Subject: Night bombers interception in Western Europe in 1944
From: (WalterM140)
Date: 7/14/2004 3:07 PM Pacific Standard Time
Message-id:

Butcher Harris wouldn't have agreed to the drop in tonnage carried in
exchange
for the saved lives of a few thousand Bomber Command heroes - they had
discussions on re-installing the turrets and it was flatly denied.

Worse, it was shown that enlarging the ecape hatch diameter just a few inches
would mean a lot more air crew could get out of damaged aircraft. But that
was
nixed because that would have slowed down the production. The crews were
expendable.

Walt



Same in the Army AIr Corps. The escape path for a bombardier in a B-26 Marauder
was near impossible to negotiate in dire emergencies. The problem was solved in
the later A-26 Invader.I took off on every mission with the knowledge that in
case of dire emergency I would probably die in the nose of Willie the Wolf.


Arthur Kramer
344th BG 494th BS
England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany
Visit my WW II B-26 website at:
http://www.coastcomp.com/artkramer