B24 takes pic of emily while attacking it

[bangsbox]

http://i.imgur.com/E2sTdHk.jpg

[Ack-Ack]

For a period of time in the SWPA, the Japanese were losing scout planes at an alarming rate to "unknown enemy activities" as the scout planes were shot down before they were able to radio in a full report.  Turns out that a lot of these Japanese scout planes were lost due to being shot down by US scout planes, in most cases bombers like the B-24 and B-17.

Lt. Hitsuji, 851 NAG, was commanding an H6K (Mavis) in November 1942, and became one of the first to find out what shot down Japanese patrol planes and survive. The following is a translation from his memoir "Saigo no Hikotei (The Last Flying boat)" (Asahi Sonorama, ISBN4-257-17286-X).


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"Enemy plane! Close! Starboard and to the rear!" the tail gunner reported.

"All men on air to air battle station!" I yelled as I put the plane in a full speed dive to sealevel.

It was 0700 November 21, 1942, 150 nautical miles south of Guadalcanal. We were in midst of a very bloody battle, losing flying boats almost every day to unidentified enemy activities. Our boats would have just enough time to radio a consecutive "hi" signal (consecutive signaling of the Japanese Morse code signal for the character "hi", the initial for "hikoki" or airplane) before the shoot-out followed by silence. Very few survived air combat. If a boat is able to make detailed reports about the enemy, that boat was sure to make it back.

Our commanding officer was in distress about the mounting losses, and just a few days ago, I had assured him that this will not go on for long. So far 16 of our boats were lost. I was not about to be number 17. It wasn't a patrol plane's duty to engage in air battles, but now I had no choice.

I figured that the fight must be decided quickly. The B-17 positioned itself above and to the starboard rear of our plane and followed us with ease. It must be radioing it's base about our position. One of them was bad enough. If there were two or even fighter planes we did not have a chance. I made a tight turn to the port and headed towards the enemy. The only chance we had was the relatively small turning radius of our slow plane compared to that of the fast B-17.

The enemy was obviously surprised at our sudden turn. As we passed each other, our tail cannon fire hit the B-17 and its port inside engine started smoking. The enemy fled, trailing a long streamer of black smoke. The enemy was surprisingly inpersistent. We continued our search mission, but I had a feeling that it wasn't over yet.

"Eat your breakfast now before they come back" I ordered and went to the commander's seat to open my lunchbox. Pretty soon the co-pilot silently pointed his finger forward and to the port. I took a hard look, and there he was. Another big-tailed B-17 heading straight toward us. The one we damaged must have called for help. We were all ready to fight, and I stood up from my seat. I sealed the tank chamber and pulled the fire extinguisher lever. This fills the tank chamber with CO2. All gunners manned their stations. I could see the front gunner grinning in his turret.

"Okay we're ready" someone said.

At altitude 30 meters and speed 150 knots, we headed towards squally skied in the direction of our base. The enemy didn't start his attack immediately. It flew alongside us and passed us. I figured that he was avoiding our tail cannon. It would probably be making a frontal attack. The shoot-out was about to begin.

"Here it comes!" someone shouted, and at the same time, the enemy's front guns and all four of our starboard machine-guns started firing. As we passed each other, I could see the enemy's tail gun fire, but tracers were way behind us. No hits on either side. We didn't change our course and headed toward the squall.

The faster enemy caught up quickly and crisscrossed our path, attacking as it passed us.

We were at very low altitude, and the sea behind us whitened with machine-gun fire. As the shooting went on, this started moving closer and closer. I could not hear anything other than the roar of the machine-guns and the engine noise. I couldn't keep my eyes off the enemy for a moment. The enemy made its fourth pass, and as it crossed our path, a 50 caliber shell jumped into the cockpit.

I heard someone yell "Damn!" and smelled smoke at the same time. I turned around and two men were down on the floor. Our main radio man PO2 Watanabe's left arm was hanging limp from his shoulder, and blood was shooting up to the ceiling. Flight engineer Leading Mechanic Nakano was down on the floor, holding his left arm, and shouting "Gasoline, gasoline!".

[Ack-Ack]

He was yelling to the radioman because the spark from the telegram key could set the vaporized gasoline on fire. But the injured radio man continued to send the message that we were combating an enemy bomber. The enemy started making yet another pass.

I took off my muffler and threw it to Lt. (jg) Ide who was shooting away, and yelled "Stop his bleeding!" I could see from the tank chamber window that gas was gushing out of a hit tank. It was a miracle that it wasn't on fire. The floor was soon covered with gas. I injected additional CO2 gas, and I could see the white gas filling the tank chamber. The injured mechanic was still yelling "Gasoline!". I could only yell back "It's okay! You worry about yourself!"

We were able to stop the radioman's bleeding, but the enemy still kept attacking. Amid the exchange of machine gun roar, I could hear bullets tearing into our plane. The plane shook under the impact. All four engines were driving at full power.

On their sixth pass, the moment I saw their tailgun fire, there was an enormous banging noise up front gunner PO1 Takahashi pointed to the floor beneath the pilot's seat and I noted a big hole about 30cm, on the keel of our bow. I could see waves from the hole.

By this time, I was sure that this enemy has shot down more than one flying boat. "It wasn't fighters. It was this guy. Another patrol plane!. I'm going to get him. He is not going to have anymore kill marks!" As I came to this realization, there was a new determination in my mind. If we can't donw him with our guns, we will ram him. I drew and loaded my pistol.

"If worse comes to worst we'll ram him, okay?" I patted the main pilot Ensign Kobayashi's sholder with my pistol. He nodded lightly. "Okay, we're ready then". My mind was set. I was going to shoot myself at the moment of the ramming so I would die before the crew.

I noted that the side panel of the commander's seat was burning hot. I was shocked to find the bullet that hit the crew crewmen perched in the panel. Had I not been standing, this bullet would have hit my back! (This bullet is still in my possession).

I noticed that the enemy's fire was getting considerably weaker. Either some of their gunners were knocked out, or they were out of ammo. I was getting the feeling that we may be able to make it when the co-pilot suddenly put the plane in a dive. The sea was right in front of us.

"Not yet!" I yelled, thinking that he was about to ram the B-17, but soon realized that our co-pilot PO1 Kira evaded a collision with the enemy who came in from the side. The enemy passed about 30meters behind us. The tail gunner poured an entire drum of 20mm cannon shells into the B-17.

The shells all hit the enemy's fuselage. The enemy passed us from the right, then banked left and started closing into our plane. I could see the enemy pilot's face. I couldn't help but fire my pistol at the enemy.

Maybe the enemy was trying to ram us too. I noticed all his guns were pointing random directions. He must have been out of ammo. He flew alongside us banking and yawing for a while, but eventually disappeared into the rain towards Guadalcanal, trailing gasoline. "We won!" we said to each other, but we could no longer fight.



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Lt. Hitsuji's H6K made it back to Shortland, but taxing was something of a small adventure. After splashdown, as soon as the bow came down, water started gushing in from the hole in the bow. Since they did not have material to close the big hole in the bow, they stuffed their life jackets into the hole. This obviously wasn't holding up, and six men piled up on the life jacket-stuffed hole to stop the water. By the time they were beached, these men had their head barely above water. Everyone was covered with water, oil, and blood.

Their plane #36 (could have been O-36 or 851-36 or 51-36) had endured ninety-three 50 caliber bullets.

Measures were immediately taken to improve the defensive capability of the flying boats. The following conversions were made on the field.

1) Fuel tank protection : All fuel tanks were covered with rubber, and held together with wire net. (Hitsuji notes that American self-sealing tanks with the rubber inside the tank was much more effective, but that couldn't be done in the field.)

2) Improved defensive armament: Machine-guns on H6Ks were increased from one 20mm and seven 7.7mm to three 20mm (tail and waist) and five 7.7mm (front, dorsal, ventral, and fuselage sides).

3) Armor: 20mm armor plate behind the pilots' seat and 20mm shield at gunners' positions. However, Hitsuji notes that the armor behind the pilot was something of a mixed blessing. Since they didn't have bullet-proof glass, if the bullet came in from the front and hit the pilot , the bullet would not just pass through, but be deflected by the armor plate and tear the pilot's body apart.

4) Increased air to air gunnery training.

These conversions amounted to 1.5 tons in additional weight, but this did not affect speed and range performance.

Lt. Hitsuji survived the war to become the last Japanese pilot to fly the H8K2 when he flew the big boat to Yokohama and where it was handed over to the US occupational forces. He was escorted by a PBY, but had to fly in zigzag pattern to keep from overtaking the PBY.

ack-ack

[Saxman]

The Black Cat PBYs would also attack the H6K patrols. Thomas Miller's The Cactus Air Force discusses a couple of those engagements.

[Karnak]

I wonder how much more survivable the H8K2 actually was.  It supposedly had armor for all crew positions and the engines as well as a fully protected fuel system.  That said, Japanese fuel system protection, even when built in unlike the ad-hoc H6K modifications described by Lt Hitsuji in the story posted by Ack-Ack, was not as good as American, British or German fuel system protection.  I can't comment on Russian fuel system protection quality as I know nothing about it.

[Shifty]

Great read, thanks Ack-Ack. 

[bozon]

Nice post ack-ack. 

What I learned from this is that as opposed to AH, real gunners could barely hit another bomber from close range. I now doubt even more that they had any value against fighters, except perhaps for the tail gunner.

[Karnak]

Nice post ack-ack. 

What I learned from this is that as opposed to AH, real gunners could barely hit another bomber from close range. I now doubt even more that they had any value against fighters, except perhaps for the tail gunner.

Nose gunners defending against a head on attack also have a relatively simply gunnery solution.

[Skuzzy]

Nice post ack-ack.  

What I learned from this is that as opposed to AH, real gunners could barely hit another bomber from close range. I now doubt even more that they had any value against fighters, except perhaps for the tail gunner.

Real gunners did not have a 1000 hours of practice either and had far more distractions to deal with.

P.S.  If you ever find me flying a bomber in the game, I am easy prey.  I cannot hit the broad side of a barn with a basketball, much less shoot down a moving target.

[FLOOB]

Doesn't look like it's being attacked to me.

[colmbo]

Doesn't look like it's being attacked to me.

That is one in a series of photos, a later photo shows the Emily on fire.

[FLOOB]

He only posted a link to one photo, the same one that he imbeded.

[BnZs]

Real gunners did not have a 1000 hours of practice either and had far more distractions to deal with.

P.S.  If you ever find me flying a bomber in the game, I am easy prey.  I cannot hit the broad side of a barn with a basketball, much less shoot down a moving target.

But people manning real flex guns had to contend with not having "Auto-Level" in a turbulence free environment, which is an enormous advantage. Fighters are also operating in such an environment, but having to still *fly* their guns onto target, it makes much less difference for them. Exhibit A for this is the F2B's single rear gun being more dangerous in longish range gunfights against fighters with twice the firepower.

So you may be a bad shot, but that doesn't change things. I sometimes struggle to hit fighters flying straight and level outside of 200 flying a fighter, but I guarantee you I could hit fighters on a similar flight path at 600-800 with AHII flex guns.

[bozon]

Real gunners did not have a 1000 hours of practice either and had far more distractions to deal with.

P.S.  If you ever find me flying a bomber in the game, I am easy prey.  I cannot hit the broad side of a barn with a basketball, much less shoot down a moving target.

That may be true, but there is more to it.

To aim the guns, the gunner needs to align his eye, two points along the gun and the target - and keep them aligned while aiming. That is not easy at all, especially if there is another degree of freedom and the gun itself can move freely (like the held MGs of the waist gunners). When the plane vibrates and hops on turbulence, the head bobs and so does the gun if it is not fixed to the airframe. I did the experiment of trying to shoot out of a moving car once - I couldn't hit ANYTHING, even when driving at just 20-30 km/h, unless it was very big in angular size (i.e. either very close or very big in dimensions).  Just to keep the eye, rear and front sights aligned was no simple task. In the game, the reticule is always perfect - the bullets will fly where it points and my eye is always looking down the aiming line - no matter what the plane does or if I swivel the gun around. Gunners in AH have a perfect aim even if the plane is diving at 500 mph or pulling a 5G turn.

In addition, shooting at any direction which is not straight forward/backward is like shooting through a cross wind of the scale of a hurricane. Shooting at a plane flying perfectly parallel, the gunner has a cross wind of 200-250 mph. If the target is not flying perfectly parallel, from his point of view it is now equivalent to shooting at a moving target with a 250 mph cross-wind. To put it in perspective, this means a drift of about 100 yards per second of bullet flight-time. In AH the air is absolutely and perfectly stable, and bullets do not tumble if they come out of the barrel and meet a 250 mph wind sheer, nor do they meet any turbulence from the plane, or any variations in the airflow over a distance of 1000 yards to the target. Finally, in shooting through a cross wind, range estimation is critical. The ranged icons in the game help a lot in that respect.

AH does as good a job as any in including the scatter inherent to the gun and its installation. Ignoring the issue with holding the eye to the gunsight is a sensible gameplay concession because except for the track-IR 6DoF  users, other players have very limited and awkward control of their head position. The only way to simulate vibrations ruining the aim is to add some additional random scatter to the guns and I am not sure that this is the right thing to do. Detailed atmosphere and its effect on the bullets is probably too much effort for a minor benefit, so I see the reason in not even attempting it.

My original comment was not a criticism of AH, it was about the value of gunners in WWII bombers. I really think that they were next to useless, especially the gunners in more maneuverable aircraft like the Me110, SBD, Stuka, IL2, A20, etc. The main thing that gunners added to the heavy bombers is a higher death toll. That is just my opinion.

[Saxman]

Maybe one solution is to set up the flex guns similar to how operating a tank's main gun from the commander's position works: You get a vague reticule indicating your aim point, but it's non-specific.