Bob Jubb - Dangers of a bombing run
Transcript
I remember at one stage when the attack seemed to be aborted, we were running up on the target, and the bomb aimer had taken over as he does on the run up to what's called the bombing run. The bomb aimer gives instructions to the pilot. He says "Steady, left, left, left a bit, steady, right, right, steady, hold it, steady".
He's got control of the aircraft, and the rear gunner says to me, "Oh skipper, an enemy aircraft is about a thousand yards to the rear, port quarter, up high. "Prepare to corkscrew starboard".
At the same time, the flight engineer, standing behind me, is looking up, and he says "Oh skipper, there's an aircraft directly above". He said "I'm looking into his bomb bay. I can see the cookie", which is a 4,000 pound bomb. He said "You wanna move away from him?"
The bomb aimer is saying "Steady, steady, hold it, steady", and the rear gunner is saying "Prepare to corkscrew starboard".
It's one of those occasions when you have to make a decision. On that occasion I thought "Bugger the bomb aimer, we're gonna ruin the bombing photo, the bomb is gonna go somewhere else". I rammed on the starboard rudder, and skidded away, and at the same time the cookie came, it went between the wing and the fuselage. I could've touched it. It went wibble wobble wobble wobble, like that, down. That got rid of that.
My skidding turned away, and then I came back on the target, and by then the rear gunner said "No, he's broken away, he's broken away to port skipper". "Keep an eye on him". So on that occasion we got away with it. When we had a combat, you know, he came in from about 800 yards and opened fire.
The rear gunner says "Corkscrew starboard", so over I go, and what you do, you peel off and dive, and the aim is that when he is shooting, by then you're gonna be lower and off course, and he will not have allowed for that alteration of course but as you need to resume your journey, you've gotta, when you've dropped 500 feet, you wheel over, and pull the stick back, and regain your height again, and then resume your course again and you keep doing that with instructions from the gunners as to what the fighter is doing. The moment he lines up and comes within say 4 or 500 yards, it's time to go and just put his aim off, and you just keep corkscrewing until he gets sick of you and picks someone else.
