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Lancaster bomber crew names11/4/2022 ![]() ![]() It was open on a page containing the names which started with the letter “P.” “What a coincidence,” I thought, but without a doubt, it ended there. As I got nearer to the book, I stopped abruptly. I approached the Second World War Book, hoping to engage my students about the significance of the lists. Every day at 11:00 am, the pages are turned, to reveal a new list of 90 or so names in each book. The name of every soldier who perished fighting for Canada since Confederation is in one of the seven books. On the second floor, we found ourselves in the Memorial Chamber, which contains The Books Of Remembrance. After attending a session of the House of Commons, we walked up to the Peace Tower, the iconic bell and clock edifice, which was built as a memorial to commemorate Canada’s war dead. While a high school history teacher, I organized a student field trip to Ottawa to give my students an opportunity to visit our federal government and national museums. I knew I was destined to write this story after an incident on Parliament Hill in 1969. It is also a story of sorrow that explores the heartbreaking impact of his death on his family, when he, like so many other young men, did not return home. It is a story about youth and hope as we follow his journey from a carefree and somewhat entitled rookie pilot to the generous and proud captain of a Lancaster crew. Peppered with his amusing sense of humour, his letters covey a very personal and colourful narrative, ranging from tales of his Air Force training, the events of the war, the people he cared about, and the issues that bothered him. What makes this pilot’s story unique is that it is told in his youthful voice, selected from 150 letters he wrote home. There are many compelling stories written by veterans about Bomber Command. I have now completed a biography of his life primarily based on letters he wrote home. The actual bombing runs caused far more death and destruction below than they experienced at altitude.For years I have been posting a photo memorial (see Remembrance Day, 2017) to my uncle, Donald Plaunt, who was killed in the Second World War. LANCASTER BOMBER CREW NAMES FULLCrews that fulfilled 30 missions received a full military commission. Half of all Lancaster crews were shot down. LANCASTER BOMBER CREW NAMES SKINEnemy fighters cut swathes through the air, flak brought down aircraft or sent hot glowing shrapnel arcing through the skin of the plane and killing or maiming anyone inside, or setting off fires in the munitions or fuel storage. The crews flew for three or four hour before reaching their respective targets when all hell broke loose. At 30,000 feet the crew had to have heated suits to avoid hypothermia. Missions started general after dark and the crew huddle into their positions as it climbed up into the atmosphere. There was gunner who manned the upper turret in mid fuselage, there was a gunner who manned the rear machine guns and two people operated the bomb bay doors. The pilot sat on the left in a raised seat and the engineer had a collapsible seat and workstation. Over the bomb bay the pilot and flight engineer sat side by side. Or he could sit up and look through the bubble canopy and help the navigator negotiate the way to and out of targets. He often laid prone below that gun to use the bomb aiming gear. It could reach 45,000 feet altitude, travel at just under 300 miles per hours and go 1500 miles on one tank of gas.Īt the nose of the plane was a bubble canopy view window and firing station for Browning twin. The Lancaster was piloted and operated by a crew of 7. Lancasters were used to drop food for people trapped and running out of provisions. The Lancasters also used quite a suite of electronic warfare equipment for example acting as pathfinder aircraft marking bomb targets jamming enemy radars: rear looking radars and the Oboe radar location tracking system that kept crews from getting lost. The bombing packages were quite precise and crews used to for exact missions, incendiaries around factories, redoubt reduction, anti heavy industry bomb packages and even port mining. It was the various bomb loads that the crews prepared the Lancaster for that made it unusual in the war. The Lancaster was used for deploying the anti dam bouncing bombs in the Ruhr. It was the foresight of designers that made the Lancaster a great test bed for new anti submarine technology and other battlefield roles. The Lancaster aircraft built by Avro in the UK was the workhorse night bomber during the war to stop the Nazis. Lancasters also carried the 22,000 pound Grand Slam bombs, the largest non nuclear bombs carried in the entire war. They were one of the simplest most successful aircraft designs of world war II It featured a multipurpose and massively large bomb bay that accommodated devastating weaponry from 4000 pound bombs to 12000 pound tallboys meant to bust bunkers. ![]()
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