Axis Black Strike

[AKRaider]

The AXIS attack on V26 had all the things that FSO pilots live for.  Flexibility when the the plan went into the hamper, a great slaughter of Stukas, revenge for the slaughter of Stukas, focus on accomplishing the mission, and something totally unexpected (eh, TracerX?).

Salute to the Freebirds for their determined attack on the Stuka formation.
Salute to USMC/71sqn for enabling two Stukas to live to bomb the target and for preserving 7 of their own aircraft for additional attack cycles.
Salute to The Gunfighters for de-acking the target and further confounding the defense.
Salute to our bunch for staying focused on the mission even while flying through a Freebird meat grinder and to Dogg and Ziff for 3 successful sorties on the target.
Salute to everyone who put in their free time to organize and execute an FSO on a new terrain with some nice wrinkles (recon mission).

Last.  Salute to TracerX whose last operational thought for the evening was "What was that?!!!"
("It" was Dogg's Big Bad Bomb whistling by his cockpit right over a vehicle hanger!)

[Bannor]

LOL, My squaddie was in the tower and reported that bomb going off as somebody was strafing the tower!

[Sled]

Sorry we couldn't do better for you raider. We didn't know you were in that much trouble till it was to late.

I was riding with Tx, when the big bomb from Dogg went by the canopy. I knew it was not going to be good. 

At least collectively we did well against the target.

 

[TracerX]

Raider, it is a testament to the AK's flying abilities that two Ju87's survived.  It took us a while to find all the enemy planes.  The Gunfighters did a lot of the work over the target.  It was a fun night, and there were several good determined La-5 and P-39 pilots.  Salute to them.  Thankfully we had a close airfield for rearming.  We lost three or four of the remaining 7 planes on rearm just to attrition, bent props, tree limbs, etc.  Two of them were from the Gunfighters who we were happy to have along with us. 45Colt and another who I can't remember right now. 

Our base was thankfully close enough that we could make multiple strikes even in the lumbering Ju87's.  I had taken gondolas on my 109, and we had the single bomb, so we were able to do some decent damage each trip to the field, but the heavy lifting was done by Dogg and Ziff in the Ju87's. Each trip over we would get to the base, and straffe it till the Ju87's arrived, then went home to rearm.  On the third trip, there was one hanger left that had already been hit by a bomb so thinking it might be soft enough to straffe down, I decided to make one more pass before the Stukas arrived, saving one of their precious bombs for another target possibly.  The target was already identified over the radio, and AKDogg had confirmed it, but I though he had not yet arrived at the base.  In fact he was already diving on the target, and when I pulled out of my straffing run, I saw the ominous shape of a 4,000lb bomb go past my windshield, and my last thought was "uh oh, I hope I am high enough!"  The Mushroom cloud was the last marker of my existence, and the tower greeted me with open arms. AKDogg proves once again how terrific a marksman he is.