Thats interesting; you'd have thought that every bomber would need a Norden,
because what if by PURE chance the four lead bombers were shot down!?,
another bomber would have to take the lead and surely each bomber had a
responsibility to make sure the bombs were "in the pickle barrel"!? and not
hit any civilian targets such as shools, hospitals and the likes.
The R.A.F. did what was called area bombing, everything was hit in the
general vicinity; whereas the U.S.A.A.F., did daylight precision bombing,
aimed at hitting THE target and thats all.
How could this be done without a bombsight?
"Guy Alcala" wrote in message
. ..
"M. H. Greaves" wrote:

If the a/c had a chin turret, the bombardier used this but wouldnt be
able
to if he was on the bomb run, they were controlled via a yoke that could
swing out of the way when he needed to be concentating on the
bombsight..

Sure, but on the bomb run the fighters tended to be noticeably absent, not
wishing to be shot down by their own flak. And most bombardiers from 1943
on
served as "Toggliers" (I've always thought this should be "toggeliers"),
dropping on the lead. There were typically only four Nordens in a whole
heavy
bomber group formation: group lead, deputy lead, and the high and low
squadron
leads (the last three in case the group lead a/c was shot down or
otherwise
unable to do his job). By 1944, at least in the 8th, they often trained a
gunner as togglier to drop the bombs in the non-lead a/c, or occasionally
the
nav would do so if no bombardier was aboard.

Guy