Today:Stuffing Up Machine Gunning Road Convoys in He-111

[Apoll]

Ok...today I decided to take a break from long complex cross country flights and do a bit of attack practice around the local airfield in my trusty He-111. I decided to give those lazy gunners, who usually sit at 5000 metres reading girlie magazines and trashing their hard working pilot/bombardier, some much needed time cultivating their aim on road convoys. Which meant I needed to get down at tree top height.

 

So...I lined up on the runway in fair to middling weather conditions: not great, as squalls were coming through fairly regularly, hampering vision, and the wind sock was pretty much straight out. Going to be bumpy. And it was as I climbed off to the west with my two 1800 SC bombs attached (mistake). The bird was a pig, slipping all over the sky and buffeted by turbulence as I slowly climbed to 1000 metres to make my first attack. I turned back east; you cannot lose concentration for a moment in this thing, and in this landscape, or you will become badly disorientated, especially down low. There was an artillery park off to the right distance by a copse of trees, and I pointed my nose roughly in the direction, hit the auto pilot, and jumped into the bombsight view to set up the attack.

 

Let me tell you...at 300 kts at 1000 metres, you don't have much time to sight and get set up and I rushed through the setup in time to drop onto a couple of specks in the distance. The sight was swinging wildly as I tried, and over compensated, to put the cross hairs on the target. All too soon, the auto points touched, and I felt the bomber jolt as the two heavy bombs fell free. I watched...and watched...and finally a dirty brown/black massive explosion blossomed out...near the guns but still far enough away to make their demise doubtful. In this weather, rushed and not properly set up, it was always going to be a long shot. And it was. Takeaway lesson: give yourself plenty of time to run in and spot the target and set up. Anything else is going to be a flunked shot.

 

Oh well...now, let's give those gunners a work out and I headed down a road at tree top level just off to one side...on which an enemy convoy was supposedly travelling. The road led south and I followed its twists and turns. It was hairy...it was nasty...it was fast. The snow rushed by between my feet; I could see the texture of the snow as I rushed across it! Little cracks and dips and indentations in the land. Now and then a tree. The weather kept flinging squalls at the aircraft, obscuring my vision, and the turbulence at 300 kts was awful: the old He-111 kept bucking and swinging and I struggled to keep a straight and level course. I gave the attack commands to my gunners but still no enemy, as the road unwound below the glazed front between my rudder pedals. This was hard.

 

Then, I suddenly saw on a curve ahead a line of moving...what looked like tricks. I knew we had found the sought after enemy, as the front cannon gunner, lying prone in the nose, suddenly came to life, and popped up and aimed the cannon. He got a couple of shots off as we roared over the convoy and I heard the rear ventral gunner firing. Then it was over and I stood the wing on its end trying to tear the bucking aircraft back up the road. It didn't like bring treated like a fighter and the nose dipped in protest. I yanked the noise back up...come up you !@$/!!, and found myself climbing fast...too fast. Low and slow just over the enemy convoy.

 

In this scenario, at barely 400 metres and wallowing like an old tart over the enemy, there can only be one result: the inevitable happened. The first burst of ground fire took off my starboard tail plane. The second smoked my port engine. The third wounded my ventral gunner, and aerated my right wing. The awful banging went on for ages, and I saw tracer skirt the sides and front. Looked like little pulses of light, except they made a terribly jarring sound when they hit the aircraft, and the controls jolted. Looking now like a block of flying Swiss cheese, with engine revs fluctuating wildly on the left engine, and the machine swinging to the left, I jammed right rudder as far as it could go, feathered the now useless left prop, and noted with alarm that the oil temperature on the left engine was almost off the scale..in the wrong direction. This was going to turn rapidly into a fire, and I immediately started looking for my airfield which I knew was somewhere close.

 

Know what I said about paying attention always to your location? Well, I hadn't in that little burst of excitement, and I could see squat. No airfield anywhere. I felt an actual spasm of anger and disbelief: Oh come on!! Another squall was bearing down on me as I struggled to regain some altitude to spy the missing field. No such luck. The nose shuddered and the plane wallowed as I fought the nose, then it dived away to the left, heading rapidly for the now alarmingly close snowy ground.

 

It looks beautiful up high; down close it just looks hard. I had to land, and land fast, or the ruddy thing was going to land itself, and probably not in a way I would probably appreciate. So I spotted a reasonably flat bit of snow...just like all the other snow..and control crashed my way into a small copse of trees. I totalled my old He-111 but at least I wasn't wasn't judged dead by the simulation. I live again!

 

What a ride! The weather had not helped. But most of all, I had rushed things, and tried to get into action too quickly. Then I tried to treat the bomber like a fighter; tearing down a road looking for the enemy at tree top height was okay, but not extending and taking my time to reverse and come back was not. I had also taken the AAA for granted; those Ruskies could hit a Gallah at ten paces! Wrong! Most of all, I realised - after I calmed down a bit - that I actually needed to treat my virtual life seriously, and not be reckless with it. Or I was simply going to get shot down all the time, and that is certainly no fun.

 

I resolved to do better tomorrow. This time, I will take it easy...extend properly after an attack...come in from a different angle each time! And treat my bomber as it should be. Won't stop being unlucky, or that piece of unexpected ground fire...but at least I will give myself and my virtual crew the best chance of coming back in one piece. And I will not forget to always keep my situational and geographical bearings, even during the attack. Not doing that today was a large part of having to set down on a frozen, less than ideal piece of ground.

 

We live and learn. (Ps: love the bad weather in this sim...hope it is retained and improved. So atmospheric and the simulated air feels gritty and real.)

 

Apoll out...

[=38=Tatarenko]

good read

[Froddi_VR]

Very well written!