GrauGeist
Generalfeldmarschall zur Luftschiff Abteilung
Pineapple and Canadian Bacon is perfectly fine on a pizza - on the otherhand, there is one topping that should be illegal and is most likely why the world is in turmoil:
Japanese Zero Carrier crashes
- Thread starter Maxrobot1
- Start date
Ad: This forum contains affiliate links to products on Amazon and eBay. More information in Terms and rules
SaparotRob
Unter Gemeine Geschwader Murmeltier XIII
MY EYES, MY EYES! THEY'RE BURNING! STOP THE PAIN!
Thumpalumpacus
Major
I'd rather see burning aircrew than strawberries topping a pizza. Just sayin'.
buffnut453
Captain
See what happens when you make negative, nay nasty, comments about pineapple on pizza? Let that be a lesson to you!
GrauGeist
Generalfeldmarschall zur Luftschiff Abteilung
FACT!
- Thread starter
- #26
Greg Boeser
1st Sergeant
Love the livery!
Admiral Beez
Major
Especially when the aircraft landing on the carrier, presumably with a light fuel load, only weighs about 4,500 lbs. That's more than 500 lbs. less than the empty weight of a Spitfire V.
DarrenW
Staff Sergeant
I hope you're not insinuating that their was some inherent issue with the strength of the Hellcat's landing gear because that would be patently false. It was known to be more than durable enough to handle daily carrier use without incident.
However with the hundreds of thousands of carriers traps it's not hard to imagine the occasional but rare gear failure (combat damage and pilot error not withstanding). And because basically the same footage makes the carrier crash highlight reel over and over and over again (and over again) which to the layman might seem a somewhat common occurrence... I can definitely assure you it was not.
And I believe the Zero's landing gear to be perfectly fine for carrier use too.
Last edited:
I hope you're not insinuating that their was some inherent issue with the strength of the Hellcat's landing gear because that would be patently false. It was known to be more than durable enough to handle daily carrier use without incident.
However with the hundreds of thousands of carriers traps it's not hard to imagine the occasional but rare gear failure (combat damage and pilot error not withstanding). And because basically the same footage makes the carrier crash highlight reel over and over and over again (and over again) which to the layman might seem a somewhat common occurrence... I can definitely assure you it was not.
And I believe the Zero's landing gear to be perfectly fine for carrier use too.
Nope, just noting that there is a popular belief that the F-6F's undercarriage was stronger than the Brooklyn Bridge and some sort off indestructible entity.
Even its extremely strong undercarriage would break in a heavy landing - and heavy landings are part of landing on a moving deck.
Now if you want a fragile carrier fighter undercarriage? The Seafire - up to 50% failure rate on a good day
Admiral Beez
Major
That's an odd choice of words, suggesting that the Hellcat's very character is somehow being maligned or insulted. But it's just a machine - the Hellcat doesn't have feelings that must be defended. I assume you chose your words intentionally to stymy debate; but instead of shutting M Macandy down, why not ask for an elaboration?
Last edited:
Admiral Beez
Major
If given the chance with a clean sheet the Brits could make retractable undercarriage sufficiently robust for carrier ops. Check out these no-issue landings of the Fulmar.
View: https://youtu.be/vrwpRP7ZQF0?t=688
buffnut453
Captain
Again, Macandy, you're making a bold statement. Can you please back that up?
If a squadron suffered 50% losses for every mission it undertook, then the squadron would be non-op in a matter of a few days, maximum. How do you maintain operations under such constraints? And yet the FAA did maintain ops with the Seafires on (relatively) small carriers that didn't have space for an entire squadron's worth of replacement airframes.
Seafire operations were always 'exciting', Pecking the deck was a full time hobby for the useless devices, and a pecked deck was a broken Seafire off for an early bath.
It really wasn't unusual thro launch 4 and break two coming back aboard. The Carriers carried spares in bits roped up in the hanger overheads.
ThomasP
Senior Master Sergeant
Hey Macandy,
Aside from a few instances like off of Salerno where most carrier aircraft would have had problems (including the US types), the Seafire had similar accident rates to most of the US carrier aircraft. This includes late-war in the PTO while operating at similar operation tempos to the US.
Yes, they sometimes hit their props on the deck when landing, so did other aircraft.
Yes, they sometimes had their gear collapse, so did other aircraft.
Yes, they sometimes missed the arrestor wires and hit the crash barrier, so did other aircraft.
Yes the Spitfire had a bit of a problem with 'floating' when landing, and the Corsair had problems with rolling to the right into the gun positions and island structure.
Yes, the RN carriers carried spare parts to repair the Spitfire when damaged (as they did for all other aircraft they operated) including complete aircraft in partial assembly or wholly assembled, and so did the US.
There were war-time aircraft that had significantly lower landing accident rates (ie Hurricane, Fulmar, Albacore, Swordfish, Hellcat, Vindicator, Wildcat(?), Zero) but they were the exceptions in this area.
Aside from a few instances like off of Salerno where most carrier aircraft would have had problems (including the US types), the Seafire had similar accident rates to most of the US carrier aircraft. This includes late-war in the PTO while operating at similar operation tempos to the US.
Yes, they sometimes hit their props on the deck when landing, so did other aircraft.
Yes, they sometimes had their gear collapse, so did other aircraft.
Yes, they sometimes missed the arrestor wires and hit the crash barrier, so did other aircraft.
Yes the Spitfire had a bit of a problem with 'floating' when landing, and the Corsair had problems with rolling to the right into the gun positions and island structure.
Yes, the RN carriers carried spare parts to repair the Spitfire when damaged (as they did for all other aircraft they operated) including complete aircraft in partial assembly or wholly assembled, and so did the US.
There were war-time aircraft that had significantly lower landing accident rates (ie Hurricane, Fulmar, Albacore, Swordfish, Hellcat, Vindicator, Wildcat(?), Zero) but they were the exceptions in this area.
Last edited:
Winton in "The Forgotten Fleet" has an analysis of the BPF aircraft losses during different operation. Looking at the three principal fighters, the Corsair (first figure), the Seafire III (Second figure) & Hellcat (third figure) the numbers look like this:-
Operation Iceberg
Combat & flak - 11/15/6
Suicide attack - 17/0/0
Hangar fire - 23/0/0
Deck landing accidents - 15/28/3
Other - 18/5/5
Total - 84/33/14
At the start of operations there were about 73 Corsairs, 40 Seafires and 29 Hellcats.
July/Aug 1945
Write off due to:-
Combat & flak - 17/8
Deck landing - 9/22
Other - 10/7
Total - 36/37
Repairable but replaced by CVE:-
Combat & flak - 4/1
Deck landing - 3/7
Other - 3/4
Total - 10/12
Grand total 46/49
At the start of the July/Aug operations there were 73 Corsairs and 79 Seafires (and 6 Hellcats for night and PR work only).
And please note that the Seafires were NOT restricted to flying CAP over the fleet as had been the case during Operation Iceberg in April/May 1945. They were engaged in flying the full range of operations carried out by the fleet including strikes on airfields which proved the most deadly.
Winton also provides a comparison of operations by both British (first figure) & US (Second figure) carriers during these operations:-
Offensive sorties/complement aircraft/strike day - 1.39/1.39
Enemy aircraft destroyed or damaged /offensive sortie - 0.21/0.22
Tons of enemy shipping sunk or damaged/offensive sortie - 224/90
Combat losses as a percentage of offensive sorties - 2.38/1.61
Operational losses as a percentage of offensive losses - 2.0/0.55
It is the Seafire's performance at Salerno that always attracts the attention of its detractors. But as discussed before on other threads there were a variety of reasons that contributed to that. It never suffered the same level of losses again despite operating from escort carriers over Southern France, the Aegean and the Indian Ocean and from fleet carriers in the Arctic and over the Indian and Pacific Oceans.
Operation Iceberg
Combat & flak - 11/15/6
Suicide attack - 17/0/0
Hangar fire - 23/0/0
Deck landing accidents - 15/28/3
Other - 18/5/5
Total - 84/33/14
At the start of operations there were about 73 Corsairs, 40 Seafires and 29 Hellcats.
July/Aug 1945
Write off due to:-
Combat & flak - 17/8
Deck landing - 9/22
Other - 10/7
Total - 36/37
Repairable but replaced by CVE:-
Combat & flak - 4/1
Deck landing - 3/7
Other - 3/4
Total - 10/12
Grand total 46/49
At the start of the July/Aug operations there were 73 Corsairs and 79 Seafires (and 6 Hellcats for night and PR work only).
And please note that the Seafires were NOT restricted to flying CAP over the fleet as had been the case during Operation Iceberg in April/May 1945. They were engaged in flying the full range of operations carried out by the fleet including strikes on airfields which proved the most deadly.
Winton also provides a comparison of operations by both British (first figure) & US (Second figure) carriers during these operations:-
Offensive sorties/complement aircraft/strike day - 1.39/1.39
Enemy aircraft destroyed or damaged /offensive sortie - 0.21/0.22
Tons of enemy shipping sunk or damaged/offensive sortie - 224/90
Combat losses as a percentage of offensive sorties - 2.38/1.61
Operational losses as a percentage of offensive losses - 2.0/0.55
It is the Seafire's performance at Salerno that always attracts the attention of its detractors. But as discussed before on other threads there were a variety of reasons that contributed to that. It never suffered the same level of losses again despite operating from escort carriers over Southern France, the Aegean and the Indian Ocean and from fleet carriers in the Arctic and over the Indian and Pacific Oceans.
DarrenW
Staff Sergeant
Thanks for the clarification. By the way that picture is a good example of a gear locking malfunction. During hard landings early F6F-3s would occasionally slip out of correct locking position and end up 90 degrees out of position, which resulted in what we see here.
Pecking the deck was a constant headache, there was barely any clearance. A pecked deck was a broken Seafire going for a swim
Gear collapse was endemic, it simply wasn't up to the job, it wasn't fixed until the post war marks
They missed the war a lot, it was a major problem and not fixed, yet again, until the post war marks with a proper sting hook.
The Seafire had a murderously high accident rate during the war. When the FAA was forced to dump all its Corsairs and Hellcats after VJ Day and go back to them as their sole fighter, the accident rates stayed just as high in peacetime flying. It was, and would remain, an utterly useless carrier aircraft - they weren't missed when the last ones were pushed onto the fire dumps,
Admiral Beez
Major
I was never conceived as such, so we can't blame the aircraft. What they needed was a Merlin-powered, three or four blade Seafang - essentially a Seafire with robust construction, longer range and wide, well-suited undercarriage,
I wonder what RJ Mitchell would have made for the FAA had he asked in the late 1930s. After he died Supermarine's naval aircraft were all rubbish, ending with the Scimitar.
