The P-51 could stay in the
air about six hours which was the amount of time it took to go to
Berlin and back. Our missions took anywhere from one to six hours.
After being tightly strapped in and unable to move around in that
small cockpit for six hours, it was difficult to even stand up when
getting out of the plane. Some guys would step out of the cockpit
onto the wing and fall off onto the ground. We used to tease one
fellow because he opened his parachute when he fell off the wing.
Being so tired (and the strain of combat really was exhausting) the
shot of whiskey we got at the debriefing after a mission was welcome.
On each mission we had one pilot who flew up and down the coast of
England at 30,000 feet. This was the "relay plane" used to relay any
massages to the planes over Germany. Due to the curvature of the
earth and communication equipment at that time, radio messages could
not be sent directly. If the wind direction changed while the planes
were over Germany it would affect the compass heading we were given
to return to England and if it was overcast we could have blown off
course, missed England entirely and gone out to sea. If your home
field was fogged in you were directed to another field. I flew the
relay plane just once and it was very monotonous sitting up there for
hours. You could throttle the engine down so it would Just keep you
from stalling out and save gas that way.
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