Carrier Night Actions in WW2 - What you can't see can still hurt you

Today we look at some key highlights in Allied night-time carrier operations in WW2 to determine the problems involved with night-flying and some of the solutions used.

Sources:
RADIO AIDS TO HOMING AND BLIND APPROACH OF NAVAL AIRCRAFT - D.Quinn, 1947

[Big_E_Soul_Fragment]

I remember that one episode of Battle 360 where the pilots were telling the story of how the ships lit up the sky with their search lights to guide them to the carriers during the Battle of the Philippine Sea
"Home is that way"
Brings tears to my eyes

[charlesgoodrich]

My father was a dive bomber pilot on the Essex and told me some of the problems in pre-dawn operations. They wore special goggles during the early morning briefings prior to getting in their planes before dawn, to prevent night blindness. He lost a friend when the brakes failed or weren't applied and his airplane just rolled off the bow of the ship. It was so dark no one, not even the doomed pilot, realized what was happening.

[ph]

First, thanks for using my idea drach. Second of all.

Enterprise: I don’t sleep and you won’t either.

[ph]

In addition to the late and great Butch O'Hare. Another Night Ops pioneer was William "Bill" I Martin. He was deployed with VS-10 at Guadalcanal, first as XO and later as CO of the squadron. Then he transferred to VT-10 as CO while Air Group 10 was requalifying back in the States. Where he began making the squadron night qualified. In fact, he was the mastermind for the night portion of Operation Hailstone. But could not lead it due to breaking his shoulder before the start of Operation Hailstone. He was also supposed to have led a dozen Avengers on a night attack against Ozawa's carriers at the Philippine Sea. But the mess from having to recover the afternoon strike had ended that plan.

After returning to the States, Martin was assigned to Night Group 90 and brought many of VT-10's pilots with him. They would lead the Air Group on their 24 December 1944-14 May 1945 deployment on Enterprise. A big highlight was being able to maintain nonstop air ops over Iwo Jima for 174 Hours

[Dave-dm]

The British actually planned to operate Mosquitos from carriers. The Pacific War ended before detailed plans were developed. Eric Brown was the first to land a twin engine aircraft on a carrier. He brought his Mossie in at full power with full flaps literally hanging it on the props. First attempt failed when his arrester hook broke. Second attempt actually worked.

[timgosling]

Night nav in those days was difficult, but actually it was pretty difficult in daylight as well. It's a big featureless ocean whether you can see it or not! At least at night there might be stars and the Moon; in daylight you've only got the Sun but you might see the carrier/target at some distance. Astro nav in a small aircraft is also not the most exact process! But mostly crews relied on 'air plot', where you apply the expected wind to your track to derive a heading, updating the wind when/if you get a fix to update that heading. I still have the 'whizzy-wheel' circular Dalton computer I once used for this purpose. The main problem was that you were highly dependent on the accuracy of the met forecast and for some reason it was hard to get data from the areas under enemy control. For this reason any met data passed back from recce aircraft shadowing a target was amost as valuable as knowing the target position.

[JosipRadnik]

20:00 - just take a few moments to observe the landing of a Swordfish bomber and it instantly becomes clear why this was such an invaluable workhorse under the circumstances given in the mediteranean as well as the atlantic and the north sea.

[frankbodenschatz]

That Australian picture with the sailors silhouetted way below the carrier plowing thru the waves is awesome! ❤

[salvationsplace]

"It was so dark you didn't know where the ship was until your wheels hit the deck" - my dad

(Squadron VC-42 North Atlantic, unit citation for the development of night flying)

[ulrikschackmeyer]

1 part broad, easily understandable overview, 3 parts fascinating detail, one part ordinary humour and and one part sardonic irony.

Another perfect and delightful dish

[jessmarks]

"Hello darkness my old friend, I'm here to attack you again.." innovation, necessity and stealth. The need focuses on, the platform, technology and skill set of operators... results vary.. and costly.

[pdunderhill]

Thank you for that practical explanation of the RN's 'Dustbin' transmitter, a wonderfully simple and graceful idea.

[whiskeytangosierra]

Was fortunate to know a man who flew the night fighter version of the Corsair. He had three kills before being switched to the night version supposedly because he had superior navigation skills. He chased many phantoms through the night, but never fired his guns at night. He was not a fan of the whole exercise, only getting one other kill after insisting he be mounted with two extra fuel tanks and launched in the wee hours so he could be up at altitude as the day broke, with a full load of gas, so he could try to catch a recon bird. In daylight, of course...

[thomaskositzki]

18:00 Am sitting here in awe at the "Dustbin" device - so simple, so effective! 😯🙂

[robsmith]

God created the Fairey Swordfish - and it was good.
Then god created RADAR - and it was good.
Then God mated the Swordfish with RADAR - and it was good
Then God painted the Swordfish black - and the Italian navy thought "This is very bad".

[brittgardner]

A blow-by-blow account of a night flight from a carrier sounds like a good collaboration for you and Rex.

[fguocokgyloeu]

Much like with flight navigation pre-GPS, my brain has a hard time wrapping my head around night actions pre-nightvision and thermals. It just amazes me that people didn't get lost more often than they did.

[morganhale]

Back about ten years ago I read a book about a US naval aviator who fought in the early carrier Battles of the Eastern Solomons and Santa Cruz with a furthering posting by necessity at Henderson Field (I could be wrong about the specific carrier battles, so please forgive me, ) but the interesting part and almost the entirety of the book was about his experience training and deployment for his second rotation as an F6F night fighter in 1944 and 1945 off of the Enterprise, which was the same ship he was on earlier as just an F4F jockey. Fascinating book and a good read. I can't remember what it was called but a thoroughly good record of what being a night flyer off of a Fleet Carrier at war was like.

[louisinjoliet]

If you ever go to Chicago for a U505 tour, also go to the Adler Planetarium. They have a steel ball planetarium used to train WW2 pilots how to navigate at night

[zachsmith]

With today’s topic, the intro imo was really fitting! Thanks for all your work in providing us with excellent content!