Eunometic wrote:
"Richard Brooks" wrote in
message ...
Eunometic wrote:
nt (Krztalizer) wrote in message
...
I have tracked down and interviewed ~2 dozen Mosquito airmen and
read most of the available works about them - first I have heard
this. One hundred knots over the target would have been absolute
suicide.

TV strikes again; within a couple of years, folks will all "agree"
that this was a fact. :\


A dozen agincourt longbowmen with fire arrows could have brought
down the wooden wonder at that speed.

How exactly did they aim the bombs?

We'd just had a documentary about it on Channel 5 in the UK, just
last week. The narrator said they just used their judgement.

I can't remember whether I recorded it but I'll look through my
tapes to check,


No one seems to know for sure do they?

The task of bomb aiming at low level must have been formidable. For
instance if a bombsight was used it would need to know altitude above
ground. But how? A radio altimeter feeding into a computing
bombsight would be maybe 30ft. A barometric device about the same but
would need to also need to know the altitude above sea level which
adds another source of error. Maybe there more accurate devices but
I don't think so.

In an attack at 100ft a 50ft errror would produce a big error in bomb
hit: about 30/100 = 50%

In an attack at 8000 ft that is 30/8000 or about 0.4%

The most accurate method of attack I think of is the glide/slide
bombing using a computing bombsight (eg the Stuvi of the Ju 88 and I
think some of the British sights could work in a dive) but that still
isn't a low level attack whuch could get a bomb within 10 meters quite
with good consistantly.

I recall reading about Fw 190 pilots on the Eastern front attacking
T34 tanks simply by flying the nose over the tank and releasing a bomb
to slide along the steppe. It was regarded as accurate method.

So I suspect they relied to a certain extent on the bomb sliding along
the ground. The accuracy required would be greatly reduced.

I think it was down to dropping and keeping at least one finger in one ear!

It was remarkable that they decided to take a cameraman along to film the
low level raid, which seemed to go against the fact that the British seemed
a bit dubious about cameras popping off everywhere (all "hush, hush" and
that) unlike our American Allies.

Richard.