Posts about "bombs"
McDonnell F3H Demon: Troubled Transition to Supersonic Flight
The McDonnell F3H Demon was a single-seat, carrier-based jet fighter developed for the United States Navy in the 1950’s. This aircraft represents a critical but troubled chapter in American naval aviation: one that pushed the McDonnell Aircraft Corporation toward design philosophies that would ...
Tallboy and Grand Slam: World War II Bunker Busters
By 1940, both England and Germany realized that the Kriegsmarine’s U-Boats were the key to the Battle of the Atlantic. Eliminating the German submarine threat was Britain’s top priority. Expanding the U-Boat fleet was Germany’s greatest hope to bring the British to their knees. In those dar...
Karl-Gerät Mortar: Germany’s Tracked Giant
In the mid-1930s, Adolph Hitler cast his eye towards France and dreamed of revenge for the outcome of World War One. Standing in his way was the French Maginot Line, a collection of massive concrete strongpoints, casemates, armored turrets, and observation posts. Among the barbed wire, mine field...
USS Saratoga: WWII Carrier Sunk by an Atom Bomb
The USS Saratoga (CV-3) was one of just three United States Navy aircraft carriers—along with USS Ranger (CV-4) and USS Enterprise (CV-6)—to survive the entirety of the Second World War. Although outdated by 1943, as the newer and more capable Essex-cla...
Mikoyan MiG-29: The Reactive Fulcrum?
Military aircraft design of the Cold War era could be described as akin to physics, or, more specifically, to Newton’s Third Law of motion, which states, “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” From lessons learned in the Vietnam War, the United States Air Force determi...
Curtiss P-36 Hawk: Hero Plane of Pearl Harbor?
At the National Museum of the United States Air Force, many visitors will see an unfamiliar aircraft at the entrance to the WWII gallery. The museum’s display of the gleaming silver fighter coded “86” on the fuselage, features a pilot boarding the plane in his pajamas, with an M1911 pistol ...
Fate of the “Unsinkable” Japanese Battleship Yamato
During the Second World War, the Imperial Japanese Navy’s Yamato was feared due to its immense size and power. She was the most heavily armed battleship ever built, with nine 18.1-inch (460mm) main guns, the largest ever mounted on a warship. Each shell weighed nearly 1.5 tons and had a range i...
Kingfisher vs. Zero: Shocking Victory Over Iwo Jima
A wide range of really well-known aircraft types were used in World War II, by both sides. But for every Mustang, British Spitfire, Bf109, Zero, Flying Fortress, Corsair or Mitchell bomber, there were many other hard-working planes that received little to no attention. Quite often their operation...
Arado Ar 234 Blitz: Germany’s Jet-Powered Bomber
Despite around-the-clock bombing by British and American heavy bombers, the Germans during World War II produced an ever-increasing volume of advanced military materiel right up until the end of the war. Even though they had terribly limited resources and were being squeezed on all sides, they st...