Yesterday's Weapons Forums

I still have nightmares after seeing the footage of a B17 bailout when a guy was holding his chute and he let go of it. Imagine free falling 23,000 feet. Ugh!

Bern

that old footage always reminds me how many flyers we lost in both theaters

"...More US servicemen died in the Air Corps than the Marine Corps. While completing the required 30 missions, your chance of being killed was 71%...."

Our air crew casualty rate was very bad and one can only admire the courage of the crews who flew them knowing this.

What was the English and German mission number before a break? any one know? I'm guessing that near the end of the war for the Germans it was fly till you die or were to badly shot up to go back.

For the Krauts it was that way from the get go. He's long passed away now but when I was a kid a family friend was a ME 109 pilot in the war. Siegfried Zipperlin was his name. He used to tell stories of the war. My grandfather on the other hand didn't speak much of it. Probably because coming here in '49 there wasn't a lot of love for the Germans