Carrier Pilot - WWII Memoir

[Jeff_S]

I stumbled across a good book on Amazon Kindle called Carrier Pilot. It's a WWII memoir of an RAF pilot who trained with the Yanks in Pensacola before heading out to war. I'm only a few chapters in, but his prose and dry sense of British humor is enjoyable reading and his descriptions of flight are spot-on. Here's a good example as he describes spin training...quoted from the book:

"The classic method of recovery is to kick on full opposite rudder to stop the spin, centre the ailerons with the joystick and then to ease forward on the stick to regain flying speed. (The main thing is to remain cool!) Provided you are not close to Mother earth, all you have to do after that is to ease back gently on the stick until you level out from the resultant dive. On the other hand, if you are too close to those green fields you will quite rapidly and altogether too noisily cease to take any further interest in the proceedings and will henceforth be nothing more than a shovel-and-wheelbarrow job."

If you enjoy these books I'd encourage you to look for it...only $3.99 on Amazon.

[Bennett]

I read the book last week. Fascinating to read about British pilots flying Corsairs off carriers in the Pacific theater. Writing with humor, style, and without coming off as a braggart. Couldn't put the book down. Highly recommended. .

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[BKlott]

So many great stories have come out of WW2. Can't remember the name of the book or the author but he flew with the RAF during the Battle of Britain. He trained in Hurricanes then through some fortunate SNAFU got sent to his Operational Squadron which flew nothing but Spitfires. Claimed he had never even seen a Spitfire up close until he got there. Kept his mouth shut (who wouldn't!) and ended up flying Spits. Can you imagine being a young kid in that situation?

[thinwing]

Same here..great read and explains why the Corsair failed its carrier sea trials and the Marines got them instead of the Navy.Mean while the accident rate the RNAF suffered was really telling...