Books - What are you reading?

[DN308]

On 10/21/2021 at 4:39 PM, busdriver said:

 

Queued up...

 

I’ve already read 9 out of your list…

Surprising muselé as English is not my native language 

[SYN_Ricky]

On 10/21/2021 at 4:39 PM, busdriver said:

 

Queued up...

 

I read a couple in this list, another one that I enjoyed about Mosquitoes was "Focus on Europe: A Photo-Reonnaissance Mosquito Pilot at War 1943-45" by Ronald H. Foster.

 

 

Edited October 31, 2021 by SYN_Ricky

[DN308]

[busdriver]

7 hours ago, SYN_Ricky said:

I read a couple in this list, another one that I enjoyed about Mosquitoes was "Focus on Europe: A Photo-Reonnaissance Mosquito Pilot at War 1943-45" by Ronald H. Foster.

 

 

I really enjoyed that one as well. 

 

 

[DN308]

And now:

[JG4_Moltke1871]

I play right now a career as leader of III/KG 55 on Kuban Map.

This makes me curious about my Unit and makes me buy this book:

 

Edited November 9, 2021 by JG4_Moltke1871

[sevenless]

Some interesting new insights (at least for me).

 

Air Battle for Moscow 1941-1942: Amazon.co.uk: Degtev, Dmitry, Zubov, Dmitry: 9781526774460: Books

 

[cardboard_killer]

Getting my next fiction today. Dopamine Nation (above) was a bust, finished Battle For Leyte, so also looking for another non-fiction

 

[CUJO_1970]

On 10/27/2021 at 8:41 PM, Enceladus said:

When I'm less busy in life I'm going to get this book

 

 

Southern 242 went down about 10 miles from where I’m sitting right now, right next to where our veterinarian’s office now is.

 

It’s a small miracle anyone survived at all.

 

 

[Enceladus828]

1 hour ago, CUJO_1970 said:

It’s a small miracle anyone survived at all.

And the number of people who survived the crash, 22, definitely. Also, the fact that flight attendant seated at the front of the plane, Catherine Cooper (who died last year ?) survived relatively unscathed is amazing.

It's pretty sad that up-to-date weather information at that time, specifically about severe weather and the squall line in that area, wasn't passed along to flight crews; the crew left Huntsville with weather information that was hours old. Also, the fact that Cornelius-Moore airport wasn't on the Air Traffic Controllers scope is very disappointing (one of the survivors, Don Foster, who was also a pilot, anticipated that they would land at Cornelius-Moore).

 

I remember seeing the episode about this crash on the show Mayday over 10 years ago when I was 9 years old. Being that I had never heard of this crash before, unlike other episodes, and the introduction offering very little insight on what would happen other than a really bad storm (I quickly forgot about the introduction), I had no idea what the outcome of this flight would be. When the plane touched down on the highway, I thought that everything would be alright and the plane would come to a complete stop on the highway and everyone would survive.

Sadly that was not the case ??

 

1 hour ago, CUJO_1970 said:

Southern 242 went down about 10 miles from where I’m sitting right now, right next to where our veterinarian’s office now is.

When the pilots realized they couldn't make Cartersville, the Captain suggested twice that they land in an open field but the co-pilot suggested they land on Georgia State Highway 92. But based on the fact that you live in that area, do you know if they could have landed in an open field instead of the highway?

[CUJO_1970]

31 minutes ago, Enceladus said:

When the plane touched down on the highway, I thought that everything would be alright and the plane would come to a complete stop on the highway and everyone would survive.

Sadly that was not the case ??

 

When the pilots realized they couldn't make Cartersville, the Captain suggested twice that they land in an open field but the co-pilot suggested they land on Georgia State Highway 92. But based on the fact that you live in that area, do you know if they could have landed in an open field instead of the highway?

They would have been ok landing on 92 all things considered…the problem with them began when the right wing hit a gas station - it broke off and cause the fuselage to roll, which in turn caused the aircraft to break up. Unfortunately they landed on a car with a family in it (‘you can hear the copilot call out the car right before they touched down)

 

There are no open fields in the vicinity they came down. To this day the area is heavily forested with tall Georgia yellow pines. In my opinion more loss of life would have resulted had they tried anything other than setting it down on 92. As it were many of the survivors simply walked into a house and waited for the ambulance/fire dept to drive right up to them. 

[busdriver]

7 hours ago, Enceladus said:

It's pretty sad that up-to-date weather information at that time, specifically about severe weather and the squall line in that area, wasn't passed along to flight crews; the crew left Huntsville with weather information that was hours old.

 

This episode was case study in the DC-9 training program at Northwest Airlines (from the merger with Republic which was a merger of Southern, North Central, Hughes Airwest et al). The big take away for us DC-9 guys was a concept of "radar attenuation" where precipitation is so heavy that radar returns give you a false sense of where the weakest precip is. IOW our analog monochromatic radar would/could make the worst conditions appear to be the safest to fly through. Essentially that's what the pilots of Southern 242 did, they flew directly into the most severe conditions. "Radar attenuation" and heavy precip is a common safety topic at all airlines.

 

 

[Bremspropeller]

Robey, did you like the Diesel? There's a long thread over at PPRuNe about the DC-9 in Australia (Ansett and TAA) and it seems like I have ben born 30 years too late to enjoy all the fun and games...

 

 

[ZachariasX]

I was just about old enough to reach the pedals the first time I had the chance for stick time in the DC-9 full motion sim used by Swissair. I love that dutch rolling bastard of a crate ever since. My kind of flight deck.

[busdriver]

2 hours ago, Bremspropeller said:

Robey, did you like the Diesel? There's a long thread over at PPRuNe about the DC-9 in Australia (Ansett and TAA) and it seems like I have ben born 30 years too late to enjoy all the fun and games...

 

 

I liked it much more than riding side-saddle on the 727 panel (flight engineer). We flew four different series, 10s, 30s, 40s, and 50s, with a whole lot of airplanes equipped with different models of JT8 motors (often with two different engines). The airflow around the edges of some cockpit windows caused a lot of noise, and they leaked like a sieve when getting blasted with de-icing fluid (dripping down into your flight bag or coffee cup).

 

After I flew the 757 for the first time I never considered going back to the 9 for the “fourth stripe.”

[cardboard_killer]

There are only two kinds of planes: ones I been airsick flying, and those I haven't. Never on a DC-9, for obvious reasons.

[busdriver]

2 hours ago, cardboard_killer said:

There are only two kinds of planes: ones I been airsick flying, and those I haven't. Never on a DC-9, for obvious reasons.

Bummer, about getting airsick. I tossed my cookies on my “dollar ride” (first T-37 flight) when we did a spin, and in straight and level flight in IMC with my German student pilot at the controls. Let’s just say that “smooth hands” is not a phrase used by any IP when describing this particular pilot. ?

[LLv34_Flanker]

S! 

 

2 books at the momeny. First one about Finnish WW2 ace Hans Wind, who was credited with 75 kills before being seriously wounded in 1944 spending rest of war in hospital. 

 

Second book about Bomber squadron 48 also called by name Red devils of Onttola. Onttola is an airfield still in use located in eastern Finland near Joensuu. They flew Do-17Z, Blenheim, IL-4, DB-3, Pe-2, Pe-3 etc. 

 

Sorry for bad angle in pic, Phone decided to flip it. 

Edited November 14, 2021 by LLv34_Flanker

[DN308]

Another one for me, finished in no more than 2 days. Stunning story, very well written, even for a non-English native speaker like me!

 

[Gunter_Severloh]

Finished reading this book this past week

https://www.shop.kagero.pl/en/54-junkers-ju-87d-g-vol-i.html

 

Read this one prior to that

https://www.shop.kagero.pl/en/ju-87d-g-vol-ii.html

 

Prior to that ? i finished reading this

What an amazing crazy read that was, this book blew my mind

on what he did and experienced a must read!

[Feathered_IV]

The Navy's here! 

Finally managed to get myself a copy and it arrived today...  What a fantastic book!  

 

[Off_Winters]

on a bit of a Luftwaffe theme at the moment.

 

I like to collect aviation auto-biographies and biographies released in the 1920's through 1980's. in conjunction with the normal array of historical aviation literature. 

[Duce_de_Zoop]

I've mostly stuck to reading dryer history most of my life, and only recently Ive been getting into memoirs. These are way more fascinating than I'd first imagined. Just finished up Emelianko's memoirs, "Red Star Against the Swastika". Very wild, especially as an Il-2 main seeing what it was really like (id like some white phosphorous to drop on tanks and inf...), though I agree with the critiques that the writing style was confusing and seemed to get more confused the further into the narrative it went. 

 

I'm now reading "D-day Through German Eyes" and it's... brutal. The veterans are incredibly candid about the events on the beach, almost too candid, though I appreciate their strength in sharing things so horrible. I've had to put it down at points though, it's one thing watch explosions and gunfire in a movie or video game, it's another reading what really happened, knowing this is how real people went out, in such violent and cold and lonely ways. Christ, you hear war is a nightmare, but the way these soldiers talk about D-Day I can't imagine being there. I don't know how anyone was able to get through that, and it just makes me grateful that there hasn't been another war of that scale since. 

Edited November 16, 2021 by Duce_de_Zoop

[cardboard_killer]

Actually just finished this one. I do not recommend, although the prose is fine. The thesis is thin for a book half as long IMO.

 

 

 

[SYN_Ricky]

I read this one years ago when I bought it, but decided to go at it again, as I thought I had forgotten enough of it to make it a fresh read. Entertaining book, with lots of personal accounts of Degelow himself, but also from other members of his Jasta and from their british and french rivals. Funny detail, he didn't like the Dr.I very much, and preferred the Pfalz D.IIIa to it and to the Albatros Dva while waiting for the Fokkers D.VII. He said that the ruggedness of the Pfalz and his ability to dive made him feel safer.

[SCG_ErwinP]

My first time with a Libertarian book.
Next should be: Democracy: The God That Failed

[Uufflakke]

Started reading The Dream of the Red Chamber.

One of the four masterpieces of Chinese literature.

 

2000 pages. Still 1800 to go.

 

 

[LukeFF]

Finally got around this past week to starting Volume 4 of Black Cross / Red Star. 

[Lofte]

Just finished this book. Cool thing)

 

[cardboard_killer]

Got this from the library a couple of days ago. So far, so good, but seems a bit generic so far.

 

Finally decided to start on this translation (available for download at Corts Foundation)

 

[cardboard_killer]

I just saw that Christopher Shores et al's final volume on the Med air war has been released here in the USA. I'm going to wait for the kindle version to complete my set.

 

https://www.amazon.com/History-Mediterranean-Air-War-Five/dp/1911621971

 

[Ace_Pilto]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chickenhawk_(book)

 

10/10

[cardboard_killer]

Picked this up at the library after finishing Harlem Shuffle, which was just okay. Unfortunately, The Invasion of the Dutch East Indies pdf doesn't fit my kindle fire's screen, so I abandoned it. I may try to export it or something to get it into a readable format.

 

[Diggun]

2 minutes ago, cardboard_killer said:

kindle fire

That's very 2010 of you

 

NB this is librarian humour, no offense intended!

[cardboard_killer]

3 hours ago, Diggun said:

That's very 2010 of you

 

I'm burning a CD right now, so 2010 is in the future for me.

 

3 hours ago, Diggun said:

this is librarian humour, no offense intended!

 

Your punishment is to be a librarian.

[DeadlyMercury]

 

[cardboard_killer]

Interlibrary loan arrived for me today:

 

[Vig]

Dox Quixote courtesy of Project Gutenberg.  This following The Three Musketeers and the rest of the D'Artagnan Romances, which were excellent.

Edited December 10, 2021 by Vig
spelling

[Bremspropeller]

Can anybody recommend a book about escort carriers in the Atlantic - including Sea Hurricane operations?

[TheBlackPenguin]

56 minutes ago, Bremspropeller said:

Can anybody recommend a book about escort carriers in the Atlantic - including Sea Hurricane operations?

 

My search yielded nothing on Google, however if you're on Twitter you may want to try asking people like Dr Phil Weir:

 

https://twitter.com/navalhistorian

 

Matthew Willis:

 

https://twitter.com/NavalAirHistory

 

Looks like he has a webpage here:

 

https://navalairhistory.com/

 

Hope that helps, still really not enough about the Battle of the Atlantic.

 

Edited December 22, 2021 by TheBlackPenguin