... that 'random' pull-out heading must have been quite stimulating in hilly/mountainous terrain, when you have a limited perspective of where you're going to be pointing?!...
Most of my work was on the coastal plain of Arakan, even the "hill" targets (into which the Japs liked to dig the bunkers we bombed) would only be about 500 ft high.
Trips across the Arakan Yomas to the Chindwin area river villages (Jap stores staging dumps - or at least Intelligence said they were) would always have the river to aim for on pull-out.
In Assam, Manipur was mostly 2,500 ft amsl - but the hills run up much higher. Even so once you'd pressed the button (and no longer had a target to bother about), you had a perfectly clear view ahead (might be a bit "greyed-out" with 'G') and would screw the aircraft round away from any mountain in front . It was only for the first seconds of pull-out that you were disoriented.
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Fareastdriver (#9014),
...On Danny's description by turning the aircraft longitudinally it follows that if there were any corrections the last part of the dive will be into wind..
True, but drift changes with loss of height. Even so, in almost all cases only one correction was needed, and never more than two. In the dry season (when we needed a minimum 10,000 ft of clear air to work), you could rely on perfect weather and light and variable winds (might be a light onshore breeze in Arakan - didn't trouble us).
In all events, when you have pulled out to 45° or so, your first priority was to slacken the pull to get down to the relative safety of the treetops ASAP, and only then start to navigate ! (and only the leader had to do that, the rest just looked for the chaps ahead and tagged-on).
Only in Akyab (where they had Bofors-type - might've been ours, left behind in '42) could you see stuff coming at you and jinked as necessary (never hit anybody
AFAIK).
Bit rough and ready, but worked well enough.
Cheers, both, Danny.