WWII Era Flight Operations

As far as I can tell, ATC has not changed at all for missions set during or around WWII. Even on the Normandy map with a small airfield, if you request azimuth it sends you 8 KM down range to line up with the runway.

Also, I don't think I've ever seen anything like a chart with holding patterns for airfield. Has anybody seen one?

Does anybody know what AI AC do if you tell them to go into a holding pattern?

There was also a question a while ago about night operations. I saw a video recently from somebody flying one the the Charnwood missions, and starting just before sunrise, with just the soft light in the east before the sun came above the horizon, and the AI aircraft hand their running and landing lights on. That's just a bug no-no. Is there anyway to program that in the ME that AI do not turn their external lights on? Although that too ought to be SOP and be the case without any special commands.

Hi,

"American engineers constructed or rehabilitated over 280 continental airfields

in the EPO from D-Day to V-E Day" ( incl. captured German airfields )

Charts for temporary air fields ?

I'm not sure - I guess : Coordinates, runway headings as pilot notes and a red cross for the airport location on a flight map

I'm not really so much interested in how the airfield look, as much as what they did for holding patterns etc. When I look at the Normandy map now, it's pretty tight with airfield. You could hardly have a circuit off to one side about a km or so.

Also, I read somewhere the British simply circled the field at a minimum altitude, that holding AC wouldn't interfere with landing or taking off AC.

Anyway, I haven't noticed anything having been changed so far, when it comes to the way things work, but maybe that's just me.

I'm not really so much interested in how the airfield look, as much as what they did for holding patterns etc. When I look at the Normandy map now, it's pretty tight with airfield. You could hardly have a circuit off to one side about a km or so.

Good questions!

For aircraft returning from combat missions, holding around a field was rarely done, or needed.

Air-Ground radio communication in the weeks after the invasion was mainly for the purposes of forward controlling (i.e. what we'd now call combat air support). There wasn't much in the way of Air-traffic controlling. AFAIK they were still using the tried and etsted system of firing very-lights (flares) from the ground to signal whether or not approachign aircraft could land.

Outgoing operations didn't tend to spend time "circling" in a pattern to form up either. Pierre Closterman even descirbes one sortie during which the squadron (was either typhoons or tempests) took 100km to form up! they finally got in formation just as it was time to begin diving on the target.

I've used scripted-flares to try and create some of the feeling of airfield control, but it's cumbersome and unsatisfactory.

I'd love to see ground control which is suitable for the time period.

I think there must have been some controlling going on, if only in specific situations. Kind of like a traffic cop at an intersection with only sporadic usage. If there's no other traffic coming, there's no need for the cop to be waving traffic through.

On the other hand, only positive signals are actually safe in all situations, and if a damaged aircraft needs to land right now, having to wait for another flight to land and clear the runway may simply not be an option.

But we don't even have the ability to tell ATC that our AC is damaged and going around may not be an option.

It's really just icing on the cake for us, because you can just land without even contacting ATC and nobody's going to chew you out or anything lol.

It just feels kind of neglected, and the directions from ATC to a 9km away entrance to a landing pattern is just *bläh*

As I have posted elsewhere regards some of the less prototypical elements to the Normandy map:

Control towers particularly should not feature on these temporary fields as Flying Control consisted of a couple of bods with a radio in a tent - or if really lucky, a large caravan trailer. Par example:

 

Full thread here:

https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?p=3177654#post3177654

So, yes there was flying control, of a limited nature for each field.

And yes, I'm with Orso on this - it'd be nice to have more prototypical WW2 era comms routines, and not just for ATC but also for flight and wingman interactions.

For example, current "Enfield 1-1" should be "Enfield Red 1" and "Enfield 2-2" Should be "Enfield Yellow 2", at least for commonwealth Air Forces.

Further, more protypical (and accurate) Squadron Radio callsign options for WW2 squads would also be nice.

Trouble is you'd need a separate WW2 comms infrastucture to do this, with the additional man hours not only to program but also record. Then how do you enable it? By map? By a/c? By mission date? What happens when you get a mission with F15 and Spitfire in? Which comms architecture is loaded? Both? Is there head end?

Many questions about enabling such a feature, though agreed it it is very desirable.

I know they have talked about updated comms for WWII, but I have no info on a timeline.

Oooohh!

Tantalising!

TBH: I bet that if the call went out, the community would respond with loads of free vocal samples for ED to use.

I would certainly be happy to record a full set of voice audio (I can do one of the commenwealth accents. . .) for free.

Kewl :cheer3nc:

At least we now have something to look forward to looking forward to... ummm ... :huh:

:D