“They used to fly into our local airport for the CAF shows. You could hear them miles away. Always thought the same thing about what a 1000 plane raid sounded like. Not sure the Germans would have needed radar to know they were coming.”
Circa WWII a weatherman gave the pilots their weather briefing and ended it with “Aluminum overcast.”
PS I in the past flew out of Norfolk as a passenger commercial back in the seventies. It was near a once USA Army Air Force base of WWII. In the hall they had pictures of those air crews. They were kids. The “old man” in the front left seat would be in his early twenties. They were kids but they were giants!
When I learned to fly in England one of my instructors was a kind and gentle man. He was a Lancaster pilot in WWII. He related a most amusing story. He was not 21 years of age and flew Lancaster’s and bombed Germany. He was not old enough to drive a car in England. He said, “My majesty’s government would give me a Lancaster to bomb Germany but would not let me drive a car off base.”
As mentioned he was a kind and gentle man. His backbone was made of iron. Students that were a little bit nervous were given to him as was I. His kind and expert guidance soon set us straight. He was an outstanding gentleman and instructor. Post WWII he became a teacher and headmaster, which is a principal to us. His students were most lucky to have a man such as him.
We always called him, “Mr. Frank.”
My dad was 22 when he went to England.