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RE: Name This...(142)
Posted: Wed Aug 11, 2004 2:25 pm
by drw61
I think this is a B-24, the tail is correct, but it looks smaller than I would have guessed. The turret had to retract; the B-24 had a nose wheel so an extended turret would be acting like a tail wheel on takeoffs and landings.
RE: Name This...(142)
Posted: Wed Aug 11, 2004 3:50 pm
by Simon Wagstaff
RE: Name This...(142)
Posted: Wed Aug 11, 2004 4:39 pm
by gunnergoz
The B24 ventral (belly) turret did retract for takeoff and landing. The plane was still so tail-heavy that it had a sturdy tailskid anyway. Failures to retract were rare but I seem to recall at least one belly gunner killed upon an emergency landing because he couldn't get out...but that might have been in a B-17 with the ball stuck horizontal (where the gunner can't get out).
Postwar studies showed the belly turret gunners were statistically the least likely to be KIA, possibly because it was pretty well armored in the back half that the gunner lay upon, and the big round window the aimed and looked through was "bulletproof" lexan.
RE: Name This...(142)
Posted: Wed Aug 11, 2004 4:47 pm
by I Earl
Looks to me like a very early picture of Michael Schumacher, the F1 driver or his grand father.