No, the P-51B is not a poor choice to attack B-17s. The B Mustang can shoot them down quite easily if the pilot knows how to properly engage bombers. All you described was a Mustang driver that had no clue about how to attack a bomber and attacked from the dead six position, which is rather stupid.
ack-ack
Ack-Ack, I didn't say they made a "Dead 6" attack, though most of the 51 drivers that upped against me lost patience, then committed to a dead 6 attack and were usually downed. In fact, some of the people who uped a P-51 to intercept my bombers, make beautiful attack passes on me. They were patient, setting up nicely before committing to the attack pass. It's these folks I tend to end up chasing away and not downing. I should have stated it as a personal opinion that the P-51B is a poor choice. That's my own fault there and I got called on it. But you still stand a better chance of downing a B-17 in something with heavier firepower than you would a P-51B. Of course that does not mean you CAN'T down them with a 51B.
The Tail Gunner bit of my post was referring to a Tail Gunner who fell 20,000 feet and survived, and was awarded a medal by the Germans. It turns out, it was a B-17 ball turret gunner that fell 22,000 feet. Here's two links about my bit on the subject. It also turns out it was an RAF Tail Gunner who fell 18,000 feet, that was awarded a certificate by the Germans, not a medal.
http://209.157.64.200/focus/f-news/1071076/postshttp://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?173042-Amazing-Parachute-Survival-Falls-of-WWIII just typed in, "WW2 bomber gunner survives high altitude fall" into the google search bar. So if you are uncomfortable with the 1st link, you can type in what I did into the search bar and see it through that.
Yes but your timing has to be excellent and can't be off one bit. I did manage a few years ago taking out a formation of Lancasters that were flying NOE off the deck about 50ft or so with a BFB from the Ju 87D-3. It was one of those 'one in a billion' kind of shots, I got really lucky and dropped the bomb (not thinking I had a snowball's chance in hell of getting kill) so it would explode just a hair ahead of the Lancaster formation. To my surprise, the resulting blast from the BFB was sufficient enough to take out all three Lancasters. I have tried many, many times to see if I could do it again and never have been able to.
ack-ack
Yeah. You have to love those, "once in a life time" situations. I had a similar situation happen to me once. I had upped a 109K against a formation of B-24's and this guy was doing everything he could to ruin my setups. I eventually got some distance ahead of him and had JUST started my turn to make my attack pass when he turned in the opposite direction of my turn and dove (I have to give him credit. He was doing well in evasive action). It turned what would've been a solid head on shot, into a high deflection snap shot. As we were very close to one of his bases, it was the last pass I intended to make. I pulled hard on the stick (was using a mouse and was closing in on him at around 400 MPH) to just get the nose ahead of one of his bombers and fired off a single 30mm shell. I got an oil hit as I zipped by his formation (which I nearly rammed), and jinxed away. I didn't think it would connect at all but when I checked the buffer, it said, "You shot down (I forgot his name)". Oh how I so wish I had activated my recorder prior to engaging. I managed to bring the plane home to boot, though I don't think 2 1/2 sectors is overly far for a wounded 109K at 2k alt (the alt I was at after I was done jinxing and still had a lot of speed).
This question remains, Will our B-17's be able to withstand extensive damage as the ones that were brought home during WW2, with the new damage system update?
Here is a site I found that contained many pictures of damage sustained to B-17's.
http://www.daveswarbirds.com/b-17/contents.htmAgain, if anything like this happened to us, we go poof. The B-17 is really an amazing aircraft. Damage like these brought down just about everything else, but not the Flying Fortress. You must give credit to those who designed and made this plane as it really did save a lot of guys from capture or worse.
