Risk of Being Shot Down as Battle of Britain Pilot - Same Odds...?

[Been There...]

I was having a discussion with someone about risks in SCUBA diving and they said:

I read an article about a statistic to do with Spitfire pilots during the Battle of Britain that went along the lines of no matter how many sorties they'd flown before, the chances (risk) of them being shot down remained the same on each flight. Their experience levels (you could argue maturity of skill and experience of the individual) didn't change the overall statistic. Yet gut feeling would tell you that the more experienced pilots had a greater chance of survival.

I personally don't believe the former statement but does anyone know of anything to either support or go against this gem?

Regards

[Chairborne 09.00hrs]

I belive this was largely true of Bomber Command, but unlikely in the BoB...

[SASless]

It would seem each flight has a 50/50 chance of that happening....either you will....or you will not be shot down.

However....just as in rolling Dice....at some point you just might "Crap" out!

[Danny42C]

From memory of the times (although not directly involved), there were two beliefs current among bomber crews:

(a) if you (or, to be exact, your pilot) survived your (his) first five 'ops', you had a good chance of getting through the next 25 (the "infant mortality" theory).

(b) As losses averaged (say) 3% per night, and the roulette wheel has no memory, your chance of survival each time were 97%, and remained the same on your last trip as on the first.

It was my good fortune to be shipped out East of Suez, where most people came back unless they were either unlucky, careless or stupid, and the foregoing considerations did not apply.

D.

[thing]

Isn't that sort of statistic cumulative though? Hence the one in three chance of getting through a Bomber Command tour?

[Danny42C]

thing,

Mathematically, '(b)' must be true. Yet the trouble was that some roulette wheels seemed to have memories, in which case the odds on the 'chop' on your last trip could be 3x30 = 90%, as you suggest. And we know that the final overall figure was almost 50% - although training accidents account for part of that - not that matters much to you, if you're one of the unlucky ones.

Was ever an analysis done of the percentage of 'chops' per (single or five-trip experience) bands, that might show a pattern ?

Really we want to have one of the old-timers here (and surely there must be some left) to tell us what sustained them through a period of mental stress such as few men are called on to endure.

D.

[thing]

Just read a very good book actually Danny by Harry Yates who flew a tour on Lancs during the war called Luck and a Lancaster. No glamour here, he tells it warts and all and how he got very twitchy towards the end.

[Lima Juliet]

Danny42C

Really we want to have one of the old-timers here (and surely there must be some left) to tell us what sustained them through a period of mental stress such as few men are called on to endure.

Whilst I do not profess to having ever been subject to such losses, I do remember early on in flying training that our instructor/course mentor exclaimed that 1 out of the 10 of us would probably not make it to our 16/38 pension point due to our chosen career. He was right and a good mate was lost. How did we all cope? Well none of us ever believed that we would be the one - some call it "denial".

Using this logic, if I were Battle of Britain or Battle of Berlin aircrew, then I would choose to believe that I would be one of the lucky ones! :ok:

LJ

PS. I have ~50hrs in the Lanc and ~100hrs in the Dakota. So my hat goes off to all WWII aircrew; low technology and speed was so much more likely to kill you in those days.

[hanoijane]

The probability of dying on a bombing trip to Germany (or of dying in any 'event' involving aeroplanes) is a simple calculation once you've defined the variables.

Probability does not vary with the number of times you expose yourself to the likelihood of an event, assuming the variables inherent in that exposure remain constant. So, you were no more likely to encounter an 88mm shell on your last trip than you were on your first, unless your first trip was to somewhere defended by myopic old men with Mausers and your last took you directly over a flak tower in Berlin.

Leon's 0.9 probability of collecting his pension is quite acceptable for a motivated individual. Should it decrease to around 0.5, most individuals - even young Leon - would likely be putting the pins in their seats and moving on to a day job with Tesco's.

[Brian Abraham]

Williamson Murray in his book "Luftwaffe" gives the following figures for Hurricane, Spitfire and BF 109 pilot losses. Luftwaffe figures in parenthesis.

xxxxxxxxxTotal Losses xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx% Loss of Pilots*
xxxxxxxxxxAll Causes
July xxxxxxxx84 (124) xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx10% (11%)
August xxxx237 (168) xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx26% (15%)
September 264 (229) xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx28% (23.1%)

* Based on number available at the beginning of the month

[MG23]

I belive this was largely true of Bomber Command, but unlikely in the BoB...

If I remember correctly, the existence of Schräge Musik weapons on German night fighters was deduced by Bomber Command statisticians who noticed that the loss rate for experienced crews had risen close to the same level as inexperienced crews, and therefore there must be something shooting them down other than the kind of flak and fighter attacks earlier in the war that experienced crews could better avoid (at least on the flight to and from the target, if not the actual bombing run).

[Mk 1]

If I remember correctly, the existence of Schräge Musik weapons on German night fighters was deduced by Bomber Command statisticians who noticed that the loss rate for experienced crews had risen close to the same level as inexperienced crews, and therefore there must be something shooting them down other than the kind of flak and fighter attacks earlier in the war that experienced crews could better avoid (at least on the flight to and from the target, if not the actual bombing run).

The other interesting statistical observation involved working out when the aircraft landed, was observing where on the airframe they were getting hit. Say if the vast majority were getting hits in the wings then the statisticians recommended that the tail and fuselage was armoured. This initially sounds bizzare - if the aircraft were getting hit in the wings - why wouldn't you armour plate them rather than the untouched fuselage and tail? The logic was that if your wings were peppered full of holes and you still made it back to base then that was OK. Obviously if your aircraft was hit in the fuselage or the tail, they were not making it back to bese to be counted - ergo the seemingly strange logic.

[Easy Street]

Danny42C,

Mathematically, '(b)' must be true. Yet the trouble was that some roulette wheels seemed to have memories, in which case the odds on the 'chop' on your last trip could be 3x30 = 90%, as you suggest.

Assuming that the chance of being shot down on any single sortie remains a constant 3%, the mathematics of probability dictate that the likelihood of surviving 30 consecutive sorties is 0.97^30, which works out at 40%. This is pretty close to the observed figure of 50%. Reverse-engineering that 50% (by taking the 30th root of 0.5) indicates an average single-sortie loss rate of 2.3%.

Sorry, don't have any useful observations on that, but thought the mathematical input would at least be of interest!

[langleybaston]

agreed. We are not talking here about the chance of not returning from a single sortie, but of not returning.

If the Met man is offered a trip to Berlin and turns it down, his chance of not making it back is zero.
If he goes along, it is say 3% or the chop rate for that trip.
If he is as mad as a hatter, he takes every ride offered throughout the war, and, reductio ad absurdem, if the war went on for ever minus a day, we would not expect him to be casting the runes or consulting the seaweed awaiting the last trumpet call.

[dubbleyew eight]

war statistics are bull****.

they are taken over the period of the entire war.
this assumes that the war was a totally uniform event from start to finish.
well it wasn't.

during periods when an enemy has superiority the probability of a pilot meeting his demise is significantly higher than at periods when the enemy is beaten into submission.

the australian RAAF lasted two weeks into the pacific war and were totally wiped out. after resupply of aircraft, primarily by the USA, they rearmed and went on to a creditable effort. the overall statistics I'm sure will give no hint of the utter demise they suffered in the first two weeks.

[500N]

Mk 1

That theory doesn't take into account the changes the Germans made
to the weapons used and that they didn't target the fuselage in case they
detonated the bomb load.

In addition, they targeted the wing fuel tanks which it was said caused
an instant fire and or explosion. So those who made it back with a heap
of holes in the wing might have given a distorted view.

But of course they didn't know that.

[langleybaston]

quote: war statistics are bull****.

Just what I wanted, a balanced and dispassionate analysis from first principles explained in simple language.

By the way, Group Captain Cheshire's surviving 100 or so missions was down in the weeds:

0.04755, about 5%.

[dubbleyew eight]

you exaggerate :E

if you read the accounts there were guys coming on line well after the BOB who flew defensive patrol after defensive patrol over homeland england and never saw a single german aircraft in all their service time.
their statistics must sway the averages to the point that numpties could say world war per se wasnt a dangerous experience.

[thing]

I believe the majority of allied fighter pilots in WWII never fired a shot in anger, never mind had a shot at an enemy a/c. Not taking anything away from them, just an observation.

[Danny42C]

It always comes down to this (as someone else said, and which I've copied ad lib), "We each had to fight the war we were given". There was no choice.

No two pilots (or anyone else) had the same war. Some thought they were going to have a soft war, but got a hard war - or vice versa. A hard war could turn soft, or a hot one hard. It was in the lap of the Gods.

It is interesting to compare the mathematical chances of survival, but at the time we were always confident of who was going to get the 'chop' - the other bloke! Not me !

I'm interested in the idea that you could pick and choose where your shots might land - unless your enemy were straight and level, and sound asleep. They should have told me about this on my Spitfire OTU in '42 ! Most ordinary chaps were delighted if they hit him at all !

I grant you, Shräge Musik was a special case. where the guns were angled so that the night fighter could come up under an unwary Lanc, which had a blind spot underneath (so they tell me). As the obvious thing for the Ju88 (or whatever) to do was to "formate" direct line astern under his victim, and the closer he tucked in, the harder he was for the rear-gunner (so they tell me) to spot, or to depress his guns if he did. He was then well placed for the cannon shells to go straight up into the wings where the engines and fuel lived.

I'd imagine that survival rates were about 0% after that.

[500N]

Danny42C

Question for you that hopefully you can answer.

I have read before that the Polish got a high number of kills because they
got closer to the enemy before opening fire.

Was / Is this true and was it clearly known at the time that this was why they
got good kill rates, as opposed to history being written after the event ?

Did you ever fly / meet with the Polish fighter pilots ?

[Mk 1]

Mk 1

That theory doesn't take into account the changes the Germans made
to the weapons used and that they didn't target the fuselage in case they
detonated the bomb load.

In addition, they targeted the wing fuel tanks which it was said caused
an instant fire and or explosion. So those who made it back with a heap
of holes in the wing might have given a distorted view.

But of course they didn't know that.

500N - perhaps I should have said "for example" rather than "say" - the reference to the fuselage vs wings was just to illustrate the logic behind the statisticians logic.

After a search I found this:

During WWII, Allied bomber losses were high, so high that the British Air Ministry undertook a rigorous analysis in hopes of finding a solution. Their engineers set out to examine every bomber they could, gathering data on each bullet hole. After analyzing the results, engineers decided to reinforce the areas that had the highest concentrations of holes with armor plating.

It didn’t work.

Perplexed, the engineers assumed that the extra plating had made the planes too heavy, and that the difficulty in handling the planes was offsetting the protection of the armor plating.

Enter Abraham Wald.


Wald, a mathematician, suggested that they simply put extra armor plating where the bullet holes weren’t. The idea was simple: if the planes are returning with bullet holes, obviously those areas can be struck without causing the planes to crash. The planes that weren’t returning, Wald theorized, are the ones that are getting hit in different areas.

The engineers’ error was so significant, statisticians decided to name it: Survivorship Bias (the tendency to include only successes in statistical analysis).

From: Solving problems of WWII bombers | MacStartup (http://www.macgetit.com/4943/solving-problems-of-wwii-bombers/)

[500N]

Mk 1

That is very interesting.

Thanks for posting.

[Brian Abraham]

Should anyone have an interest in the statistics of pilot and aircraft losses during the conflict I highly recommend Williamson Murray book "Luftwaffe".

Re BoB he says "60% of the British pilots lost were experienced aircrew, while replacements were coming from OTUs. Losses reached the point where aircrew were transferred directly from Bomber Command and cut the OTU course in half in order to get pilots out to the fighter squadrons."

At this distance we have little understanding of the loss rates, which were truly prodigious. German aircraft losses as of initial strength for the period May - September 1940 were,

Single engine fighters 57%
Twin engine fighters x94%
Bombers xxxxxxxxxxxx65%
Dive bombers xxxxxxxx50%
Transport xxxxxxxxxxx43%

Aircrew survival rates for Bomber Command 1939 - 1945 are eye watering, and you can understand their grievances re recognition.

Killed on operations xxxxxxxxxxx51%
Killed in crashes England xxxxxxx9%
Seriously injured in crashes xxxxx3%
Prisoners of war (some injured) 12%
Shot down but evaded capture x1%
Survived unharmed xxxxxxxxxxx24%

[dubbleyew eight]

brian finally some figures that show the incredible carnage of it all.

you need at least one more statistic to make the figures useful.
what was the death rate during training?
you need both ab initio training as a figure and subsequent operational preparation training as a figure.


as a historical perspective my uncle was a wellington bomber pilot. had a few successful missions under the belt in and around the italian campaign.
when the brits went all out to kill the U-boat menace in the atlantic the wellington crews practised night intercepts off europa point gibralta against a naval pinnace. evidently the searchlight in the wellie nose was controlled by a morse key on the glare shield. uncle was one of the first pilots in this training and one night in the practise attack run, leaning forward to key the light he unknowingly applied forward control pressure and in the darkness flew the wellie into the sea. all but the two rear crew were killed on impact.

deaths during training was a horrendous figure. that needs to be bought to light as well because the ww2 lessons still colour flight training today.

[MightyGem]

what was the death rate during training?
I can recall reading somewhere(possibly in an RAF Airpower article) that 10000 aircrew were killed as a result of non combat causes during the war.

[Pontius Navigator]

I do remember early on in flying training that our instructor/course mentor exclaimed that 1 out of the 10 of us would probably not make it to our 16/38 pension point due to our chosen career. He was right and a good mate was lost.

Lucky.

Our deputy course commander put the lost rate at 50% and he was right too. One of the first to go was in a Vulcan.

Leon, not as many Lanc hours as you but still had three near misses - out the astrodome, fuel starvation, and pilot error. To some extent all 3 were pilot error - same pilot.

[airborne_artist]

In the days of the Sea Vixen it was reckoned that an FAA squadron would lose two crews per commission of the embarked carrier (two years). Naval aviation was a pretty high-risk career choice in the 50s and 60s.

A girlfriend of mine had lost her father to a Sea Vixen crash in the early 60s. When she told her mum she was stepping out with a baby pilot it was made clear that she was not to see me again. She married a seaman officer who made flag rank ;)

[Danny42C]

500N,

Sorry for delay in reply, broadband trouble. I never had any fighter experience, being posted out East in '42 (where there were no Spits) straight from 57 (Spit) OTU, Hawarden (things like that happened a lot then).

Obviously, the closer the range, the better your chances of hits - provided your prey would stay still and let you ! I would suppose that he would be taking violent evasive action as you came in close, whereas you might catch him less reactive if you opened fire at 250 yds, as I think we were taught.
("Screwball" Beurling attributed his many successes to "think what deflection you need, then double it"). This was really good advice !

There is also the point that extra time spent in closing the range was more time for your attacker to be drawing a bead on you.

I met a lot of Polish pilots during the war and after (for many stayed on in the RAF): they were splendid chaps, but only flew with the odd one who turned up on a RAF unit. For myself, I would tend to doubt that there was much overall difference between the score-rates of various nationalities. Luck paid such an overwhelming part, in any case.

Cheers, Danny.

[500N]

Danny

"("Screwball" Beurling attributed his many successes to "think what deflection you need, then double it"). This was really good advice !"

I use the same theory when shooting ducks and Geese,
that always look like they are flying sower than they are !


Which brings me to another question, more to do with Bomber gunners.

I have heard a couple of times that an Australian taught Aerial gunnery
to Bomber gunners during WWII and he used the "Black Duck theory
of shooting (or gunnery",

This equates to his history of shooting Black ducks and having to
give them plenty of lead like you mentioned deflection.

I have never found a reference to it so just thought I'd ask if you
- or anyone else on this thread - had heard of it.

Anyway, thanks for your time.

[thing]

I can recall reading somewhere(possibly in an RAF Airpower article) that 10000 aircrew were killed as a result of non combat causes during the war.

My great uncle was one of them. Navigator on an Albemarle (bloody awful aircraft) span in when they lost a donk on take off.

When you say 10,000 it's a number. I have the telegrams and associated stuff that go with it, every one of them was a personal loss.

Stalin said something along the lines of 'The loss of a million men is a statistic, the loss of one man is a tragedy.'

[Mk 1]

Stalin said something along the lines of 'The loss of a million men is a statistic, the loss of one man is a tragedy.'
Unusually thoughtful for a man who is thought to have been responsible for the deaths of between 4 and 10 'statistics'.:eek:

[Brewster Buffalo]

In 1942 some data was calculated of the percentage chance of survival of one and two tours on various types of RAF aircraft.
Best rate was the Catalina 77% one tour and 60% two tours
Worst torpedo bomber 17% and 3%

For heavy and medium bombers the %'s were 44% and 19%

[thing]

Unusually thoughtful for a man who is thought to have been responsible for the deaths of between 4 and 10 'statistics

Kill one man and you're a murderer.

Kill 100 men and you're a mass muderer.

Kill a million men and you're a great leader.

[hanoijane]

thing:

What Stalin actually said - according to Stephen Goranson who has researched this quote - when talking about a famine in the Ukraine was;

"If only one man dies of hunger that is a tragedy. If millions die, that's only statistics."

As Simeon Strunsky so astutely observed;

"Famous remarks are very seldom quoted correctly."

[caiman27]

Aircrew survival rates for Bomber Command 1939 - 1945 are eye watering, and you can understand their grievances re recognition.

Killed on operations xxxxxxxxxxx51%
Killed in crashes England xxxxxxx9%
Seriously injured in crashes xxxxx3%
Prisoners of war (some injured) 12%
Shot down but evaded capture x1%
Survived unharmed xxxxxxxxxxx24%

Even these statistics are somewhat misleading as it includes those who were in training or just getting started operationally in 1945. At that point in time there was a much lower chance of being shot down as the Germans were close to fuel depletion and were rapidly running out of places to fly from. I have no idea if the data still exists but it strikes me that a set of survival rates for those that flew through the thick of it would be considerably worse than those given.

[MAINJAFAD]

The Most Dangerous Enemy by Stephen Bungay has excellent research into the causes of aircraft losses on both sides during the first phase of the battle and gives good insight into the problems that Fighter Command had in the later phases (I haven't got my copy to hand, but here are some of the conclusions from memory).

You were more likely to survive if you were flying a Spitfire than a Hurricane, the main reason for this (besides the Spitfire's better performance), was the fact that a shell from low muzzle velocity cannon on the Bf 109E tended to explode on contact with the skin of the Spitfire fuselage and would not normally kill the pilot, while on the Hurricane, it would penetrate all the way to the armoured plate behind the pilot where it would explode and the armour wouldn't always save the pilot. The other problem the Hurricane had was it very easily caught fire due to its method of construction and the location of the wing fuel tanks. What would be a few random holes in a Spitfire would result in the loss of the airframe if it was a Hurricane. The only thing that the Hurricane had in its favour was the majority of the Luftwaffe fighter pilots had great distain for the aircraft and got careless when engaging them, normally then to suffer when the Hurricane pilots got the better of them in a turning fight.

In the first month of the battle, the biggest cause of lost RAF fighter airframes and fatal aircrew losses was flying accidents (around 25%), one of the major reasons for this was Dowding's attempt to build up a night fighting capability in the command using single engine fighters.

The major problem in late August through to mid September was caused by Dowding having to rotate Squadrons into 11 Group to replace units that were burnt out and required a break. Dowding left it to the Group commanders to sort out who went where and in the case of the Squadrons from 10 and 13 Groups, Saul and Brand sent Squadron that had some knowledge of what was happening in 11 Group's area and they got good kill / loss ratios. The Squadrons sent by 12 Group, totally different story, they still used close formation Vic's and Area Fighting tactics and suffered heavy losses to bounces by Bf 109's for very few kills (66 Sqn's first day of combat on 7th September 1940 resulted in five lost aircraft for zero kills. Likewise 616 Squadron lost half their strength in a few days for very few kills). It was during this period (first two weeks of September) that the Luftwaffe got some of their best kill loss ratios.

The 303 Squadron boys are a special case, as technically they were the most combat experienced unit to enter the battle when they did. Most of the Squadron's officers had been Squadron or flight commanders in the Polish Air Force pre war, they had seen combat against the Luftwaffe in Sept 1939 and May/June 1940 and thus knew what worked and what didn't (i.e. Area Fighting tactics) before they entered the battle in late Aug 1940.

[Brian Abraham]

caiman27, the figures given are for the entire duration of the war. As you say the loss rates varied from time to time, and particular raids. One night good, the very next horrendous. You can draw your own conclusions from the tables produced by the Air Ministry War Room (Statistical Section) in PRO AIR 22/203, War Room Manual of Bomber Command Ops 1939 - 1945.

The first figure is the number of aircraft present for duty on frontline squadrons as of January for the particular year, and the figure in parenthesis is the number written off for that year.
xxxxxxxxxxxx1941 xxxx1942xxxxxxx 1943xxxxxxx 1944
Wellington 275 (463) 374 (743) x 186 (328) x 15 xx (22)
Mosquito xxxxxxxxxxxxx 5 x(30) xx 34 x (62) x116 x(223)
Stirling xxxxx 7 x(51) x 52 (228) x 93 x (411) 134 xx (77)
Halifax xxxxxx3 x(38) xx46 (249) 195 xx(838) 307 x (902)
Lancaster xxxxxxxxxxxx 20 (202) 256 (1,112) 652 (1,978)

[finestkind]

Statistics like photo’s never lie. Please forgive the throw away comment. Loss rates and scores are all relative to numerous variables. The theatre of ops, the time of ops, the time of development. As such in total agreement with dubblyeyew eight.

BOB. As all were newbies at the start, apart from the BOF boys who were very war weary at this time, and given the poor development of tactics at the start everyone was in with the same chances. Give it a few plus weeks with tactics developed and expanded SA your chances of survival rose. Give it another few plus weeks and the continual tempo and fatigue setting in your chances dropped. Not quite as low as the newbie but only because when you got yourself in place were you shouldn’t have been you had the experience to get out.

The Corsair had an 11.1 kill ratio. Entered ops at the time that was the pivotal point for Japan. What was the kill ratio in 1943 and what was it in 1945. Although stat’s are stat’s would this have been the case if only ops in 1943 were used?

To many variables to consider overall statistics for the war to be an accurate representation. How many did Bomber Command loose in 1940 compared to 1942 or 1943?

[GeeRam]

I have read before that the Polish got a high number of kills because they
got closer to the enemy before opening fire.

This was certainley true of many of the high scoring Luftwaffe pilots, and was very much the preferred technique of Erich Hartmann in scoring his 352 aerial victories.

[thing]

What Stalin actually said - according to Stephen Goranson who has researched this quote - when talking about a famine in the Ukraine was;

"If only one man dies of hunger that is a tragedy. If millions die, that's only statistics."

As Simeon Strunsky so astutely observed;

"Famous remarks are very seldom quoted correctly."

Point taken, words incorrect, same point made though. How do you know Goranson got it right?

[hanoijane]

thing,

Oh, I don't. I was simply telling you what I believe to be true. I could be wrong. It happens.

Anyway, I took your point. Every death is a tragedy, whether you happen to be the first or the millionth.

Sorry to hear about your great uncle. I'm sure he was loved and missed.

[Brian Abraham]

How many did Bomber Command loose in 1940 compared to 1942 or 1943The 1940 figure is not included, but you can see from the above the total figures for Bomber Command are

1941 1,326
1942 1,789
1943 2,823
1944 3,238

finestkind, re survival, the German experience was that only eight of their 107 fighter pilots who scored more than 100 victories joined their squadrons after mid 1942. Those who had survived the attrition of the first air battles, and honed their skills, had little difficulty defeating new Allied pilots. As the war progressed the German pilots were receiving progressively less and less training prior to being thrust into combat. With Allied fighters ranging over Europe in the later stages, even German ab initio students became targets while on training flights.

[Load Toad]

In reading I've done it should be noted:
- The Germans could only end a tour if they died or were incapacitated
- The Germans often loaded up on kills against very inexperienced pilots and / or in inferior machines (early in the war esp in Russia)
- The Germans (wrongfully) promoted the concept of the master hunter / ace and 'lesser' pilots acted to protect the ace who went after the kills.
- Some German pilots reportedly felt they were merely cannon fodder whilst these aces got the glory.

[rolling20]

I am late on this one, but here goes. No debate about Bomber Command losses is complete without the work of Freeman Dyson, who went straight from Winchester to the Operational Research Section of Bomber Command. He is by the way still alive. He computed that by taking all the turrets out of bombers, along with their gunners, would increase their speed by some 50mph. The Lanc would therefore have cruised at about 250mph with a top speed of around 340mph. This would have made them much more difficult a target for the Me110s and Ju88s ,which along with Lichenstein radar and Scharge Musik, were a lot slower than their designers originally intended. Indeed Night fighter ace Peter Spoden stated the Me110 was a `heavy ship`. So what did Arthur Harris do? Absolutely nothing. It was decided that it was better to have the turrets in place for the basis of morale. Also the production lines were all geared up for turrets. Harris did towards the end of the war equip some Lancs with .5 inch rear turrets. This was done on his own initiative with the firm of Roses in Gainsborough Linconshire.

Dyson was also concerned with the poor survival rate from Lancs. He estimated 10,000 crewmen lost their lives due to the main hatch being some two inches narrower than in other bombers. Yet again nothing was done until it was too late and the war was almost over. We have to remember that this was total war. The losses they suffered night after night, would not be acceptable now. Back then armour plate was ripped out to increase bomb load at the expense of crew survival. All that mattered to Harris, his Group Commanders and Squadron Commanders was Tonnage! There were tonnage ladders and a Squadron was judged on bombs dropped, not the least number of losses. Some crews went through a tour never firing a shot in anger, others lasted all but one mission. As an example of how experience did not necessarily ensure survival: On 1.1.44 156 Squadron (Pathfinders) lost four out of 18 despatched to Berlin (some 22%) including two Flight Commanders who had amassed 118 sorties between them.

[ShotOne]

Contrary to intuition, skill had very little to do with survival rate. It really was mostly down to which coloured light the Luftwaffe controller decided to vector his (often her!) fighter on to. In my opinion the Air Staff were well aware of this and instituted the bomber "stream" as a calculated and effective way of improving the odds but were keen to avoid saying as much to the crews, hence the reluctance to ditch the gunners and turrets.