COMING THE BOCHE.

Hokitika Guardian, 8 April 1918, Page 1

COMING THE BOCHE.

MOW OUR AIRMEN WORK. ■ By Clarence Winchester.) In the days when oranges and flour were cheap, flying with a friend at a military ae.odrome I took up “ bombs ” made of these two foodstuffs, just to try my hand at bombing a white mark on the ground below. The oranges were placed in the bags of flour to give them momentum, and whet, the bags struck the ground the flour puffed out as an imitation smoke-cloud, and fivm that I could correct my aim for the nexi shot. I never once hit the bull's-eye) but my amateur bombs must, lie taken iij to* account for they were not designed to “ take tlie air ” as are tlie real air bombs ot to-day.

The ordinary man has just such a rough idea of bombing raids, except that lie understands that, the presentday airman’s bomb is a very businesslike affair. How often do we not hear people refer to the “ throwing ” of air bombs, as if bad-tempered, airmen hurled their load on tj the targets below p But bombs are not casually thrown.

Bombing from the air is one of the most systematic of the many branches of aerial warfare. If an aerodrome, a waterway, a munition factory, or some other small but important object has to be bombed, aerial photographers with special cameras first of all take many ..photographs of tlie, objective. When developed and printed, the photographs form an a.ir plan of the district. It is frequently necessary to descend very low amid violent gunfire, take the photographs, and hurry off out of range of anti-aircraft guns and away from attacking aeroplanes. Aerial photographers are very much harassed and some'have had parts of their machines shot away while in the act of taking photographs.

.#**** “ Camouflage ” is very extensively practised.' Sheds, works, arid stores are skilfully covered with trees and turf or painted with sufficient eccentricity to satisfy Futurist ideals. It is ouiy fair to say that the Huns copied’this idea from the Allies, who in the early dAys of the war painted ; their aeroplanes a mixture of many j colours. From a height it is. difficult | to see objects that are properly ( “ camouflaged.” j

Positions on the photographs are marked, and the bombers then know I where and what they have to hit. With considerable experience our airmen have become remarkably good shots, as the Huns have reason to know, but there is necessarily a fair percentage of “misses” When a bomb is released it travels forward at the same speed as that at which the aeroplane is travelling, and its descending path is curved for some distance until it takes a straight path downwards. With a craft moving at over a hundred miles all hour great skill and care are necessary to hit an objective. Air currents and crosswinds have a great effect on the course of a bomb, and often spoil what would otherwise be a successful aim.

No photographs are necessary for a raid on a big town that can easily be found in the ordinary way. Such a raid would he carried out in squadron formation (i.e., a number of machines would approach the town together). Here a tribute ought to be paid to our own airmen, who never hesitate to descend into severe gunfire, described to me by one flying man as “ Hell multiplied by six.” Pogs and mists, being local, very often hide small things that have to be 1 blown up or fired, but our pilots “get there all the same.” After the raid, the photographers set to work again and take pictures of ' the damaged places. Sometimes 1 photographs are taken as the bombs 1 explode. Either system enables mis--1 calculations to be ganged, and pilots —sometimes called “bombing hogs” r have been known to return to their 1 quarters for more bombs “to correct their errors,” in the true British e . ■ 1( spirit.

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