Battle Damaged B-17s

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british bombers tend to be quite manouverable, the lanc was proberly the most manouverable 4 engined heavy of the war, they could sometimes outmanouver an attacking fighter, she could even barrel role and one NF pilot said he saw one go into a loop-the-loop..................
 
no it doesn't, even by day it was an extremely difficult manouver to follow, and there's not way to counter it unless you're a crack shot.............
 
ah my young apprentices..........

correct, it was a skillful pilot that could corkscrew and evade a skilled German nf crew. there are enough nf accts that lost lancs and halibags on clear nights and more so when they zoomed up into the clouds.

Peter Spoden has told me about 3 different incidents when he flew his Ju 88G-6 that they would get behind and slightly above a Lanc and let the Lanc crews go through the corkscrew and when they came up and out of it he would fire.........
 
as a side note go take a peek at the gun camera footage thread again and check the hits on the B-17's in the 3 films.........yes they B-17 and the B-24 could take a lot of damage and somehow make it back. Not every film individually shows a shoot down in those clips

if you chaps have ever been in the fuselage of a B-17/B-24 or any RAF 4 enigne heavy then you know there is not much room. with 2cm and 3cm rounds going through and tearing things apart it is a wonder that more crews were not killed and more a/c did not come back.

Erich ~
 
Manuevering to lose a nightfighter (getting out of his sight) versus having the fighter manuvering with you by day are very different though. It does look like Peter Spoden, and I am assuming other night fighter pilots, knew how to counter that manuever.

But you are right, the quarters are cramped in all of the heavies (B-17, B-24, Lanc). Good point about the luck/divine intervention that kept some of those crewmen from being killed. It really is amazing.
 
thig is about countering the corkscrew, manouverability of the atticking fighter has little to do with it, the lanc isn't outmanouvering the fighter, it's making it very difiicult to get a good aim, and if you put a "drop" in there as well, you've got a chance................
 
all German nf pilots in time learned how to take advantage of a corkscrewing RAF heavy; it was just that some German nf pilots were better shots than others..........
 
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