Human gunner on bombers: shoot down own plane?

[flyingskytro]

I recently realised that, when manning the dorsal gun on a Pe-2 series 35, that it is possible in the heat of a battle to damage or even shoot down your own plane by accidentially shooting the tail rudders. I assumed this was not possible on bombers in real life, as an interruptor device (at least on turrets) would have prevented the gun from firing when airplane structures interfered with a gun's fireline.

 

Does anybody have more information about this problematic?

[Jade_Monkey]

Interesting, i didnt know they had interruptors, but makes sense.

 

I'm assuming only the sophisticated turrets did.

Edited March 20, 2018 by Jade_Monkey

[Herne]

1 hour ago, flyingskytro said:

 

 

Does anybody have more information about this problematic?

 

 

[LLv24_SukkaVR]

I shot down my own Ju-87 today, not my greatest moments in this sim. I recommend using the iron sights to make sure you dont hit your own plane. With the yellow crosshair thingy its much easier to shoot up your own plane in the heat of the battle.

[BeastyBaiter]

I'm not aware of any WW2 aircraft that had interrupters on hand operated MG's. These guns were usually just normal tank/truck/infantry guns mounted on planes.

[56RAF_Roblex]

It is certainly possible though the AI gunners usually manage to avoid doing it.  On the other hand the AI gunners are very good at shooting friendlies instead.   My squad did a 7 ship PE-2 raid in close formation and I believe all 7 of us received friendly fire warnings because of our AI gunners :-)

[CrazyDuck]

Friendly fire was a serious problem in tight bomber formations in reality, especially with bombers equipped with weapons with lots of angular freedom (360 deg turrets etc.). In a heat of battle gunner was focused on the enemy, tracking/leading him with his gun, often turning his gun into a nearby friendly by mistake. When famous USAAF box formation was being developed, one of the main goals was to minimize the quantity of inevitable friendly fire by positioning the planes optimally. With aircraft of those proportions, flying so close to eachother, packing so many powerful guns pointed in all directions, this was a serious thing to consider.

Edited March 21, 2018 by CrazyDuck

[Ehret]

Considering drawbacks, I wonder if all those gunners and turrets weren't counter-productive... Without them a bomber could be much lighter, faster, had higher payload and fewer sorties would be needed for the same effect. Thus fewer people would be lost, probably.

 

"The bomber always will get through" - sure but back? Not necessarily.

 

Personally I would prefer to be in a crew of the A20 than B-17.

[Legioneod]

2 hours ago, Ehret said:

Considering drawbacks, I wonder if all those gunners and turrets weren't counter-productive... Without them a bomber could be much lighter, faster, had higher payload and fewer sorties would be needed for the same effect. Thus fewer people would be lost, probably.

 

"The bomber always will get through" - sure but back? Not necessarily.

 

Personally I would prefer to be in a crew of the A20 than B-17.

The payload that the heavy bombers carried were usually a bit lower than what was actually capable.

[Cpt_Cool]

Reminds me of a statistical analysis i heard on the internet which concluded that the 8th air force would have lost fewer airmen by drawing lots and sending unlucky crews on one way trips. The math was dubious, but the concept was thought provoking anyway.

[BeastyBaiter]

You have to convince the guys to go though. An awful lot of warfare is psychological. Wars have been lost by those with superior weapons, numbers and training simply because they weren't up for a fight. The most recent example I know of is the Iraqi Army against ISIL when ISIL first overran much of Iraq. 100,000+ men with state of the art tanks and training from the US Army got routed by a few thousand minimally trained hillbillies with pickups and AK's.

 

Going with a WW2 example, allied tank crews covered their tanks in sandbags, tracks and jugs for added armor "protection." All that extra stuff actually reduced the armor effectiveness though, since the sloped armor didn't work properly with all that clutter. But it made the crews feel better, and so nobody stopped it even though it ended up in the deaths of more allied tank crews.

 

Was slapping all those guns on allied bombers the most effective way to fly them? Maybe not. But they made the crews feel better about flying, and that's far more important than the raw statistical efficiency.

[flyingskytro]

3 hours ago, BeastyBaiter said:

You have to convince the guys to go though. An awful lot of warfare is psychological. Wars have been lost by those with superior weapons, numbers and training simply because they weren't up for a fight. The most recent example I know of is the Iraqi Army against ISIL when ISIL first overran much of Iraq. 100,000+ men with state of the art tanks and training from the US Army got routed by a few thousand minimally trained hillbillies with pickups and AK's.

 

Going with a WW2 example, allied tank crews covered their tanks in sandbags, tracks and jugs for added armor "protection." All that extra stuff actually reduced the armor effectiveness though, since the sloped armor didn't work properly with all that clutter. But it made the crews feel better, and so nobody stopped it even though it ended up in the deaths of more allied tank crews.

 

Was slapping all those guns on allied bombers the most effective way to fly them? Maybe not. But they made the crews feel better about flying, and that's far more important than the raw statistical efficiency.

 

Interesting aspect; reminds me of my time on the Leopard 2 MBT, where we had a machinegun (not a heavy 0.5' M2) on the loaders hatch, which was officially called an 'anti aircraft gun' - as if 7.5mm would be useful against a heavily armoured ground attack aircraft... 

 

 

However, I am still wondering if bombers in WWII were not equipped with notches on the ring mounts/rotating assemblies, preventing from firing a plane's own empennage... But I realise this may not have been easy on pintle-mount machinegun installations.