George Preddy, six in one day

George Preddy claimed six Bf 109s shot down on a single mission setting a record for the US 8th Air Force. This documentary attempts to visualize what that mission might have been like using the words of George Preddy as told by the authors of the referenced book.

References: “George Preddy Top Mustang Ace, The complete combat biography of a 27-victory ace”, Joe Noah & Samuel L. Sox Jr., 1991

Disclaimers
- George Preddy didn't use the K-14 gunsight until the month after this mission
- Can't do external fuel tanks or 4-engine bombers with the Great Battles flight sim
- The photo of the 486th FS (not 485th), PZ sqn code was taken on 20 Jun 1944.
- P-51B "Frances B, Too!" should have serial number 43-6754

My setup: IL-2 Great Battles, Battle of Bodenplatte (Combat Flight Simulator) version (Mar 2022). Windows 10, HP Z440 desktop PC with six Intel Xeon 3.5 GHz processor cores, 16 GB RAM, 1 TB hard drive, 118 GB SSD (unused). NVidia GTX1660 graphics card. 1920 x 1080 pixels/frame x 30 frames/sec converted to 4K mp4 for upload then converted to Youtube 4K with VP09 encoder (~"1080p" x 30 f/s).
Logitech Extreme 3D Pro joystick, TrackIR Head Tracker.

[knightwolf]

Gosh, all the hours of work it must have taken to make this video! Thanks so much for sharing!

[antoargu]

Fantastic work and tribute to the man, really like those Blue nose Bastards schemes, cheers

[JeffsAirplaneCabinet]

I updated this video, which was originally published on 5 May 2022, to get a little more 4K resolution to try to see those "tiny dots", to shorten it and to improve the P-51 aircraft skins. Some of the previous comments are pasted below.

Mai Mai toca Amazing story! What a time it must been to live And fight through.

Scott Oliver
In the spirit of the North Carolinian 26th Infantry Regiment 1863. A Tarheel fo sho.

Dan Stewart
Where are the drop tanks?
@JeffsAirplaneCabinet
Unfortunately IL-2 Great Battles doesn't have an option for drop tanks.

The Ghost of

The Idaho Traveler
yes another one! I love your little movies bro and especially when your camera is about 50 to 100 meters Zoomed out. then do a slow motion close up so you can see exactly where the bullets are going

The Idaho Traveler
at 8 mins what is your altitude?
@JeffsAirplaneCabinet
29, 250 ft (9000 m). The top cover squadron is about a thousand feet higher.

@ricardocorbie6803 • Dec 2022
What a man!! Rest In Peace Ancient Warrior!! Thanks for your sacrifice!! Gone but never forgotten

@amyrichard3203 • Jan 2023
Good thing Preddy had a great aircraft and many German aces were no longer around after four years of war.

@Firstbaptisttulelake • Nov 2022
Great story and video.

@JeffsAirplaneCabinet • Nov 2022
Thanks. George Preddy had a reputation as an aggressive pilot who maybe was fearless to the point of recklessness. I was surprised by the story Bill Whisner told about Preddy ignoring his warnings about flak and having his P-47 downed by it over the North Sea. Sounds like Preddy was a complicated guy. Seems like his squadron leader John Meyer who could be a disciplinarian maybe looked the other way in Preddy's case and was very supportive and fond of him.

@jwardroper • Feb 2023
You dont move the surfaces of the rudder ect, the enemy can guess your moves that way, according to captain w e johns

@scottinohio701 • Aug 2023
If Im not mistaken, Preddy was crdited with 22 NOT 27!!!!
@JeffsAirplaneCabinet
In the book "Top Mustang Ace", the appendix shows five scoring sources for Preddy. Scores range from 25.83 to 28.5 aerial victories. George also claimed five aircraft destroyed on the ground. The last source, Study 85, shows 26.83 aerial victories. A new cross was added to George's aircraft for each victory or shared victory, aerial or ground. His claim of three Ju 88s on July 18th was reduced to two (USAF Credits for the destruction of Enemy Aircraft, World War II).
@scottinohio701
That would make him the leading American ace in the ETO!!! Gabreski was no 1 with 28 and Johnson was no 2 with 27!!! What he claimed and what he was awarded are 2 different
@JeffsAirplaneCabinet
ETO aces were ranked by aerial victories and Preddy was ranked #3.
@scottinohio701
YES!!! 7 of the top ten American aces in the ETO flew P-47s includding the top

[bueshirt]

The Picture of the P-51 Mustangs in D-Day markings was taken at Debden Airfield in July 1944. They flew with the 4th Fighter Group on a shuttle mission to Russia.

[Mike-]

John C Meyer got 21 shoot downs only 2 less then Preddy not many videos about him. He passed away in the 1970's from a heart attack.

[DrumBob]

You pictured a Mustang firing what amounted to an 18 second burst. That likely never would have happened in real life WWII air combat. Bursts of 1-5 seconds were most common. Also, Preddy was a member of the 428th Fighter Squadron. In addition, I believe the number of kill markings on Preddy's plane is incorrect for the time.

[anonymous]

P-51B/C did not have N-9 gunsights, but they had the earlier N-3 sights.