea and occupied Japan.
Two movies about WW2 bombers you may find interesting. "Command Decision" with Clark Gable and "12'0 Clock High" with Greogry Peck. About B-17 bomber groups. There was also a tv series titled "12'0 Clock High". A WW2 I recommend is "Victory at Sea" made in the 50's. Most episodes are about the US but some do talk about other allies.
Thanks for doing this series. Up front I'll say this series sits between BoB (best series ever) and The Pacific. You've obviously already picked up on the fact air combat is WAY DIFFERENT that fighting on the ground. It seems so odd that after a "mission" these guys go back to relative normality...bunks to sleep in, hot meals, and evening entertainment. For this luxury they are blessed with having the greatest odds of dying of any member of the armed forces. The 8th Air Force in Europe suffered more casualties than the entire US Marine Corp. in the Pacific. The fighting is BRUTAL. You did a fine job keeping up....and I know others here in the comments have answered the bulk of your questions. I look forward to your review of Episode 3.
Being that you previously reacted to Band of Brothers, Saving Private Ryan, and The Pacific, there is a bit of information that you might be interested in. As horrendous as the casualties were for the men on the ground, the 8th Air Force in Europe had more casualties than the Marines did in the Pacific. When I heard that the airmen had to make 25 missions (then raised to 30) before being able to return stateside, initially to me, it didn't sound like that many. Considering that they were often suffering near 10% losses on early missions, that means that the survivors would have seen all of their original friends be replaced two to three times, by their 30th mission.
The reason for the 25 was that statistically the chances were close to zero, so if a crew managed to beat the odds and survive then may as well send them home. It was raised to 30 as the odds of survival went up
Yes. The average survival rate was 10 missions. My dad was shot down and captured on his 10th. He had turned 19 a couple of weeks prior.
so happy you are watching the series
Lonesome Dove. You will just love it.
Flak. Anti-aircraft (AA) guns - 88mm (others bigger and smaller). I was able to interview a German gun crewmen 3 years ago. He was just 16 years old when he crewed a gun. Some target areas had as many as 1,000 AA guns to protect them. Over 1 million Axis personnel were involved in the Reich's air defense.
22 years Air Force. In an emergency, there is nothing more reassuring than a calm steady voice. We train for that.
Main German flak gun is referred too as an eighty eight (88) and they had a lot of them. Norden Bomb sight, manufactured in Connecticut. After two plus years, you still have awesome reactions and still love them.
having flown Bombers and tankers in the Air Force for 23 years. yes, air crew are very calm during an emergency, they have to handle the problem. when they survive, and on the ground afterwords they can let all the fear and emotion out. if you ever listen to black boxes from a plane crash, you will hear the crew very professional and calm right up to the impact.
Thank you for your service!
Over 4700 B-17 bombers were lost in combat during WW2. That’s just B-17s. You watched “The Pacific.” There were more airmen casualties over Europe than Marines in the Pacific theater. So far there hasn’t been a miniseries made to show the hell the sailors went through in the Navy.
It's a little known fact that the Army Air Force lost more than 15,000 men killed in training accidents, before they ever got to fly a single mission in combat.
A decidedly unfun fact is that the Norden bombsight they talked about as being nearly as secretive as the nuclear bomb was basically a sham. It was not anywhere NEAR as accurate as it was made out to be at the time. However, under the assumption that they needed daylight to accurately use the useless bombsight, they continued to conduct their bombing raids in the day which contributed to the appalling number of casualties you’ve already seen in this show.
That, and the company that made the bomb site concocted the whole secrecy thing to make it seem more important. There was at least one better bomb site that didn't get selected by the government.
And they made the Brits look incompetent in the show while the US had so many casualties.
@@rbaldinoDidn't help that Germany had drawings of one in 1938, and got one in 1940, so not very secret at all.
I can understand the RAF decision to switch to Night time bombing, especially after the Blitz. Though they did continue to develop techniques to be far more accurate, with Lead bomber techniques, flares and such.
They (the higher ups) knew it was a war of attrition - so much so that on D-Day there were almost no German planes in the air.
After the war was over, an RAF bomber pilot was in a pub, drinking with an American bomber pilot. He summed up the situation succinctly and accurately. "We area bombed area targets, and you area bombed precision targets". Considering the CEP for daylight bombing in Europe was on the order of 1000 meters on a good day, precision bombing was an urban legend.
The first model plane I made as a boy was a B17.
You should also try and watch the movie 'Red Tails (2012)' to learn a bit more about other American pilots who served at this time
Norden Bombsight. Allegedly accurate enough to drop a bomb in a pickle barrel from height. None the less, very accurate for its time. The Enigma code breaking was more of a closely held secret I would maintain, but yeah, it was important.
You got to be kidding me Bremen goddamn Bremen for their first mission
it didn't have the reputation then.
And then its on to "Flak City" St Nazaire as the next stop on the tour!
any landing you can walk away from is a good landing. any landing where they get to use the plane again is an outstanding landing.
Ken lemmons played by jude Laws son was actually 21 and a master sergeant by that point not a corporal but he was an exceptionally highly rated Crew chief oh and also already married
The Norden Bombsight was a remarkable electro-mechanical computer that used gyroscopes and a pair of optical reticles linked to the bomber's autopilot. As the plane approach the target, the pilot trimmed the aircraft to fly at the required atltitude, while the bombardier actually controlled the course of plane through the bomb sight. When the target lined up in bombsight, the bombardier released the bombs. In theory, when everything worked right, it could drop a 500-lb bomb within a 100-yard circle from a height of 20,000 feet. In reality, nothing ever went right--either there was flak, or fighters, or clouds, or the winds weren't right, which meant the theoretical accuracy was never achieved in combat. The average median error radius (a circle in which half of all the bombs dropped would fall) in Europe was 1000 yards.
I have a love hate relationship with this series. One of my grandfather's flew a B17 from 42-45. He was hit multiple times and lost many crew members, but he was one of the few that flew back home in the verry same plain he flew over in. Granted nearly entirely rebuilt. As a teen I got to read some of his journals he kept. I was blissfully unaware of the real truth behind the numbers he talked about in those pages. One bomber, tail number xxxxxxxx named xxxxxx was ten men, ten brothers fathers sons uncles. and today we lost thirty bombers. I cannot help but tear up every episode. However, it should NOT be antiseptic or sterile. We must know the real coast because there are still those in power that think they can use the world like their own chess bord. Use people and lives as fodder to their own greed. We have learned nothing, and I get a knot in my stomach looking at the state of the world today knowing that so many sacrificed for this? I am glad my grandfathers are not alive to see what the west is becoming. We may have wone the war, but politicians are destroying us from within now because we did not learn from history that any government is either controlled by its people or the people are slaves to that government.
My college math teacher was in the ball. Ask "How did you end up there???" He said, "We all showed up...they had us line up tallest to shortest...and I was the shortest.." All he said was you basically had to shoot WAY in advance of a fighter..and hope they ran into it..
Great reaction Cassie like always. I like that is actor that portrait Lt. Harry Crosby (The guy that is always throwing up) the narrator of this series, and the real Lt. Harry Crosby was a author and writer of many books and stories about the 100th bomb group, and the producers use many of his stories as material for this series. In his book 'A Wing and a Prayer: The "Bloody 100Th' Harry H Crosby stresses how incompetent he felt leading the group to Tronheim. All the congradulations he received after the mission left him dismayed. Being switched from Brady's crew to Blakely's was the best thing that could happen to him. Blakely was all about practice. Every day they would fly practice missions to and from Scotland. Sometimes just an individual aeroplane and sometimes in formation with other Forts. Soon Crosby worked out the kinks and built up his confidence. Not only him, but the whole outfit. By the end of the War he was regarded as the best navigator in the whole eighth army air corps. And a heads up dont watch the end credits of the episodes as they show the upcoming episode it may spoil some things. Keep up the good work.
To this day the U-boat pens at Trondheim exist. They were too well-built to be destroyed after the war, so the Norwegians built over the top of them. German construction was built for a "thousand year Reich."
Hey Cassie, just so you know, the RAF bombers flew bombing missions at night. When the Americans arrived, the Germans were getting bombed night and day.
There were ten men in each plane in Flying Fortresses, and seven men in the British heavy bombers. Flak is the name for exploding anti-aircraft shells. The word comes from a German word they used to name their main anti-aircraft guns.
That word was; fliegerabwehrkanone, which means; aircraft defence cannon. They shortened the word to FLAK by taking these latters from the longer word, like so:-
FLiegerAbwehrKanone. Taking the capitals from the word, we get; FLAK. Flak guns fired shells that were 88 millimetres in diameter and 571mm long. Each shell weighed from 9.6, to 10kg and were set to explode when they reached a certain height. You’ve seen Band of Brothers and what German artillery did to the trees at Bastogne. The guns that did that, were the same kind of guns, just being used against ground units, instead of planes. That gives you some idea of what kind of damage FLAK could do. A shell didn’t have to hit a plane, just explode nearby. The skins of the planes were not thick steel, but thin aluminium, so you can imagine what it was like. They were amazing young men. Simply amazing.
My Dad was in an RAF bomber squadron, but he was accepted into Med school and spent the war becoming a Doctor in Northern Ireland. Errol Flynn’s father was one of his professors. He met my Mum in Postwar Germany. She was an RAF nurse.
My grandfather served in WW2 in the South Pacific. He was 3nd generation German so he was sent to the South Pacific as a cavalry flak gunner to shoot down aircrafts.
He had quite the knowledge of aircraft tactics. On the other side of the war, in Europe, B-17s did a fairly big job of dropping bombs on military targets. Before grandpa entered the service (he was drafted at 17) the B-17s were tasked with flying over occupied territory, dropping bombs, and getting out of there. They had P-51 escorts, fighter planes, but their range made them have to turn back to base prematurely. That was when Axis forces sent their planes in, and there was a lot of B-17s shot down after their escorts returned to base. One way this was fixed was with the invention of the 200 US gallon drop tanks they put on the P-51's. Like grandpa said, the Nazis probably pissed their pants when the bombers still had their fighter escorts with them. The P-51s were superior fighters to the Axis Messerschmidt 109s.
In the South Pacific, they had fewer bombers, but the ones they were using were B-24's and B-29's due to their longer range. They weren't just flying across the English Channel. Many of them did their work, and then landed in China.
Cassie asked why don't they go higher. Planes don't have the luxury of high altitude flight. The air is too thin for the engines to properly work at high altitudes, and the planes themselves were not pressurized. You'll notice the crew wearing masks. That was so they could breathe.
Cassie asked "Why did that pilot drop his bombs over the channel?" He lost at least one engine. In order to stay in the air, the bombs were likely dropped and not armed because they're heavy. A B-17 can fly with 2 engines out, provided the wings are still intact, even if the 2 engines are both on the same side. They can't stay in the air with a full payload though if even one engine goes out, even if the reason it went out was due to mechanical failure, and not because it was shot.
"What am I in for? What am I watching?" Cassie, you may not appreciate this the same way I do, but the fact of the matter is, you're watching it, and you understand, while this is based off real events, it really isn't all that far from the truth. WW2 was unlike any war ever fought at the time. Technology was at a peak where the bombs were huge, there were planes that were several times faster than the next worst war (WWI) guns that were more powerful, with extended ranges, and weapons technology was unlike anything ever dreamed of, but yet, not so advanced that bayonets weren't fairly heavily used. So hang in there. It may not be pleasant, or have a bunch of random love stories in it like other movies, that is an unfortunate downside of reality, though.
It's interesting that Cassie speaks of the mechanical failure part, as there have been 4 of them that she's recounted... That was where the term "gremlins" came from. When something wasn't working as it should, they referred to as gremlins in the works. I suspect this was the progenitor term for SNAFU's and FUBAR's later. (SNAFU = Situation Normal All Fucked Up and FUBAR = Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition).
Your comment at the end of episode one about "...if they hit one part of your plane, you're done for" reminded me of something I read about the allies trying to reinforce the bombers to improve survivability. At first, they studied the planes that came back and saw all the holes in the planes, so they started improving the armor in those locations...but they quickly found out that THAT was ineffective. Then someone (I don't recall who) pointed out that they were solving the wrong problem. Since they were looking at all the holes on the planes that made it back, they were looking at the locations that the planes could take hits and still survive. They needed to figure out where the planes that WEREN'T COMING BACK were getting hit, and improve the armor plating at those locations.
Two reasons for dumping unused bombs: In the event of a crash landing, the bombs could detonate inside the plane; Secondly, planes only carry enough fuel to make it to their destination. The plane would be too heavy & wouldn’t have enough fuel to make it back to base.
Even today when you get on a plane, they calculate the average weight of passengers & cargo, only carry enough fuel to make their destination, maybe a tiny bit more for an alternate nearby landing site in case of emergency.
There's no "maybe" for the alternate fuel, it is always carried. Airlines always have enough fuel on board for loiter time and a diversion to an alternate airport. Not doing so will get you in BIG trouble with the FAA or similar.
My grandfather enlisted in 41. Sargent Major. Navigator and radio
You were thinking about fighter planes where they have one or two man crews. The old school Heavy Bombers carried usually ten men into battle. The crews that flew over Europe did so with places that were pressurized like the B-29. Flying that high a man could freeze quickly as it was about -40f as well as C. Not to mention what would happen if they touched anything metal without gloves. As was shown when the tail gunner removed his gloves.
Not only can the flack guns mess up your day with a lucky hit. When the shell explodes, it sends shrapnel {little bits of metal} flying all over the place. Not the kind of thing that is good for an engine nor the thin aluminum skin of the plane itself.
Your question about which would be better. Flying or being a soldier is a good one. Best part for the pilots when they got home to their base they were pretty much safe and had nice beds and decent food. Soldiers were not so lucky.
you also forgot, Sailors. Who were pretty well off, unless they were actually in battle.
why were they so condescending? The USAAC at the time was drawing a lot of interest from the local women.
FYI - The bombers were flying at altitudes where the temperature was minus thirty degrees or more! Instant Frost bite was a concern. The flight suits in some cases were electrically heated. Flying above 10,000 feet oxygen was needed. Average missions were flown around 15-24,000 feet. Most of the bullets fired at the bombers were at least the size of your thumb! Once a bomber was hit and falling to crash the "G" forces could impair your ability to parachute to safety, trapping you in the plane due to these forces!
A falling plane might get you to zero G, so you would have to crawl thru like astronauts do in the space station.
You're correct, there are variable "G" forces in play, that's why I used "Could" vs. "Would" impair or trap you in the plane. Just like the famous vomit comet to replicate zero gravity.
A relative of my wife was a gunner on the first crew to complete 25 missions in that theater. The plane was the Memphis Belle
Memphis Belle wasn't actually first. the First crew crashed and died on their way home from Europe, and the supreme allied commander was on board and died too, thus Eisenhower was promoted to Supreme Allied Commander.
lol making up stories again
The Memphis Belle wasn't actually the first. It's now believed that a B-17 named Delta Rebel No. 2 was the first, but she was shot down before returning to the States.
@@rbaldino it crashed, it was not shot down
@@SoloRenegade Accoring to the wiki, Delta Rebel No. 2 was shot down on August 12, 1943. Four crew member were killed and six were captured.
"Fly Higher"
The problem was that the flak shells could be set to explode at higher altitudes too, and the bombing accuracy declined.
Generally the Eighth Air Force bombers would fly and bomb from around 25,000 - 30,000ft.
"The Norden bombsight, outside the atomic bomb it was the most closely held secret of the war"
A German spy had been working for the Norden company, and had given the Germans details of the sight when he visited Germany in 1938. The FBI arrested that spy in 1941, before the US entry to the war. Perhaps the biggest secret was that the sight had already been compromised.
A downfall of the Norden sight is that it required a long, straight approach to the target, which would give time for the gunners on the ground to perfect their aim, particularly with a large number of bombers lining up the target. So the tactics were changed so that the bombs were released as a formation, rather than aiming individually.
"That's a big bomb"
The bomb shown was a a 500lb General Purpose (GP) bomb. It weighed around 500lb and had roughly 250-300lb of explosive filling. It was the bomb the Eighth Air Force used the most.
For specific targets, like factories, they would use 1,000lb GP or 2,000lb GP bombs.
The submarine pens that they attacked in the missions shown were hardened concrete structures that were impervious to even the 2,000lb bombs.
The RAF breached a couple of submarine pens using the 12,000lb Tallboy deep penetration bomb later in the war.
The British had trouble hitting, or even finding, targets at night during 1941 and 1942. But by the time the 100th Bomb Group had arrived in England in mid 1943, the RAF had adopted electronic navigation and bombing aids and improved tactics to become quite accurate - about as good as the Eighth Air Force was during the day.
The first raid on Bremen was conducted by 4 groups - 94th, 95th, 96th and 100th Bomb Groups, for a total of 78 bombers.
Yrs, on top of representing RAF men as snooty condescending arseholes the series also implies that the RAF bombed randomly at night without any thought or planning and didn't care where the bombs landed.
Pretty annoying.
I like that "maths" exchange. Ask why they say maths and they answer, "You say physics, don't you? You wouldn't say physic would you?" English and Americans. Two peoples divided by a common language.
Add Canadians, Australians, and New Zealanders to that, and you have 5 peoples speaking technically the same language, with their own unique twists :)
@@Scuzzlebutt142 Yeah except the Canadians, Aussies and New Zealanders (and some Americans) were all in the RAF :)
@peterireland4344 some were in the RAF. Canada had over 30 RCAF squadrons, Australia had the RAAF and New Zealand the RNZAF with their own squadrons. Same with the Poles, South Africans and others.
@@dzed9191 Correct. In that theatre, all of those (RAAF, RCAF etc) operated under Bomber Command. There were also all-Australian, all-Canadian, all Polish etc. squadrons in the RAF proper, and many entire crews of various nationalities within regular RAF squadrons. It's fascinating to look at a list of the personnel of 617 squadron, for example!
Hi Cassie, I'm buzzin' you've gotten into aerial warfare, it's my favourite kind of war as it's easily the most exciting and entertaining to watch. It's my thing, I love anything to do with the war in the air and I loved your reactions to the first 2 episodes and i'm glad you're enjoying it :) i's excellent you're seeing war from this perspective. I'm loving this series and everything about it so far; the combat, the effects, the acting :) and if Steven Spielberg & Tom Hanks is involved, you just know it's going to be epic! I'm about 2 thirds the way through watching on Apple TV at the time of writing this & I don't want the show to end. Yes those that fought in the air had it much worse in combat than those on the ground, so the greater the risk the greater the reward. And it's about time a depiction of air war was put out there, I feel that this aspect of war has been overlooked for too long. I can't wait for your continued reactions to this awesome series :) you have to react to Memphis Belle (1990) as a follow up please - it flew in a different bomb group but it's based on the true story of the first US Army Air Corps B17 bomber plane crew's 25th and final mission of their tour of duty in Europe during WWII. It's essential react-to material :) as is Red Tails (2012) also based on a true story: Of the first African American pilots in the US Air Force during WWII :) George Lucas the star wars guy did the CGI visual effects for that! Please react to that too. Lots of love, our beautiful kernel queen, I hope you're feeling better soon. x
I’ve been waiting for your reactions on this Cassie! Im already on episode 8 and I’m looking forward to your reaction😊
If you haven't been told already the reason they had to drop the bombs before landing is it was to dangerous to land with them and also the added weight on return would consume more fuel which wasn't planned for and may not have enough to make it back to the airfield.
They can also move faster with less weight.
So glad you reacted to this series Cassie. Means a lot.
I’ve had the pleasure of flying on a B-17 twice (Nine-O-Nine). I wish I could describe the experience, abs wish you could experience witnessing a B-17 fire up, warm up and take off. Such a beautiful and awe inspiring sight.
Thanks for doing this show. And I hope you feel better soon.
No dramamine. It looks like that was first marketed (and maybe first available) in 1949. Remember in Band of Brothers Blithe said the airsickness medication (whatever it was) knocked him out and made him sleepy when he got to the ground. So that would be one more thing air crew would not be likely to use.
Cassie: welcome! I'm very glad to see you here, since you always do a great job with reactions. Rumor has it that after episode 9 there will be a documentary, maybe like "We Fought Alone Together." I hope you react to that.
Crosby only suffered air sickness before he put his mask on usually but it did get better the more he flew.
Can’t land with bombs armed. Too dangerous. Also Cassie, if you like this series there’s a really good movie from 1990 called “Memphis Belle”. It was the first B17 bomber crew attempting to finish the final 25th mission. Really great cast. Has a lot of heart.
Love the Memphis Belle movie
Hey Cassie, my late Father was in the Air Force, but that was in the 60ties and onward.
I'm almost done with this series, just 1 episode left. While hard to watch at times, you realize how tough these AF Bomber flights could be, each time they got sent up. These guys the actors portrayed were real ppl. Brave guys all.
Not sure if you noticed but in ep.2 they featured for a few mins, the Top guy who worked on the planes, the 19 yr.old guy. Well that is actor- Jude Law's son! And he looks SO much like his Dad. Look him up and you'll see lol. 😊
The writers lifted a good bit of the first episode from “Memphis Belle.” You really should watch it; I know you’d like it.
The bombs were dropped in the channel for fuel consumption, the planes would remain heavy on the way back to base consuming more fuel. About not going higher to avoid enemy fire it would be impossible to reach the target without flying through flak.
You should really watch Memphis Belle. Great movie where they had 5 actual B-17 bombers for filming.
The one used in the movie is in Geneva NY I was inside it was a tight fit. The original is in Dayton Ohio being restored still I believe
At about 13:25 Cassie states that she was thinking these were single seat planes and she is surprised how big the b-17s are. As an airplane enthusiast and a pilot myself I was also under the same impression for a long time. I'm fortunate enough to live outside of Eglin Air Force Base in Florida . Outside of the base, is the Air Force Armament Museum and there they have a collection of various Air Force Planes from almost every era of military flight. Right out front is a B-17 Flying Fortress, and i was quite shocked to realize how SMALL and fragile it looks! It really is hard to conceive that aircraft taking on multiple fighter attacks and flak barrages and all of the stories and film footage show how much damage they could take and still make it back to their airbases. The courage and skill of these incredibly young and brave aircrews is even more impressive once you see one of these "giant" aerial tanks.
The “Exec” in “Air Exec” stands for “Executive Officer,” who’s Second-in-Command of the Wing. Normally XO is a Major’s job.
You’ve been made familiar with the job from Band of Brothers. It’s the job Capt. Dick Winters got promoted to in 2nd Battalion after Market Garden. That was the last time he fired his weapon and got to do paperwork, typewriting after-action reports with those flashbacks, while 1Lt. Moose Heiliger took command of Easy.
Here Buck got demoted to Squadron Commander while the other Squadron Commander got promoted to Air Exec. Air Force Squadrons, past and present, are roughly analogous to Army Companies.
So, I'm not 100% sure if the shells have timers or sensors, but the flak shells aren't designed to hit the plane directly (I mean if you manage to, that's just bonus points). The flak is just shrapnel designed to disable core components of a plane, like fuel lines, landing gear, flap controls, the meat bags inside. the B-17 has a height limit. These bombers were not designed to climb at a 50 deg angle, so the best you could do is just deal with the flak. Also the reason you dump the bombs in the channel is its better to drop in the ocean than on land and potentially hit targets that are civilian. It's incredibly dangerous to land with bombs.
Thankful to all of the Greatest Generation for their wonderful bravery and supreme sacrifices. Without which we would not be here today enjoying this great channel.
I live 10 mins from Thorpe Abbotts base. The museum is a wonderful place to visit to learn more and pay respects to the men.
Great job as always, girl! I've been following you for years and this is one of your best yet! But I'm also just really loving Masters of the Air. Can't wait for your next reaction!
The European air campaign was positively brutal. Especially early on. We had brass that didn't think sending fighter escorts with the bombers was a priority, that we only needed large bomber formations to cover each other. As a result, R&D into fighters that could stick with the bombers for their whole run was shunned by the brass.
Later in the war, thankfully, more sensible heads prevailed,
I don't know if anyone else answered your question from around the 18:45 mark: They had to drop the bombs over the channel to drop weight so they had enough fuel to get back to base. Planes are given enough fuel to complete the mission -- round trip to and from the target location(s) -- with a little extra "just in case". The amount of fuel required is calculated assuming that the planes return lighter (i.e., they've dropped their payloads [bombs] on target). So, in order to have enough fuel to get back home, the bombs HAVE to be dropped.
One thing to keep in mind was that these Aircraft when first produced and used (during these episodes) were flying coffins. It was 50/50 whether the A/C would get you or the enemy. First and foremost were the Engines. The early versions were just as likely top blow themselves up with them.
Watching this is like watching a color version of the Gregory Peck movie Twelve o clock high. Its an excellent movie about the leadership and problems facing the groups.
That was my Grandpa's job; Navigator.
Sitting at a table thirty thousand feet in the air with a map and some pencils
Map and Pencils useless without Compass, Stopwatch, Protractor, and Ruler. Don’t forget those.
What a job! My dad's nav had to get the crews from Greenland to The Azores. Bring both up on Google Earth and it's amazing to consider the skill needed to find the little specks of earth in the Atlantic.
This is why I finally subscribed. Watched Ep 8 last night. The series is an emotional Hail Mary
Cassie, there are many aircraft types in the military: fighter, attackers, bombers, cargo, gunship, AWAC, and etc. Within a couple of the categories, there are more aircraft classification. For instance, during WW2, in the fighter classification, there were two types of fighters: 1) fighter and 2) heavy fighter. WW2 fighters were usually single-engine aircraft like the German Messerschimitt Bf109, the Allied air force's main nemesis, and later you will see the North American P-51 Mustang, which you have already seen in the movie "Saving Private Ryan" where a pair of Mustang planes fly over the bridge after blowing up the Tiger tank. Heavy fighters were planes with two engines with minimum two crews like the Messerschimitt Me110. The exception was the Lockheed P-38 Lighting, which was a two-engine heavy fighter operated by a single crew. Later in the war, German Fighter General Adolf Galland introduced another type of fighter, Fighter Destroyer. According to his memoir, the sole purpose of Fighter Destroyer was to shoot down the heavy strategic bombers like the B-17 and B-24.
The aircraft the show centers on is Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress, which is classified as a bomber. You can identify the type of aircraft by it's classification, "B" for bomber. This classification is still used in present day. Currently for fighters, the ID is "F" like F-14 Tomcat and F/A-18 Hornet, the two featured jet fighters in "Top Gun" and "Top Gun: Maverick", respectively. However, U.S. Army Airforce (USAAF) fighters were designated with "P" for Pursuit at the time of WW2. Whereas the U.S. Navy already used the "F" for fighter like the Grumman F4F Wildcat or the F6F Hellcat.
You noticed the B-17 is a big plane. It has a crew of 10 men (pilot, co-pilot, bombardier, navigator, radio operator, top turret gunner, ball turret (bottom) gunner, two-side door gunners, and tail gunner). Whenever a B-17 doesn't come back to base, 10 men are lost. On the first mission, 15 bombers were lost. 150 airmen are gone.
The top secret device mentioned in the show was the Norden Bombsight. At the time, it was the most advanced bombsight that used analog computer which constantly recalculated the bomb's impact point based on changing flight conditions, and an autopilot that reacted quickly and accurately to changes in wind direction and other adverse effects. To ensure the secrecy of the bombsight design, the U.S. military made a very strict protocol to remove the device from the bombers after each mission and keep it in storage until it is needed for the next mission. The storage was closely guarded by military police on the airbase. Bombardier were even instructed to destroy the bombsight before they can bail out of their damaged bomber. German spies in England tried to get their hands on the device. Fortunately, they failed.
The book this is based on is fantastic, heart-breaking and just amazing... Ep9 and the finale is coming up this week and looking forward to it... enjoy the ride!
The 100th Bomb Group had the nickname, “Bloody 100th.”
The U.S. Army Air Force Eighth Air Force nicknamed “The Mighty Eighth,”suffered enormous casualties during the early phases of the daylight bombing campaign. Even though the Royal Air Force Bomber Command flew at night, under the cover of darkness, they too suffered heavy losses as well due to flak and radar equipped night fighters.
In perspective, the USAAF 8th Air Force suffered nearly 48,000 casualties of which 26,000 were killed while the RAF Bomber Command had nearly 56,000 casualties (they also had been in the fight longer) out of 125,000 air crew. Statistically, 45 of every 100 air crew in the RAF Bomber Command were killed, a truly horrific attrition rate.
The chief defense of American bombers in daylight raids was known as the combat box. It was a mutual defense of the formation’s combined guns against marauding enemy fighter aircraft. Alone, a single bomber was easy pickings but in formation, the combined firepower of multiple Boeing B-17Fs was formidable.
The mainstay aircraft of the U.S. bomber force in Europe was the Boeing B-17 “Flying Fortress,”and the Consolidated B-24 “Liberator.” Both flew with a crew of ten. The British had eventually settled on the Avro Lancaster (also operated by Canadian crews), which was manned with a crew of seven.
Stephen E. Ambrose, the author of Band of Brothers , also wrote, The Wild Blue: The Men and Boys Who Flew the B-24s Over Germany 1944-45. Worth a read.
19 yr old mechanic back then. The teenage mechanics today were advising engineers how to improve the Osprey.
They can’t fly higher to avoid the flak - as you saw in the briefing, each formation is assigned a specific altitude. They salvo the bombs for two reasons: (1) they’ve been armed already (this is done en route as they get close to target) so it would be dangerous to land with them and (2) landing weight and balance considerations.
Small point: this is not the Air Force, which didn’t exist in the US until after the war, it is the US Army Air Corps.
The losses were pretty staggering among the bomber crews. Jimmy Stewart, whom you saw perform in “Its a Wonderful Life” was dealing with depression and what we’d now call PTSD and survivors’ guilt while filming Its a Wonderful Life because he flew many combat bombing missions and was a senior officer / chief of staff so he ordered many crews into missions where they never returned. My wife and I were at the American cemetery outside Florence, Italy and were struck by the huge wall of names up above and separate for the graves. These were all men killed but bodies never found and 99% of them were bomber crews.
“What would have been the alternative?” if the others hadn’t slowed down to protect the plane with only two engines working but would have been alone and thus easy pickings for German fighter planes.
You can call it Air Force at this point because it was after the US Army Air Corps reorganized into the US Army Air Forces with a General Headquarters Army Air Forces and their own commanding general who was not from the ground Army.
Hence the Numbered Air Forces such as the Eight Air Force in England and Fifteenth Air Force in Italy.
They were flying pretty close to the aircraft’s ceiling already. Flak can shoot higher too.