Gunner's security question

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Regards the F.E.2b - I have read some authors say no harness was fitted for the gunner/observer, but J.M. Bruce (and I have more faith in him) says they were fitted, but this doesn't mean the gunners always used them. It certainly seems they were never fitted for educational photographs like these...

 
But it was an era when people did just walk on the wings of aircraft in flight. I can understand people thinking others lives were not worth much at all but not people having the same view of their own.
 
I can't imagine a harness that would allow all that freedom of movement. At the same time the only really good pics are when the plane is on the ground so again an open question but I will stick to the opinion that shooting at enemy aircraft was the highest concern and personal safety low on the totem pole
 
Personal safety may be somewhat low on the totem pole for the higher ups but I know I always felt safer and would stretch things a bit further on the end of a 65-100ft ladder when I had a belt or harness and I didn't have a 80-120mph wind to deal with.

They could order me to climb the ladder, they couldn't order me to lean out or stretch an extra few inches. And it was almost always one hand for the tool and one hand for the ladder and you can imagine how effective an 8lb axe was with one hand

You don't have to held in securely but you have to have some assurance that a fall/slip will be short (several feet?)

Anybody want to try some of those positions in the back of a pick up truck doing 90mph on a bumpy road?

I don't KNOW if they used a harness/strap--anit-cavorting strap or not but aside from some of the more dared devil types such a strap would have provided great comfort to the hundreds of air gunners were more than brave but perhaps a little less fool hardy than the would be wing walkers.
 
Back when I was young and confident ( stupid) that monkey strap made me feel that no matter what happened, I could claw my way back to safety.

Those WW1 gunners, with all the extra clothes they had to wear for much colder flying conditions than what I had to contend with, couldn't have been very agile.

And just think what that twin Lewis in photo 42 would weigh, and the gunner's got to move it to the rear socket in a 90+ mph wind for some situations.
They were supermen in my book.
 
It looks like the pilot's Lewis is pointed right at the gunner's knee.

And when the gunner is sitting down it looks like the pilot's gun would right about head level. Imagine a .303 muzzle blast about a foot from your head.

I wonder how much the gunner's gyrations effected control of the aircraft ?
Climbing up, sitting down , besides just the shifting of the weight, his upper body is close to the size of the rudder, and there are times when his whole body is exposed to the airflow..
 
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A lot.
I can feel someone moving around too much in the front of the Tiger Moth, so this would be an order of magnitude worse.
 
Graeme said:
J.M. Bruce (and I have more faith in him) says they were fitted, but this doesn't mean the gunners always used them.
Click to expand...

Jack Bruce was the former aircraft curator at the RAF Museum is something of an expert on the subject; I've rummaged through noites he left on different Great War aircraft - he wrote a lot of the Windsock publications monographs and his knowledge was second to none, but regarding the Fee, no harnesses were standard, but they could be. The observer didn't have a seat; he had to sit on the floor on take-off, without a cushion (!), but there were eyelets for the provision of a harness, but such a thing was not always fitted to the aeroplane. Somewhere I have photos of the Vintage Aviator Fee's gunner's pulpit; I'll see if I can find them.
 
Observers and Navigators: And Other Non-Pilot Aircrew in the RFC, RNAS and RAF By Wg Cdr C.G. Jefford on page 42 states the gunner of the DH-4 did not have a safety harness. Page 80 states the crews of the British Air Ships also did not have safety equipment as late as 1921.
 
A couple of pics of the gunner's hole in the Fee; They aren't great shots as I was holding my camera above my head and aiming blindly. It's pretty tall.

The stick at the front is the gun mount with its handle visible. On the coaming are clips, but I can't see the eyelets. Perhaps they are on the forward coaming out of visibility.

Gunner's hole i

The rear section isn't contoured for the gunner to rest against, it is a door, which holds drums of Lewis MG rounds.

Gunner's hole ii

The Fee in Masterton. I've done a walkaround, but its height meant that avoiding climbing aboard means that I don't have any of the cockpit.

F.E.2b

I'm heading back to Masterton in a few week's time, so I'll drop by to get some more pics. Here's an album of Great War machines.

The Vintage Aviator Ltd Hangar
 
I've read several accounts of observers, and pilots falling out of inverted, falling aircraft.

I can understand that the observers needed a lot of mobility that straps would have limited, but can't understand pilots not strapping in.

What sort of restraint did the pilots have ?
 
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