One further comment. When a
crew has to hit the silk, the pilot is not the first to go, he is always the
last to go. Thus the questions.


Agree - and for many years, the question about Bush's crew bothered me a lot.
The book addresses what happened and Bush's 'survivor guilt', but I agree, if
the pilot returns and none of his crew does, its a problem. I know of a
Mosquito Nav that discovered he was in an unpiloted a/c after his chicken****
pilot had bailed out on him after a nearby flak explosion. The Nav eventually
made it out and walked out of Luftgau 17B some months later. Upon returning to
the UK for debrief, he was surprised to pass his "pilot" in the hall en route
to the inquest - the pilot saw him and bolted, bleating, "but I thought you
were dead!!" I'd have hunted McCallum down and shot him, personally. LMF my
ass, this guy was a coward down to his cells. Opposite is when another Mossie
took a terminal hit at 33,000' and the escape hatch jammed. The pilot stayed
in down to 6 grand, waiting on the Nav to escape and only at that point did he
direct the Nav to follow him out the top hatch (the pilot had to be out of his
seat for the Nav to use his overhead hatch). In that case, the pilot perished,
while his Nav hit the ground after two swings in his 'chute.

I do agree - if your crew doesn't make it back, the pilot generally shouldn't
either.

v/r
Gordon
====(A+C====
USN SAR Aircrew

"Got anything on your radar, SENSO?"
"Nothing but my forehead, sir."