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Aviation History
1944
1944 - 1472.PDF
N FLIGHT JULY 2OTH, 1944 INVASION CLOSE-UP launches built by the Power Boat Co., Ltd. . They have triple screws and are powered by three Napier Sea Lion engines,'which are an adaptation of the famous Lion air craft engines which gave the R.A.F. such wonderful service for so many years and won the Schneider Trophy for Britain in 1922 and again in 1927. These engines give 500 h.p. each at 2,500 r.p.m., and at a continuous cruising speed of 1,800 r.p m. the output is 200 h.p. Fuel con sumption is 60 gallons per hour of 73 octane petrol. Last month's seatime average for the launches on the station exceeded 200 hours each, which is a great tribute to theif reliability, and the crews say that the boats will stand more than the men that handle them. Eleven men make up the crew. The skipper is commissioned; 1st coxswain is a flight sergeant with a corporal as his second ; a sergeant 1st fitter and an aircraftman 2nd fitter look after the engines. Two wireless operators and three deck hands are carried, and to render first aid an experienced nursing orderly looks after the patients. Mosquito Tactics At S.H.A.E.F., Grp. Capt. P. G. Wykeham-Barnes, D.S.O., D.F.C., who commands a Mosquito wing, came to tell war correspondents about the work his wing is doing. Their main task is to keep up a continuous night attack on German lines of communication as a complementary effort to that performed by U.S. and British fighter- bombers by day. The German is very quick to adapt himself to altered conditions, and he was prepared to sleep by day and move his transport by night. The '' Mossies '' are now making it almost impossible for him to move at any time. As a working area they were given from the battle line in Normandy to as far back into Germany as they could reach. Here is Grp. Capt. Wykeham-Barnes' own account of a recent attack on rail movements on the Chartres-Le Mans route with the object of preventing rein forcements coming up. The vulnerable point was at Tours, where the river Loire has to be crossed. Another Mosquito wing, which the Group Captain referred to as "competi tors," was to attend to the south-east feeder lines from Germany because the Seine bridges are blown. "When we got ready for this task, just as we were about to start our programme, which .was to send off waves of aircraft all night long, the weather became very poor and thunderstorms massed up in the English Channel; it looked sinister and consequently we weren't very hopeful. I took off about a quarter past one in the middle of a very heavy rainstorm, with lurid lightning playing all over " the place in a rather depressing way. "We are prepared, if necessary, to operate in almost any weather the/e is. The most important thing is that we never let up on this job, and have been at it every single night since D-Day. We feel if we give the enemy one night's rest, they will rush a lot of stuff through during that night. Consequently, however bad the weather is in England, if we can get to the area and have a reasonable chance of getting back again, we shove on. SSlruck by Lightning " We set sail across the Channel and weather got pro gressively worse until we got to the French coast. We cal culated we had been struck by lightning then, but we couldn't tell. As we came in at the coast, the flashes from the American barrage became visible, creeping around La Haye du Puits. It appears there was a good deal of action going on there, but as I wasn't concerned about it, I went on to Le Mans and the moonlight began to come through. " We»started, then, combing the roads south of Le Mans, but I can't exactly spin you a blood-and-thunder story. Most of the transport had been chased off these routes and there are not such good pickings left. We had a go at what was left. We found what we fondlv believed to be a troop train ; it was an engine and a lot of box cars coming north, north of Tours and south of Le Mans. "This engine just sort of appeared as we went along very low—200ft. Between the rainstorms we suddenly saw the line and this engine coming towards us, with a long string of box cars behind it. We quickly pulled a couple of bombs off on it and then wheeled around and shot it ~up—no, not up, down! and the engine did the usual thing and shot up a lot of steam. It burst in clouds of steam, and came to a stop. We went on, saving our ammunition. (We might have, perhaps, worked a little harder on that target.) Meantime, the weather was still very bad and the chaps were having a rough time. "The system we adopt is to keep in radio communica tion all the time. We had some 20 aircraft working on these lines at once ; they are all on the same radio channel, so that you can hear someone saying, "I've found some thing just south of Le Mans—come on over and get it"-— and then everybody quickly reorientates himself, and if it is good—something like a couple of petrol trains—every body will get to work on it at once. " It is a rough and ready system of performing, but you have got to have something like that. Two or three chaps may do a patrol and see nothing, and the other one or two of the rest may get to some real prize and not be able to cope with it by themselves. "Well, that just about concluded that trip. We got down as far as this place here (motioning to Brest on the map). It was actually a little further than I meant to go—I don't .mind confessing that we got a trifle lost; we only had a view of the ground about once every five minutes. "Then back we came again, and we had a couple of bombs left, and turned aside in the battle area and dropped them on what looked like a bivouac of German troops in a wood by Coutances. (We know that they bivouac under trees and disperse vehicles and petrol there, and so these bits of wood surrounding roads are always, as far as pos sible, subject to our attack." He went on to explain that this work is only for verv experienced pilots, and how good navigation keeps one clear of bad flak areas. He said also that a pilot must develop something of a "hunter" mentality before he can be really good at it. When the time comes for fluid warfare Grp. Capt. Wykeham-Barnes sees his Mosquitoes taking up the r61e of the old-time cavalry. Future Fighters Shall we see big changes before the war in Europe ends? Targets in Germany recently bombed by the U.S. Strategic Air Forces have included jet-engine factories. We have announced the work of Grp. Capt. Whittle and the Gloster Aircraft Co., Ltd., and the Bell Aircraft Corporation of America are advertising the fact that they have a fighter flying which incorporates two of these Whittle engines developed by the General Electric Company of America. It first flew, they say, on October 1st, 1942. It looks as if we are on the edge of big changes in fighter design. This will mean changed training, changed equipment, changed tactics. In fact, it will mean almost a new start. New Edition. Gas Turbines and Jet Propulsion for Aircraft By G. GEOFFREY SMITH, M.B.E. A THIRD and enlarged edition of this "FLIGHT" book with illustrated de- f\ scriptions and comments upon the varying forms of steam and gas • turbine-compressor units, is now mailable. Fifteen chapters and many new : drawings are included. In this latest edition the original chapters have been retained with modifications and additions. The joint official announcement of the R.A.F. ond U.S.A.A.F. has mode it postible to extend due credit to the inventive genius and pioneer work of British technicians who developed gas turbine units to a practical ztage for aircraft There is a foreword by Sir Geoffrey de Havilland. ' Copies are obtainable through a Bookseller, Price 6/., or 6/4 by post d'rect from Flight Publishing Co. Ltd., Dorset House, Stomford Street, London, S.E.I
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