On some occassions, a fighter pilot was rescued by the simple method of one one of his mates coming down and landing, the pilot getting out, the rescuee getting in then the pilot sitting on his lap and flying home. I am aware of this happening in a Hurricane on one occassion and also once involving Mustangs.
How many other times that you know of, did this happen ?
Over to you
Cheers
Gary
By: geedee - 4th February 2003 at 18:53
RE: Sit on my lap rescues
Queue smutty inuendoes about cockpits and the size of joysticks…
Seriously, thanks for the info guys, much appreciated.
Cheers
Gary
By: Moggy C - 4th February 2003 at 18:14
RE: Sit on my lap rescues
Er….
Willingly.
It’s just that Mrs Moggy… er…
Sorry got to go, footsteps on the stairs, I’ll try and
By: Snoopy - 4th February 2003 at 17:11
RE: Sit on my lap rescues
Moggy, I’m truly concerned. This is a matter of great interest and importance, in the study of aeronautics and aviation history. You really must find some way to overcome this constraint, and continue your research …
By: Moggy C - 4th February 2003 at 09:50
RE: Sit on my lap rescues
I believe all these myths and legends should be thoroughly researched.
In my younger days, as a very enthusiastic PPL, I did suggest to some of my more comely female passengers that we should experiment with this and see if it was feasible.
Not having any warbirds to hand my projected mount was the justly famed PA38 Tomahawk, which if you think about it is really a halfway house between a P38 Lightning and a P40, Give or take a vowel.
Unfortunately I never did find a young lady to sit on my lap in the aircraft. Indeed as I recall I had an uphill struggle to find young ladies to sit on my lap anywhere.
Ho Hum 🙁
Moggy
By: Snoopy - 3rd February 2003 at 20:22
RE: Sit on my lap rescues
[updated:LAST EDITED ON 03-02-03 AT 08:24 PM (GMT)]Gary:
There was a thread discussing these a few months ago — now archived, but still accessible, at:
http://www.keymags.co.uk/cgi-bin/dcforum/dcboard.cgi?az=read_count&om=9…
That was specifically prompted by a Spitfire case, but there are references to others including Mustangs. Enjoy,
Snoopy
By: Ant.H - 3rd February 2003 at 20:04
RE: Sit on my lap rescues
Hi Gary,
This kind of thing happened quite a bit during the war years.There are a number of cases in Europe where an American pilot would land and pick up a downed wingman,and at one time it was even approved of and a fuss made in the media back Stateside.In reality,such an undertaking was pretty risky,as there was a chance that the landing site would not be as kosher as it looked from the air,the possible result being capture (or death) of two pilots instead of just the one.
There was an incident in 1944 where a Mustang pilot tried to pick up his downed buddy from a field in Germany.Unfortunately the Mustang became bogged down and they were unable to take off.The almost new Mustang was captured intact,along with both occupants.It was this incident,along with a number of other close shaves,which lead the USAAF to make ‘pick-me-ups’ a court marshal offence.One pilot,again in a Mustang,picked his buddy up and brought them both home successfully.This was only days after AAF command had made it a court marshal offence,and the pilot was not aware of it until he was taken into custody!If I remember right,he got away with nothing more than a ticking off,but it was rather ironic considering that medals had been dished out for similar actions only six months before.
I don’t know too much about similar things happenning in other air forces,but there was one incident which Johnnie Johnson related in ‘Wing Leader’ about a Typhoon pilot who baled out of his fully functional aircraft into the channel to try and save his shot-down CO who he could see having difficulty down in the drink.The remaining Typhoons circled as long as thier fuel state allowed but had to leave the area before a rescue launch could reach the downed pair.Nothing was ever found of the two Tiffie pilots.
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February 3, 2003 at 6:38 pm