Skip to content

Comment on Put armor where there aren't bullet holesparent

Comments

Think of the scale. 40,000 US/British planes were lost or damaged beyond repair, nevermind the ones that got a few bullet/flack holes and survived - most planes every mission. Thousands of planes would meet for a single bombing run. One mission would give you a good enough sample.

Steve Blank's presentation is great on this topic and radar: http://www.slideshare.net/sblank/computer-history-museum-112...

Also note that between 5 and 20% of the planes didn't come back from each mission. How many more were damaged every run? Most? 15,000 flak cannons protected Europe, many of them radar guided/aimed. Strategic bombing was an incredibly crappy job: you died more often than a Marine in the Pacific.

AboutSource Built by g1lg1l

Hackerly is an independent reader for Hacker News, built on the public HN API. Not affiliated with Y Combinator.