Pontius, Freeman Dyson again. He and members of his team (Mike O'Loughlin) found that the Lancaster main escape hatch was 2 inches smaller than the Halifax. This he estimated cost 10,000 lives! They tried to get Bomber Command to address the issue, but the war was practically over by the time they did. He came to the conclusion Bomber Command just didn't care. (Although Harris did try to implement changes, I guess it comes back to what I mentioned earlier Officialdoms reticence to interrupt production)
The Halifax was a lot sturdier in construction. The Lancaster had a tendency to break up in flight, one of the reasons why 68% of Lancaster losses had no survivors. 25% of shot down Halifax crews survived, compared with 15% of Lancasters.
Last edited by rolling20; 6th Jul 2015 at 14:20.