If you were shot down there
was still a good chance of surviving if you bailed out safely. The
only instruction we ever had about parachutes took about five
minutes. "You put the chute on this way and this is what you pull",
and that was about it. One time I visited a building on the base
where they were packing parachutes and I learned how they folded
them, but I would never have had the nerve to do my own. When talking
to some of the bomber crews that were in prison camp with us, we
learned-much about their experiences having to bail out. They did not
wear their parachutes and had to put them on before Jumping. They
told about some airmen who were wounded or unconscious and they would
put parachutes on them and push them out. Even the unconscious ones
turned up In prison camp so it seems a fact that oven the unconscious
mind reacts, telling the body what to do. They must have pulled their
own rip cords to open their chutes.
One of the missions most memorable to me was to a target in northern
Germany where we were providing escort for bombers. When we got over
Denmark the weather turned very bad and we couldn't avoid the
overcast so were forced to fly on instruments. We never did find the
bombers. If it had been clear weather we could have seen Norway and
Sweden as we were close enough. The relay plane broadcast the message
to return to England and by this time we were all separated and lost
in the storm.
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