This was originally posted in the 323 squad forum but certain members thought I should offer myself up for public ridicule and post it's details in the general forum.
It's a longish read but needs to be said to set the scene.
Taken during Squad ops of Friday 6th June MRPLUTO and myself were on our 2nd sortie of the night having already hit D22 along with Curval & Ripsnort also in TBM's. Cavalear, Swoop & Puck were escort in F4U-1's. Engaged over D22 Curval had to ditch after taking hits from a C205 but not until he had nursed his crippled TBM to target and caused considerable damage. Rip had to leave early so exited after landing sortie 1. We were asked to target P76 on our 2nd run and MRPLUTO and myself again set off from the CV supported by Puck and Curval in the gunner positions and Cavalear as escort in his trusty F4U-1.
As we closed on target MRPLUTO decided we would Set ".Salvo 12 Delay 0.25" and level bomb rather than divebomb as done in the 1st sortie, this is where it all started to fall in a heap. "Arrrgh, I really suck at level bombing" "np" says MRPLUTO "Just saddle up real close on my 6" and "I'll shout away!" as I drop and you do the same". "Sounds good to me". What could possibly go wrong?
Well...... If you have rockets selected quite a lot From MRPLUTO's point of view in the bomb aimer position he suddenly saw white smoke and thought he had taken a fuel hit from the Ack, but spare a thought for Curval who was sitting in the MRPLUTO's rear turret having a quiet smoke and a drink. I can only imagine what it must have looked like from his position as I unloaded 6 rockets from about 100yds at quarter second intervals.
From my side all I could do was watch in horror powerless to do anything as MRP's TBM dissappeared in a cloud of white smoke. It seemed like an eternity (About 1.5 seconds) until the smoke cleared and I was able to verify I had not shot down my FL.
Vox channel was filled with exclamations ranging from uncontrollable laughter from Cavalear to questions about my parenthood from Curval & MRPLUTO.
For some reason
we divebombed in sortie 3 and MRPLUTO went in with about 1K separation. Can't help feeling Curval had his guns trained on me the whole time. MRPLUTO went on to complete 4 TBM sorties (no small achievement in itself, without squadies trying to shoot you down with rockets). I managed 3 before falling victim to a disco.
Anyway, without anymore introduction.................
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TTFN
snafu