Interesting Numbers

[Hard Sarge]

the first night in the battle of Hamburg

103 Squadron flew 27 planes

5475 men would take part as crew members

484 men on other missions

1,454 tons of HE would be loaded

along with 1,006 tons of incendiaries

26,858 30 pounders

327,250 4 pounders

the raid would use 1,300,000 gallons of fuel

[denisonh]

I assume that is 103 squadrons with 27 planes EACH

Cause that would represent a whole lot of sorties to drop that kind of ordinance otherwise......

[Hard Sarge]

no
103 Squadron of 1 group, flew 27 planes on this mission, odd 2 were shot down out side of the window stream

ahhhh

879 total took off for all missions this night

792 for the raid

[Hard Sarge]

figures

Lanc I and III carried between 9,840-13,280
Lanc II 7,600-9,200
Halli II and V, 5,960-7,960
Stirling I and III, 4,788-5,136
Wellies, 2,640-4,000

based on AF and fuel load needed

[Hard Sarge]

how the pathfinders worked in this attack

00:57 20 Blind Markers drop 2 yellow markers and 16 flares
30 non-markers (crews in training, not ready for marking duties,and help protect markers as they enter the target area) drop HE and Flares

00:58-01:00 8 Visual Markers each drop 5 red Markers

01:02 first wave starts there bomb run

Blind Markers are to light up the area around the Aiming point, so the Visual Markers can see and find the target, Main force is to bomb on Red first, Yellow second

only HE is carried, no fires allowed to be started before raid starts

[RyanCrierie]

Is this from Martin Middlebrooks' Battle of Hamburg?

[Hard Sarge]

yes

[zoul]

Fantastic book. This is an excellent serie. My favorites are hambourg and battle of berlin.