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PHXPilot
Joined: 05 Jan 2003
Posts: 800
Location: Phoenix, AZ, USA |
WWII pilots talk about contrails
 Sat Mar 29, 2003 4:39 pm
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...Contrails were so thick that they became clouds. We often said that we created weather over Europe. They would persist for many hours, maybe days. We flew a different route coming back than going in partly to avoid the contrail clouds that we created. There are some pictures of contrails on my web site - none of these are shown to be very heavy but there were time when we were near the end of the bomber stream and the contrails were so dense that it was no dfferent than flying in clouds. A thousand or more
planes (4000 internal combustion engines) can make a lot of contrail at 25000 feet or more.
Hope this helps.
Willard Reese- 457th Bomb Group
As you've assumed, the bomber crews as well as our fighter escort saw
contrails about every day even though an effort was made to avoid them. As
was often said, they represented large fingers pointing to the bombers.
Obviously of assistance to the enemy fighters who could spot us at a
considerable distance.
The nature of the contrails was such that they required certain atmospheric conditions to form. Thus, they were principally affected by altitude. At the pre-mission briefings, they typically advised us of the altitude that the formation of contrails could be expected with an effort made to avoid that particular altitude. More often than not though, we did in fact make contrails indicating that their information was faulty or that flying at that altitude couldn't be avoided. We in B-24s typically bombed from about 22,000 feet while the B-17s, which could fly higher, bombed from around 27,000, particularly at tough targets where higher was better in an effort to avoid the flak as much as possible.
My recollection is that the contrails persisted for some time. While I don't recall timing them, I would guess that they could be seen for fifteen minutes or more. At times, Germany appeared to be almost covered by contrails as far as you could see. Essentially creating a cloud layer which could possibly persist for hours I suppose. The bombers' in more or less straight lines, the fighters', usually above us, more random as they criss crossed or circled. A common sight was the escorts dropping their tanks and heading off after the bad guys.
The contrails also tended to create a cloud layer which restricted the visibility of the following aircraft. So, contrails represented a problem to us and were to be avoided if at all possible. The idea of poison clouds is obviously ludicrous to those who have regularly experienced them.
I haven't mentioned winds aloft which would affect the persistence of the contrails. In the northern hemisphere, the primary circulation at higher altitudes is north to south, combined with the earth's rotation (coriolis effect) results in winds out of the northwest. As a navigator, I'd often use a wind of 60 knots from 300 degrees if I didn't have anything better. While I've seen a wind of 120 knots from due north, in most cases it was from the northwest quadrant then you have the jet stream which can produce winds of 200 knots or more, principally from the west, but usually at higher altitudes
than we operated at.
Looking at contrails from the ground today, I've noticed occasional breaks which indicate inconsistencies in the atmospheric conditions at that altitude.
I hope some of my rambling may be of value to you.
Sincerely,
Ronald D. Spencer
788th Bomb Squadron
467th Bomb Group
96th Bomb Wing
2nd Bomb Division
8th Air Force
Since the war I have, on many occasions, called attention to aircraft marking up the sky and my memory goes back to March 18, 1945. My sons would also call my attention--"Dad, there's another airplane marking up the sky!". I have noticed that when certain cold-air masses flow south over the US that the phenomenon occurs. With many of the commercial aircarft fllying at altitudes
in excess of 20,000, I am not surprised to see contrails quite often. I believe the idea that aircraft are spraying poison is absurd!
Please write again if you have any questions that I might answer.
Hal Province 34th Bomb Group
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Contrails CAN persist for hours, and they CAN spread out into other contrails to form cloud cover!
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Catnip57
Joined: 22 Apr 2001
Posts: 596
Location: Central Washington |
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Thu Apr 10, 2003 5:58 am
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I found this interesting bit of information in my Guide to the Elements book and since the subject of contrails in World War II has been posted here I thought this would be a good spot to post this bit of information for anyone interested. Just to let everyone know that not only were contrails unintentionally formed during the war but they were also intentionally created as a smoke screen.
Another useful compound of titanium is titanium tetrachloride (TiCl4), a colorless liquid. When exposed to moist air, it forms a dense white cloud of small titanium dioxide particles. The U. S. Navy used titanium tetrachloride during World War II to make smoke screens when it was necessary to block a potential target from view.
Another use for Titanium taken from the same resource book.
Titanium is an ideal structural material for rockets and jet engines. Some 10,000 pounds of titanium and its compounds are used in each engine of a Boeing 747 jet. |
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PHXPilot
Joined: 05 Jan 2003
Posts: 800
Location: Phoenix, AZ, USA |
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Thu Apr 10, 2003 6:02 am
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Thank you for that, Catnip.
But, as you can see, these contrails they are talking about were not created intentionally. |
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msu94
Joined: 16 Feb 2002
Posts: 207
Location: Tucson, AZ |
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Fri Apr 11, 2003 11:25 pm
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quote:
Originally posted by Catnip57:
I found this interesting bit of information in my Guide to the Elements book and since the subject of contrails in World War II has been posted here I thought this would be a good spot to post this bit of information for anyone interested. Just to let everyone know that not only were contrails unintentionally formed during the war but they were also intentionally created as a smoke screen.
Another useful compound of titanium is titanium tetrachloride (TiCl4), a colorless liquid. When exposed to moist air, it forms a dense white cloud of small titanium dioxide particles. The U. S. Navy used titanium tetrachloride during World War II to make smoke screens when it was necessary to block a potential target from view.
Another use for Titanium taken from the same resource book.
Titanium is an ideal structural material for rockets and jet engines. Some 10,000 pounds of titanium and its compounds are used in each engine of a Boeing 747 jet.
Contrails were not made as a smoke screen. You are getting contrails confused from when navy landing craft and ships would make a smoke screen when doing an amphibious assault.
And are you saying there is a connection between the 747 having titanium components, and naval use of titanium tetrachloride for WW2 smoke screens?
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NW41Heavy
Joined: 28 Mar 2003
Posts: 88
Location: Tallahassee, FL |
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Sat Apr 12, 2003 7:31 am
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Man if a jet airplane were shedding enough titanium to cause a cloud, I defintely would not be in that bird.
Those williams engines for the Eclipse jet did something like that, haha.  Just kidding- the engines temped out and baked themselves on the first flight and were putting out something like 70% of the power they should have been. Might as well have strapped a pair of hair dryers on it.
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Dude, that guy has a black belt in redneck!
[Edited 1 times, lastly by NW41Heavy on 04-12-2003] |
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