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  • Bombing as a Mathematical Problem

    Until it is released, a bomb travels through the air with the same forward velocity as the airplane, and this velocity relative to the air is called true air speed. The instant the bomb is released, four factors act on it: 1) true air speed; 2) gravity; 3) air resistance; and 4) wind. Calculating

  • Strategic Bombing: Victory Through Air Power

    To avoid another long and bloody war like World War I, the U.S. Army Air Forces' leaders in the 1930s planned to use strategic bombing to destroy the enemy's factories, power supplies and transportation facilities. Without weapons, the enemy could not fight, and the war would be ended quickly.During

  • WWII Pierced Steel Planking

    The PSP landing mats under the Type F-1A heater and the Bell P-39Q aircraft represent the most commonly used form of World War II prefabricated runway material. They could be joined together with hand tools and provided a hard runway surface even suitable for bombers, where lack of time, materials

  • Type F-1A Utility Heater

    The Type F-1A heater, built by the Herman Nelsen Corp., is a World War II-era portable gasoline-powered unit designed to produce a steady flow of heated air. The Army Air Forces used it in cold climates to pre-heat aircraft and motor vehicle engines for easy starting, and to heat crew compartments,

  • The Four Chaplains

    Heroism and Interfaith in Icy WatersIn April 1941, the United States and Denmark signed an agreement pledging the U.S. to defend Greenland from invasion. It allowed the U.S. to build military bases in Greenland, which President Franklin D. Roosevelt stated was critical to defending the Western

  • Civilian Pilot Training Program

    In the 1930s several European nations built up their air forces in part by training civilians as pilots in anticipation of possible conflict. In the United States, a similar program, known as the Civilian Pilot Training Program (CPTP) began in 1938. President Franklin D. Roosevelt supported the

  • Link Trainer

    Crude pilot training aids had been designed even before World War I, but none had any significant training value. Edwin A. Link provided a giant step forward when in 1931 he received a patent on his "pilot maker" training device. He had perfected his design in the basement of his father's piano and

  • Shooting the Sun: Navigators

     Following preflight training, navigation cadets went to flying school, where they spent from 15-20 weeks. Emphasis was placed on precision dead-reckoning navigation with basic proficiency in radio and celestial navigation. A navigation cadet logged approximately 100 hours in the air and about 500

  • Forging Combat Pilots: Transition Training

    The successful completion of pilot training was a difficult and dangerous task. From January 1941 to August 1945, 191,654 cadets who were awarded pilot wings. However, there were also 132,993 who "washed out" or were killed during training, a loss rate of approximately 40 percent due to accidents,

  • Winning Their Wings: Advanced Flying School

    Advanced flying school prepared a cadet for the kind of single- or multi-engine airplane he was to fly in combat. Those who went to single-engine school flew AT-6s for the first 70 hours during a nine-week period, learning aerial gunnery and combat maneuvers and increasing their skills in