Subject: THE DAY THE 344TH STOPPED PATTON
From: "Gord Beaman" )
Date: 9/7/03 11:40 AM Pacific Daylight Time
Message-id:

(ArtKramr) wrote:

A question occured to me during this discussion of Patton being
stopped because of all the damage caused by a bomb-load being
jettisoned, bridges blown up, roads obliterated etc.

Weren't bombs dropped 'on safe' during jettison?...I know for a
fact that modern bombers can choose whether to arm (or not) their
ordnance, so why did that jettison cause so much damage?...

Mind you, I'm not looking to add fuel to this flame-war but I'm
curious.
--

-Gord.


Good question. We had no safe salvo option. If you salvoed, they all went
out
amed and we had the arming wires to show for it. Over the PO valley I got
me a
battle star because of live Salvo. But that is another story for another
time.


Arthur Kramer

Are you saying that there was no _option_ to drop ordnance 'safe'
at all then?. Or was it _policy_ to jettison 'live' just in case
there was interesting enemy items below, is that it then?...

I know that the shackles in the bomb-bays of the Lancasters,
Neptunes and Argus all had an electrical solenoid holding the end
of the arming wire in the shackle. When a 'safe drop' was needed
then this solenoid was powered which allowed the arming wire to
be pulled out of the shackle when the bomb was released therefore
the bomb wouldn't arm itself. That wasn't the case on the B-26 I
assume?.
--

-Gord.


Nope. Safe Salvo was not an option. We didn't have a "safe" switch at all. We
salvoed over the PO Valley through the clouds and hit Panzers engaged in
battle. We all got battle stars for the Po Valley for that one. It was the only
"easy" battle start I ever won. I think our air generals worried about too many
safe releases over enemy targets so they just removed that option.


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