I initially posted this on my Old Friends group chain, we
are a bunch of vintage and milsurp operators that meet 3 times
a week on 3715 and once a month for lunch, and we are
primarily in the NC/SC area.
OK, I am 72 and still love to build models just as I did
as a kid. I recently picked up an AMT Models, an actual
model maker still in the US, of the Grumman TBF-1 Avenger.
This AC actually made its first debut during the Battle of
Midway, but in just about all movies, if not all, they never
show you the radioman/bombardier and tell you there is
actually a 3 man crew. Only 6 Avengers were dispatched in
that battle and only one came back, plane shot full of
holes, radioman wounded and the rear gunner dead. It did go
on to achieve excellent results in surface ship and
submarine hunting the rest of the war and into many years
later. The Avenger was so heavy, even with the carrier at
max speed, the most takeoff velocity they could get to was
90 knots, remember no catapults then, just barely enough,
and in movies and pix, the Avenger is the one that when
launched, dropped below the flight deck as soon as it
cleared it, such that you think it went in the sea.
The word doc is an X-ray view, the radioman at the bottom
behind the wing, the two pics show the radiomans position,
the seat above him is the rear or ventral gunner. He had
two windows to look out of, and he entered, looking at the
3rd pic, in a hatch just behind his starboard window. As in
all aircraft with crews, for example, the B17 with more shot
down than any other bomber, you have to think about being in
that spot, the plane shot to pieces, maybe both pilot and co
pilot dead, you stuck by centrifugal forces such that you
can not get out as the plane plunges to the ground. In a
B17, that could take 5 minutes falling from 30,000 feet,
guessing your only thing you could do was to pray and be
calm, or totally terrified knowing the inevitable could be
measured in minutes.
Forgot to mention, magnify the radio op photo, and notice
the ART 13 under the rear gunners seat. In the Word Doc,
you can blow it up and see it is labelled 'ATC
transmitter'. The question is, what was there before the
ART 13 since the 13 did not make its debut until later in
the war, definitely not during Midway.
Charlie, W4MEC in NC