Targetting - Or, how effective is your bomb aiming

[sisemen]

Fascinating site

Bomb Sight - Mapping the World War 2 London Blitz Bomb Census (http://www.bombsight.org)

A plot of all the weaponry dropped during 8 months of the London blitz Oct 40 - Jun 41

[A2QFI]

It is certainly an accurate plot; it correctly shows the location of a bomb that blew the roof off our house! I find it odd that that there were about 200 bombs in Hyde Park and only one on Waterloo station. Suggest to me that there was not much ability to select and identify targets.

[dat581]

Didn't the Germans use St Pauls as a target and never managed to destroy it? I don't know if a bomb ever landed close enough to do any damage.

[Boy_From_Brazil]

A fascinating website. It's amazing that apart from one bomb, The Tower of London and Tower Bridge had close escapes!

I recently lived in St Katharine's dock, I understand that during the blitz, the water was on fire for 3 days due to a layer of naptha and oil.

My grandmothers house in EForest Gate was destroyed, must have been a terrifying time for the East Enders.....

[glojo]

Politicians should be forced to look at these types of maps and of course the exact same ones that will show German cities which I am guessing will look just as awful.

War is an insane activity fought by very brave men and of course women but what about those that get us into these situations?

I have NO idea what the answer is and we must never give in to tyranny but is all out war ever the answer?

[500N]

It is a fascinating map.

I would really like to see one for the whole of
the war including all V1's.

[ORAC]

A fascinating website. It's amazing that apart from one bomb, The Tower of London and Tower Bridge had close escapes! Closest escape was St Paul's. (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1342305/The-Blitzs-iconic-image-On-70th-anniversary-The-Mail-tells-story-picture-St-Pauls.html)....

[Pontius Navigator]

Another question for bit of minutiae. We know that our fighters guns were zeroed, was this done during the height of the battle or was there simply no time?

Similarly bomb sights need to be calibrated and we used to spend hours doing so flying cloverleafs. Did the Luftwaffe dispense with calibration on the grounds that they wouldn't see the aiming point anyway.

I have seen a bombing leader's mathematical calculations for Lancaster bomb sights when I was at Waddo, did Bomber Command main force do calibration sorties? I know there were east coast bombing ranges but these may have been used for crew conversion sorties rather than calibration.

[Party Animal]

glojo


War is an insane activity fought by very brave men and of course women but what about those that get us into these situations?




If you win (or think you do), you get rich - Blair/Dubya

If you lose, you pay the price - Hitler/Himmler etc...

[Pontius Navigator]

George V - Kaiser Bill

Thatcher - Galtiere

Truman - Hirohito

Tito - Mussolini

Major/Bush - Hussein

Blair/Dubya - Hussein

Spot the odd one out.

[Hempy]

Stalin - everyone..

[sisemen]

One wonders what on earth was at Trotter's Bottom (now Dyrham Golf club - 51 40 29.75N 0 13 43.67W) to warrant such a tight grouping of 19 bombs? Or were they all coincidental mistakes?

Nothing found in the archives to suggest any military site - maybe a decoy airfield?

[November4]

Would be interesting to see the bombs by day for the whole blitz and then V1/V2 etc

Even more interesting to see which are still around now (UXBs)...

[Biggus]

sisemen,

If a bomber got into dificulties, and elected to jettison it's bomb load, would it drop them live over "hostile" territory?



Could you tight grouping of 19 on no apparent target be as the result of a live jettison of ordinance?

[500N]

Siseman

I see what you mean. Not a string of bombs but bombs
dropped in one place.

As someone else commented, it's interesting to see some of the strings
of bombs and some of the locations.

[500N]

Biggus

They would still be in a string though.

I notice that a string of bombs exists just north east of that cluster.

[sisemen]

Sorry Biggus - just worked out that there was a decoy airfield there (Q and K Sites - whatever that means).

That also explains the large amount by the side of the old A1 (now A1081)

[500N]

Siseman

Do you have a link to that info ?

[sisemen]

Go to Google Earth and click on Gallery and Google Earth Community and then click on the blue "i" that comes up (there's 2 on the area in questions) - otherwise the following site is good background on K (day time sites) and Q (night time sites) - it's amazing the byways where a little research takes you. Can't find anything specific on this particular site tho'

Decoys (http://www.aviationmuseum.net/decoys.htm)

[goudie]

Over a dozen bombs were dropped on our local cemetery! Well I suppose they just wanted to make sure. Very thorough, the Germans.

[sisemen]

Seems it was the decoy for Northolt - Decoy airfield 41A

Airfield bombing decoy site listing (http://www.airfieldinformationexchange.org/community/showthread.php?8671-Airfield-bombing-decoy-site-listing)

[green granite]

Even more interesting to see which are still around now (UXBs)...


Your wish is my command:


www.ContaminatedLAND.co.uk - Where the UXB's are buried - an around-London Guide (http://www.contaminatedland.co.uk/sere-dip/estd-uxb.htm)

[November4]

Many thanks GG

Wonder if the buyers of

Back garden, 34 Hazel Grove
Front of 72/74 Warwick Gardens
126 St Anne's Road NW Kensington, W11 (front garden)

and others

were told about the extra items in their gardens? Is that something a solicitor would find on his search?

Like the comments about the concerns about the contamination of the soil etc from the bomb cases rather than the actual UXB

In Germany the bombs of course were British, however there are three main concerns arising from UXB's.

Heavy metal (Copper, Zinc etc) contamination from the bomb's casing.

Organic aromatics (Toluene, Nitrosamines, daughter products etc) contamination from the degredation of the explosive charge.

Heavy metal (Lead, Mercury) contamination from the degredation of the detonator charge.

[RedhillPhil]

A fascinating website. It's amazing that apart from one bomb, The Tower of London and Tower Bridge had close escapes!

I recently lived in St Katharine's dock, I understand that during the blitz, the water was on fire for 3 days due to a layer of naptha and oil.

My grandmothers house in EForest Gate was destroyed, must have been a terrifying time for the East Enders.....

Oft quoted from a senior fire officer on site at the height of the blitz. "Send everything we've got, the whole bloody world's on fire".

[500N]

Siseman

That is one hell of a list of decoy sights.

It obviously worked for Northolt 19 times !!!


All these dummy airfield, some pilots must have got
confused occasionally ?

[Pontius Navigator]

On jettison.

An orderly drop would have the bombs released at specific intervals to provided the greatest length to straddle a target with no gaps. A jettison is designed to get rid of the bombs as quickly as possible whilst minimising the risk of jostle. The interval could be a lot shorter.

If the bombs were dropped safe there is no absolute guarantee that they would remain safe.

[Tankertrashnav]

To answer the question posed by the OP in the thread title I have to confess - not very!

I'm in awe of the Bomber Command (and Luftwaffe) guys who managed to find their targets, particularly before the Pathfinder Force came into being. Sitting in a nice steady Hastings with the benefit of H2S and with no night fighters or flak to worry about I still managed to achieve a nine mile error (bombed the wrong reservoir dam in Yorkshire).

Still, it secured my posting to tankers and saved me from years of sitting in the black hole down the back of a tin triangle!

[green granite]

I'm in awe of the Bomber Command (and Luftwaffe) guys who managed to find their targets, particularly before the Pathfinder Force came into being.

The majority didn't in fact, from the Butt report:


Of those aircraft recorded as attacking their target, only one in three got within 5 miles [(8 kilometres)].
Over the French ports, the proportion was two in three; over Germany as a whole, the proportion was one in four; over the Ruhr it was only one in ten.
In the full moon, the proportion was two in five; in the new moon it was only one in fifteen. ...
All these figures relate only to aircraft recorded as attacking the target; the proportion of the total sorties which reached within 5 miles is less than one-third. ...

The conclusion seems to follow that only about one-third of aircraft claiming to reach their target actually reached it.[4]

That is not an attempt to belittle their courage or achievements.

[B Fraser]

Didn't the Germans use St Pauls as a target and never managed to destroy it? I don't know if a bomb ever landed close enough to do any damage.

There are a few dings in the stonework high up on the north facade.

[Fareastdriver]

Still, it secured my posting to tankers

When I was doing my Valiant course at Gaydon a senior navigator was explaining the theories of bombing to us pilots. He drew a diagram that showed that if a bomb was released during a corrective turn the bomb would fly in an arc away from the aircraft therebye increasing the error. I challenged this augument on the basis that the bomb would follow the tangent to the turning circle so would land nearer the target regardless. There then followed a long argument beteween the OCU Bombing Instructor and a U/T co-pilot.

I ended up on tankers as well.

[Green Flash]

Speaking of UXB's, there is also the SS Richard Montgomery :eek:

3,000 ton timebomb shipwrecked in the Thames estuary | Mail Online (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2195590/3-000-ton-timebomb-shipwrecked-Thames-estuary.html)

[williamp]

And these two showing plats of V1 and V2 sites:

http://farm5.staticflickr.com/4089/4997540708_ac0962db44.jpg (http://www.flickr.com/photos/22124479@N03/4997540708/)
Map Compiled at the End of the War Showing V-1 Impacts (http://www.flickr.com/photos/22124479@N03/4997540708/) by lossow.vamp (http://www.flickr.com/people/22124479@N03/), on Flickr

http://farm5.staticflickr.com/4150/4997541198_cc799855ae.jpg (http://www.flickr.com/photos/22124479@N03/4997541198/)
Map Compiled at the End of the War Showing V-2 Impacts (http://www.flickr.com/photos/22124479@N03/4997541198/) by lossow.vamp (http://www.flickr.com/people/22124479@N03/), on Flickr

[thing]

Regarding St Pauls; when it was very close to the flames on one particular night Churchill ordered that all available resources be sent to St Pauls to prevent it being gutted, as he knew what a devastating blow to morale it's loss would be. Thus ensuring that many lives/houses/industrial units were lost on that particular night.

I know we often (well let's be honest, always) knock politicians but they have to make some awful calls, I'm glad I wasn't in his shoes that day.

[clicker]

Regarding the V1 plots. Shows how many lives must have been saving by the "misinformation" fed back through the double agent spies.

I didnt know that many had fallen in Kent and Sussex, albeit quite a few might be through the wing tipping by the RAF.