8.5 Just Chasing The Maggots
8.5 Just chasing the Maggots
Throughout the battles of spring and early summer it was the single seat fighters and day light actions that had caught the publics attention but there was a quieter battle fought at night that had gone on unabated from the very first night of the war.
Each night the RDF crews watched the glowing tubes of their PPI sets and waited for the ‘maggots’ to start to crawl across the screens. In the early days there were far too few sets leaving large gaps in the system and the operators lacked experience but slowly over the winter months the gaps had been filled and the mainly WRAF operatives had become skilled at discerning the movements of the glowing ‘maggots’ on the screen.
Likewise in that first winter of the war the pilots and their RDF operators were raw and without experience and they were further handicapped by the simple fact that their Bisley night fighters were little faster than the prey they sort. One winters night a DO.117 had been chased for nearly 200 miles across the blacked out country and the crew of the fighter had never got close enough to engage their target.
These targets were usually lone intruders whose main task seemed to be to get the air raid sirens sounded to disturb the sleep of those below and disrupt the night shifts. Over time the alarms were sounded less often and the chance of an unannounced explosion taken as just another fact of wartime life. The other activity was the mining of our sea lanes principally on the east coast but occasionally a raider would fly right across the country to plant his deadly eggs in the waters off Liverpool or another major port.
Despite the difficulties the night fighters scored success and learnt their craft, whilst a Spitfire or hurricane pilot would shout ‘Bandits’ and ‘Tally ho’ as he swooped into his attack a night fighter pilot would simply say ‘maggot seen, engaging now’ and there could be the glow of flames in the night sky indicating a dying aircraft and a crew.
Late in the winter the first of the new Gloster Night Reaper with the improved RDF sets began to appear at the night fighter squadrons these were a very different beast from the plodding Bisseley. The sleek twin engine fighter carried twice the number of cannons and was nearly a hundred miles an hour faster at maximum speed. There were other differences to, whereas in the Bisseley the crew sat in close proximity in the cockpit in the Reaper the pilots sat up front and the RDF operator sat separated from him further aft in an enclosed section of the fuselage with two small vision ports (usually blacked out at night) and a solid hatch above his head. His office, was dark place with the gun ammunition and the RDF set separating him from the pilot and this was known variously as the ‘coal hole’ or ‘cave’ and not all RDF operators could cope with its claustrophobia inducing closeness.
Over the months of the phoney war a few crews distinguished themselves as being experts at their deadly nigh time duels. Likewise the controllers and operatives of the PPI sets became equally adept and tactically astute at placing ‘their’ fighter in the best place for a contact. For the early RDF sets were very limited particularly against low flying intruders of which the minelayers were a particularly difficult target. Here it was discovered early on that the RDF1.5 actual had an advantage over the early marks of RDF2. This advantage was that with RDF2 due to the ground scatter of the radiating signal the detection range was limited to the height of the aircraft above the ground so if your target was hugging the ground or sea you had to be right on top of them to get a signal and if they were low enough the detection range and minimum RDF range coincided and no fix was possible. However with RDF1.5 being a receiver only system the ground clutter interference was much less but the airborne receivers’ were dependent upon a ground based transmitter in the right location to electronically illuminate the target. The power and speed of the new night fighter slowly started to show results as the new year exploded into the continental campaign.
With the Luftwaffe now poised across the channel in easy range of Britain’s industrial heartland and population centres the officers and crews of the night fighters were only to aware that their time of trial was fast approaching for it was inconceivable that the Luftwaffe would not try to minimise their losses by waging an intense night time bomber campaign. Whilst it was the height of the summer and the nights were short the advantages of a night campaign were less compelling. The concern of the night fighter commanders was that if all the available resources were put into the day fighter force then come the day when the Luftwaffe turned to the night, Fighter Command might not have the resources to defend the nations heart in the dark of winter.
When the aircraft production priorities had been allocated the night fighter version of the Reaper had been kept at it’s current steady level whilst the day fighter version was prioritised. Like wise the day fighter version of the slightly bigger Beaufighter had also been given precedence over the night fighter version. The logic behind this decision was simple enough the heavy day fighters could kill invasion craft as well as bombers and therefore were important to countering the invasion threat. In the middle of June their was a fierce debate within the AM over the allocation of production capacity to different aircraft types and slowly by presenting the numbers and the threat, the night fighter advocates gained a consensus that expanding the force should continue in line with the greater threat. One factor that swayed the argument in favour of the night fighter force was the availability of the new Beaufighter, with Blenheim production curtailed Bristol’s were increasing production of both the Beaufighter and Beaufort. There were other options available, though similar the Reaper and the Beaufighter had significant differences, a principle one in the day fighter version was the agility of the much faster but slightly smaller and lighter Reaper. Also being a single seater the Reaper day fighter carried more ammunition and fuel than its night fighting brother. Eventually after Sir Phillip’s personal intervention a decision was made to continue building both versions of the Reaper at their current ratios of day to night fighters relying on the modular form of construction to enable an increase in production rates to satisfy the growing demand. These priorities would be continuously reviewed as the conflict continued through the summer and the autumn. Meanwhile the Bristol company would concentrate on the day version for the Beaufighter and produce only sufficient night fighters at this time to enable production methodologies and skills for rapidity increasing night fighter production if needed could be established. The night Beaufighters built would be used for operational training and trials.
Throughout the battles of spring and early summer it was the single seat fighters and day light actions that had caught the publics attention but there was a quieter battle fought at night that had gone on unabated from the very first night of the war.
Each night the RDF crews watched the glowing tubes of their PPI sets and waited for the ‘maggots’ to start to crawl across the screens. In the early days there were far too few sets leaving large gaps in the system and the operators lacked experience but slowly over the winter months the gaps had been filled and the mainly WRAF operatives had become skilled at discerning the movements of the glowing ‘maggots’ on the screen.
Likewise in that first winter of the war the pilots and their RDF operators were raw and without experience and they were further handicapped by the simple fact that their Bisley night fighters were little faster than the prey they sort. One winters night a DO.117 had been chased for nearly 200 miles across the blacked out country and the crew of the fighter had never got close enough to engage their target.
These targets were usually lone intruders whose main task seemed to be to get the air raid sirens sounded to disturb the sleep of those below and disrupt the night shifts. Over time the alarms were sounded less often and the chance of an unannounced explosion taken as just another fact of wartime life. The other activity was the mining of our sea lanes principally on the east coast but occasionally a raider would fly right across the country to plant his deadly eggs in the waters off Liverpool or another major port.
Despite the difficulties the night fighters scored success and learnt their craft, whilst a Spitfire or hurricane pilot would shout ‘Bandits’ and ‘Tally ho’ as he swooped into his attack a night fighter pilot would simply say ‘maggot seen, engaging now’ and there could be the glow of flames in the night sky indicating a dying aircraft and a crew.
Late in the winter the first of the new Gloster Night Reaper with the improved RDF sets began to appear at the night fighter squadrons these were a very different beast from the plodding Bisseley. The sleek twin engine fighter carried twice the number of cannons and was nearly a hundred miles an hour faster at maximum speed. There were other differences to, whereas in the Bisseley the crew sat in close proximity in the cockpit in the Reaper the pilots sat up front and the RDF operator sat separated from him further aft in an enclosed section of the fuselage with two small vision ports (usually blacked out at night) and a solid hatch above his head. His office, was dark place with the gun ammunition and the RDF set separating him from the pilot and this was known variously as the ‘coal hole’ or ‘cave’ and not all RDF operators could cope with its claustrophobia inducing closeness.
Over the months of the phoney war a few crews distinguished themselves as being experts at their deadly nigh time duels. Likewise the controllers and operatives of the PPI sets became equally adept and tactically astute at placing ‘their’ fighter in the best place for a contact. For the early RDF sets were very limited particularly against low flying intruders of which the minelayers were a particularly difficult target. Here it was discovered early on that the RDF1.5 actual had an advantage over the early marks of RDF2. This advantage was that with RDF2 due to the ground scatter of the radiating signal the detection range was limited to the height of the aircraft above the ground so if your target was hugging the ground or sea you had to be right on top of them to get a signal and if they were low enough the detection range and minimum RDF range coincided and no fix was possible. However with RDF1.5 being a receiver only system the ground clutter interference was much less but the airborne receivers’ were dependent upon a ground based transmitter in the right location to electronically illuminate the target. The power and speed of the new night fighter slowly started to show results as the new year exploded into the continental campaign.
With the Luftwaffe now poised across the channel in easy range of Britain’s industrial heartland and population centres the officers and crews of the night fighters were only to aware that their time of trial was fast approaching for it was inconceivable that the Luftwaffe would not try to minimise their losses by waging an intense night time bomber campaign. Whilst it was the height of the summer and the nights were short the advantages of a night campaign were less compelling. The concern of the night fighter commanders was that if all the available resources were put into the day fighter force then come the day when the Luftwaffe turned to the night, Fighter Command might not have the resources to defend the nations heart in the dark of winter.
When the aircraft production priorities had been allocated the night fighter version of the Reaper had been kept at it’s current steady level whilst the day fighter version was prioritised. Like wise the day fighter version of the slightly bigger Beaufighter had also been given precedence over the night fighter version. The logic behind this decision was simple enough the heavy day fighters could kill invasion craft as well as bombers and therefore were important to countering the invasion threat. In the middle of June their was a fierce debate within the AM over the allocation of production capacity to different aircraft types and slowly by presenting the numbers and the threat, the night fighter advocates gained a consensus that expanding the force should continue in line with the greater threat. One factor that swayed the argument in favour of the night fighter force was the availability of the new Beaufighter, with Blenheim production curtailed Bristol’s were increasing production of both the Beaufighter and Beaufort. There were other options available, though similar the Reaper and the Beaufighter had significant differences, a principle one in the day fighter version was the agility of the much faster but slightly smaller and lighter Reaper. Also being a single seater the Reaper day fighter carried more ammunition and fuel than its night fighting brother. Eventually after Sir Phillip’s personal intervention a decision was made to continue building both versions of the Reaper at their current ratios of day to night fighters relying on the modular form of construction to enable an increase in production rates to satisfy the growing demand. These priorities would be continuously reviewed as the conflict continued through the summer and the autumn. Meanwhile the Bristol company would concentrate on the day version for the Beaufighter and produce only sufficient night fighters at this time to enable production methodologies and skills for rapidity increasing night fighter production if needed could be established. The night Beaufighters built would be used for operational training and trials.
