Comments by "Big Blue" (@bigblue6917) on "The Drydock - Episode 203" video.

  1. There was a reported blue on blue for a coastal command aircraft sink a RN submarine during WW2. The submarine was on the surface and near the British coast when it was spotted by the aircraft. There was a RN submarine which was to have transited that area but should have been clear of it by that time. The aircraft's captain believe that was not the a RN submarine but a German U-Boat decided to attack. They attacked the the submarine which was hit and then rolled over and sank. When he got back he reported the sinking but there was a problem. It turned out the RN submarine was reported missing. There was an enquiry where the pilot pointed out that the submarine he had sunk had a rust hull below the waterline whereas the RN submarine was new which meant there would have been no rust. His problem was that when it rolled over he was the only one who saw the the bottom of the submarine so no one else could confirm what he saw. He was court-martialled which ended his flying career. Skip bombing could be as dangerous for the aircraft and its crew as it was the enemy. One problem was that the first skip of bomb could skip higher then the hight it was dropped at. More than one aircraft was destroyed when it was hit by its own bomb which had skipped back up and hit the aircraft. And even near misses could cause some consternation especially to the tail gunner of one aircraft as it passed so close the airman claimed he could have reached out and touched it as it went passed. As to the ends of gun barrels being polished. There is a post WW2 story of senior British officer who insisted that all the artillery guns under his command, 25 pounders I believe, had the paint of the first six inches from the end of the barrel removed and polished when on parade. Whether it happened or not I do not know. But in the version I was told the barrels were brass which had to be polished every day. This leads me to think that if the story was true then we are looking at some sort of cap rather than brass as to the best of my knowledge the barrel of the 25 pounder was not made of brass. The thing that makes me doubt it is true is the fact that the gun had a muzzle brake. Which was not brass either.
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