Olham

The escort mission must have been great! Meeting single Camels, all lower than you - I wish I would have that once! You "driving into the hangar" was - not a good idea. Next time you want to see them land, just circle over your field - they will come. See my post with pics in that "WW1 relative as pilot" thread - the Pfalz made it. The Albs crashed though; one of my wingmen was at least only semi-crashed. Jasta 4 has funny black spirals round their crates - probably to avoid being mistaken for an enemy craft by their own ground crew. So close to the front, anything is dangerous.

Heavy artillery! But so true!! It's hard for the "logical gender" to please the "emotional one" ". Only yesterday, I saw my ex debating with her new husband about the house they just bought. Before they bought it, he had sat down with her to decide, and said: we must not buy it. So please decide intensively and deeply - cause when we buy it, I want your full support in all furthermore work that is to be done here. She said, yes, it's a nice house, let's buy it! Mow, only three months later - it was the absolutely wrong decision. Wrong place, wrong village, wrong neighbours, and totally wrong built.

Yes, you have to fly her the right way, SvK. I have complained a lot about the weak lower wings of my Albatros, but now I know, what I just CAN'T do. I can't even, for example, pull her out of a shallow, throttle-back dive hard with lots of G-force - they might break. And what makes it real hard to accept: my opponent's Nupe 17 wings should also fold, but on AI craft, they don't, and he happily escapes me!

Oh yes, mutton stew with carrots and star anise! Sometimes, the artillery comes in very handy - and so effective!

Can only guess there, Iti, but I believe, that promotions come sooner, the more you follow your exact orders and complete the mission goals. I rarely ever get promoted, cause when I'm on my way to a railyard attack, I love to get distracted by enemy scouts passing miles away, and I approach them, to make sure, they see and attack me.

A ceasefire of 48 hours, to let the men sleep, wash their undergarments, cook some real food, and write a letter home - but all still in the trenches...

Yes, you're right, Paarma, the colours look too bold somehow. I may leave them for this skin, or perhaps tweak them a little in Photoshop. Thanks for the link; I had it somewhere, but now saved it again. About Jeschonnek / Jeschonneck: I'm beginning to get confused - German Wikipedia has him, and say, he entered the Fliegertruppe in 1917. But then they write, he fought at the frontiers of Ober-Schlesien? And they write Jeschonnek, while there is also Jeschonneck elsewhere. Now I wonder, if there where two different ones, both pilots in WW1 ?

Great pics here! Flynn, the group photo - I think I see a Scotsman and Englishmen, and are there also Americans, or did the British have that "canoe" form cap too?

Great aviation here, Lou, and perfect choice of music. The planes just dance in the air like swallows in a summer sky.

Thank you, Paarma. Yes, I followed their "design idea" for Jasta 26. Don't know for the Lozenge - I took it from a 3view of Pearson, well aware, that the colours look different to the other Lozenge. Do you know, why Pearson did this one (Albatros DVa, pilot: Schreiber) in different colours?

Hasse Wind: I almost wanted to throw my monitor out the window when I lost my best pilot... Ahh! The same emotions! I'm not mad - hahaha!!! - everybody has it the same!! - Hihihi!!! - I'm not mad... Arhmhmhmm!! Sorry, gentlemen! It's just so, that I sometimes scream my head off - if there was a flower pot besides the monitor, the plant would sure have died from those terrible experiences.

Bullet, with every sentence of your description, Bruce Willis' "Die Hard" comes to my mind again (Lol!) Sounds like the Jasta to pick instead of the new 12 vs 12 instant fights? Duce, DVa in 1918 is alright against SPAD XIII (shot down two in my first sortie with Jasta 26 in late April 1918 - see the "Who's ancestor was a WW1 pilot" thread). But soon, I will have to face hordes of S.E.5a or Camels! According to Bullet - real masses of them? That will be almost impossible. Jasta 4 is on my list now, too. I'll join you, Bullet and Duce (if we only COULD fly together - that should be fun!)

Jasta 40, Wasquehal, 28. April 1918 Leutnant Karl Alfred Mahlo Just arrived at my new Jasta 40, I had a sortie with Rausch, Jeschonneck, Hertel and Dilthey today. I was lucky - my flight got Albatros DVa; I could even let my Berlin Bear get painted on mine. A-flight went up with 6 Pfalz DIIIa. That is a sturdy battle horse, and she sure can dive like hell, but apart from that, I wouldn't like to fly her. B-flight where 6 DVa. On the way to military defense 429, A-flight ran into 6 SPAD XIII; three or four more joined in shortly. I managed to remain unnoticed in the bad April wheather, and lead my flight around a cloud to a higher position; then we attacked. Now the SPADs had a bad time - we where chasing them all over the sky! They performed their dive-away tactics, but the Pfalzes followed and chased them back up to us. Right at the beginning, my craft was hit - the ailerons didn't work too well anymore, and my roll rate was that of a van; but Lammertz and Klemm stayed with me all now and cleared my back several times. The first craft I attacked was hit in a dive. When it pulled up with lots of G, still getting hit, the left wings just flew away, and it spiralled down like a feather. Now I witnessed Hertel being chased by two Frenchmen, and I came down on the right one. Dilthey and Jeschonneck firing at the other, we got him out. I stuck to mine, and followed his descend in softer spirals, always keeping my eyes on him. When he had to evade a dive of Rausch pulling up steeply and banking right, I hit him full length from nose to tail. Now he lost speed but continued his climb. It was terribly easy to follow him and fire 100 - 200 rounds into him, until he literally fell apart and out of the sky. I had fired all my ammunition, and so I watched my wingmen Klemm and Fellinger shooting up the last SPAD near us at low altitude. Then we reassembled and went home. I was excited - none of my wingmen was missing! Near our field, we saw the Pfalzes of Hertel, Jeschonneck and Dilthey coming in. Von der Ziegler was wounded, and he made a crash landing, but he will be alright. Hertel, Dilthey and Jeschonneck came for gratulations, and we discovered, that we are relatives! What a first day! I know, this would normally belong into "Screenshots" or "Reports from the frontline". But as it was a sortie with my relative Jeschonneck, I made an exception.

Pol: ...we really need to get on with P4... Why that haste? We have just got P3, and would like to enjoy it.

Update 09/21/09 13:06 Berlin time (GMT +2) flynn, Ireland, added. Daveebee, France, added. the maps are in post 1 of this thread

Udet wasn't like that often, Duce - he wouldn't have survived the whole war with that attitude. But a German actress, who knew him well, said about Udet, that he had more than one guardian angels - and that others in his seat would have been dead a hundred times. Might be true - not many made the whole war time and survived it.

Yes, I made the same experience - in the end, I'm always left alone with my wings. But you seem to have made a very good stand against so many S.E.5a - you don't seem to have had many losses, Duce. That maybe the advantage of flying a DVII. I have flown Summer 1918 only in a DVa - not the craft of any superiority. I often came home single. I felt happy, when I had one or two wings left aloft with me to fly home.

Wow, this is a great thread indeed! Now I got curious about Jeschonnek and Jasta 40 and found this painting in the website of the aerial paints artist Barry Weekley. That site had dozens of pages with lots of WW1 Squads, Jastas and Escadrilles. www.barryweekleyart.com Thank you for the ISBN-Nr., Paarma.

Iti, I often had pilots, which I didn't dare to fly anymore, cause they had so many hours, claims and kills. What I do with those: I only fly them, when I'm wide awaky and in a very good mood. The tension will grow, the longer they live; you'll see.

Sorry, it was too tight to make pics - we had a fight with Nupe 11 from Esc.3 "Les Cigognes" (Storks). 22. August 1916 Five Halberstadt DII from Jasta 1, Bertincourt, engage five Nieuport 11 from Esc.3 - and shot them down! I found the Halberstadt much more nimble than expected; it turned well with the Nupes, and I could shoot two of them down! Anyone else made such experiences?

Yes, in such areas or times you may be able to collect many hours of flying time. Later, you can still become a hunter or a butcher. If you should ever come into a beautiful scenery with great "mountain light", please send a picture with your crates on to the screenshot section. I love to see where and how everybody is flying.

Thanks for the tip, Arto! Do you have the title for the book on Carl Degelow?

Another "same with me" thing - I drew lots of dogfights (although mostly Spits vs Messerschmidts), and there where some WW1 pics. But I didn't have any info, how they really looked.

Prosit, mein lieber Erich von Mainfeld! Prosit! And follow the advice of our veteran Rickitycrate here - be even more careful from now on. So you are in my Jasta 2 now, flying the new Albatros. A great craft with good dive and climb, not as manoeuverable as the Nieuports, but much more stable. Don't turn too tight with the French - learn to hit them from a distance, train some deflection shooting, and follwow Boelke's Dicta. I wish you a lot of success - and more than 17 hours! Prost!

Thanks for the report, Flieger Perrmann! An EIII in October 1916?!? Isn't that almost like suicide? Jasta 17, eyh? I may come for a look for a week - but Eindeckers are not really my cup of tea. When do you get the Halberstadt, or even the DII?