Aerial gunnery on '50s night fighter squadrons (part one)

From the early ’40s to the middle ’50s, the standard RAF fighter armament was 4x20mm Hispano cannon, as in this Mosquito NF36

On a squadron there was considerable emphasis on gunnery which took the form of various exercises. First cine, which used the standard gun camera which was a 16mm cine camera running at half normal speed..On a night fighter squadron this generally took the form of the standard high quarter attack. In this the target flew straight and level and the fighter positioned slightly ahead of the target about 1000 ft above and 1000 yards off on one side. From here a steep diving turn was made towards the target, and as it crossed ahead, the turn was reversed and a normal curve of pusuit attack made. The gun button was pressed when the pilot judged he was at the correct range and had the target correctly positioned.

The Mosquito had a simple ring gun sight as discussed in an earlier thread, and it was necessary for the pilot to judge the “lead”, or distance the pip was laid ahead of the target, in order to hit the target. Anyone who has used a shot gun against flying birds will know what I mean. In fact we had a skeet range where pilots could practice with a shotgun and get the idea of “pulling the gun through the target”. The lead was assessed in “rads”, i.e. radii of the gunsight ring, which depended upon the angle off. Plenty of this practise enabled the pilots to get the feel of the job.

The gunnery officer had the unenviable task of assessing the resultant film. This entailed running it frame by frame to check if (a) fire was opened at the correct range, and (b) the correct lead had been alllowed. It was also impressed on pilots that the aircraft had to be correctly flown in this attack turn, no skid or slip, the needle and ball had to stay dead centre. If that was not done then the chances of hitting the target were slim.

When the squadron changed to the Meteor NF the task was made easier for all, because they were equipped with a gyro stabilised gunsight. Provided the pip was kept on the target and the aircraft was properly flown then the exercise was much easier to assess and the pilot did not have to do his mental “rads” calculation.

Incidentally in the Mosquito the guns recoiled against a semi bulkhead immediately below the cockpit floor, so if the nav kept his feet on the floor he could feel the recoil strongly, see diagram below

A Beaufighter was used to tow targets for live gunnery which was much more interesting and there was considerable rivaly between the pilots as to who could make the most holes in the sleeve they towed. Incidentally four aircraft fired against one target taking turns as directed by the tug pilot. The solid rounds (ball ammo) fired had their noses dipped in coloured paint with a different colour for each of the four attackers. Firing had to cease when the “angle off”, i.e. that between the target track and fighter track, was less than 30 degrees. This was to ensure that rounds did not ricochet off the target and hit the tug.

On the arrival of the Meteor each squadron had one or two aircraft modified to tow the standard “flag” target. This was a woven polypropylene or similar sheet about 20 ft long and 6 ft deep. It was kept upright by a length of scaffold pole threaded through the front which had a heavy cylindrical weight at one end and a metal disc at the other. This was attached to a hook at the rear of the ventral fuel tank on the Meteor and the tug towed this off the runway on about 500 yards of cable.