5 Things You Never Knew About the Avenger Torpedo Bomber

the TBF Avenger one of the most storied aircraft in World War II this famous torpedo bomber served in clashes from the Battle of Midway all the way to the bombing of Tokyo but in this video we will cover some of the fascinating details that have often been forgotten from Vanishing planes to famous pilots so here are five things you may have never known about the Avenger torpedo bomber in making these history videos I have learned one thing I am a Creator and like all creators I need a space to create thankfully the sponsor of this video yahaha has helped me solve that problem yahaha is a user-generated Content creation platform that allows users to literally build any sort of game or virtual experience possible using their cool features and more than one million smart assets you can bring any game idea to life yahaha also supports multiplayer modes so that you can enjoy your creations with friends and even if you don't game you can build a virtual experience for use in clips for all kinds of videos they also have live sessions on Twitch and YouTube so you can constantly learn new skills so if yahaha sounds like something for you download it now at the link below or just scan this QR code to start making your dream games and experiences today thanks again to yahaha and now enjoy boy to begin our list for today we will look at an unfortunate coincidence as the TBF was being unveiled to the world in 1941. the Avenger would take its first flight in August of that year and just a few short months later was ordered into production to replace the outdated TBD Devastator as this production was beginning Grumman announced a new plant in New York that would be the site that this new torpedo bomber was to be built appropriately there was a ceremony planned and the aircraft was unveiled to the public in a coincidence that would foreshadow a trying future the ceremony would take place on the morning of December 7th of 1941 the same day that the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor I think it was it was definitely ironic when they rolled out this brand new brand new airplane on the day Pearl Harbor was attacked particularly since it was intended to be a naval aircraft and and the Pacific War was going to be a naval war I think the impact that it had meant that the TBM was going to be built in much larger numbers than maybe they had previously expected because once we were at War aircraft production went through the roof and um interestingly enough we talk about the TBF but there's also the TBM which was the Grumman Adventure built by General Motors and it became you know in order to build the numbers of airplanes that required more than one manufacturer had to build them under license but it turned out to be an excellent design and an excellent replacement for the Devastator towards the end of this ceremony news reached New York of the surprise attack nearly immediately the event was brought to a close and the plant was closed to the public security was ordered to seal off the facility as possible sabotage was feared shortly after though production would go on as planned and by the end of the war more than 9 000 Avengers would be built by Grumman and General Motors and ironically for the Japanese the aircraft that was displayed for the first time as they attacked Pearl Harbor would go on to play a key role in defeating them throughout the Pacific in this second item on our list today we will see that although the Avenger did have a great deal of success by the end of the war this was not necessarily how things started off as the first combat for the TBF was a terrible debut this would take place in one of the most famous battles of the entire War the Battle of Midway in June of 1942 the Avenger had not yet been assigned to the American aircraft carriers and the only Squadron operating at this point in time was actually a Detachment of Navy pilots flying off of Midway Island itself on the morning of June 4th of 1942 they would be the very first aircraft sent to take on the Japanese Fleet after she was spotted by a pby scout plane this unit in particular was selected as they were closer to the fleet and would be able to strike first before the Japanese began to bomb the island the around 7 A.M six TBF Avengers took off for their very first combat Mission along with four Air Force b-26s outfitted to carry torpedoes they would be taking on the might of the Imperial Japanese Navy with no experience and no fighter escort after flying for some time they finally located the Japanese Fleet and began their attack runs this would be a colossal failure at this point in the war torpedo attack strategy from the air was far from perfected and so the aircraft in this assault would be slaughtered of the six Avengers that took off from Midway five of the aircraft were shot down by Flack and Japanese zeros only one of these Avengers would make it back to the island and upon Landing her Gunner had been killed in action and the Bombardier was seriously injured grounds Crews counted more than 200 holes throughout the plane as can be seen in this photo of the lucky surviving aircraft fortunately for the Avenger the TBD Devastator saw similar losses in the Battle of Midway making it clear that this was not the fault of the plane but the tactics following these heavy casualties the American torpedo strategy would be changed and the results would see consistent Improvement for the duration of the war but as these changes were made there was one other serious problem that needed to be addressed and this is point number three in our video for today the faulty American Torpedoes that caused much grief among the U.S naval aviators and while this fact isn't exactly an issue with the Avenger itself it was a problem that plagued this aircraft and we will look at the repercussions of how exactly this affected the Avenger and her Pilots let me introduce you to the mark 13 torpedo this was the primary aerial torpedo that was used by the United States in World War II the thinking behind it was simple U.S Navy planes come in at a low level flying at about 280 kilometers per hour and no more than 200 feet off the surface of the water they would then drop their Torpedoes at about a distance of one kilometer from the target however this proved to be a losing strategy for multiple reasons first off this left the aircraft flying very slow as they came in to drop their ordinance 280 kilometers per hour would have most aircraft as sitting ducks for anti-aircraft fire and the initial combat Trials of the torpedo bomber made this Crystal Clear furthermore in order for the aircraft to get down low enough to drop their Torpedoes at the recommended altitude of 200 feet this meant that their attack runs would have to be quite long and that the planes would be much closer to the anti-aircraft guns that were shooting at them when these parameters were met by Naval aviators it often meant that they were at a high risk of being shot down when these parameters were not met it unfortunately meant that the Torpedoes would likely not work properly making the situation even worse the mark 13 torpedo quickly showed that even in ideal circumstances it was far from reliable according to historian Roland Buford in his book on the U.S Navy ordinance in World War II a study was implemented in 1943 to test the mark 13 torpedo after reports of multiple failures here are the reported results in mid-1943 an analysis of 105 Torpedoes dropped at speeds in excess of 280 kilometers per hour showed clearly why aviators distrusted the mark 13. 36 percent ran cold 20 sank 20 percent had poor deflection performance 18 gave unsatisfactory depth performance two percent ran on the surface and only 31 percent gave a satisfactory run this total in excess of 100 proved that many Torpedoes were subject to more than one of the defects just as the bulk of the problems were still due to the effects of poor air stabilization on water Behavior better performance at reduced aircraft speed was small Comfort since aviators could not be held down by paper restrictions that impose serious and dangerous handicaps in combat and even when they accepted the limitations the water entry behavior of the torpedo produced frequent hooking and broaching clearly the mark 13 had a problem and navy pilots from across the Pacific were suffering because of it in the Battle of Midway for example 41 torpedo bombers attacked the Japanese Fleet 35 of these planes were shot down and almost all of the air Crews gave their lives in service of their country and what were the results of this attack on paper essentially nothing of all the Torpedoes dropped by TBD Devastators from the carriers and the TBF Avengers from Midway very few actually struck the targets and the ones that did fail to explode in fact oddly enough the only successful American torpedo attack in the Battle of Midway would come from a scout plane a pby flying boat that scored a hit against a Japanese oil tanker early on June 4th following the results from 1942 and 1943 the United States immediately began work to improve the mark 13 torpedo and like most American Military projects of this time they were successful in this endeavor by the fall of 1944 the mark 13 was an entirely new weapon hot straight and normal runs were almost all at rates of a hundred percent and torpedo drops were soon authorized to be made at altitudes as high as 800 feet and speeds of up to 560 kilometers per hour this allowed the Avenger torpedo Pilots to change their strategy now during their attacks they could actually dive into the torpedo runs since they were not as restricted by speed and altitude this made them much less vulnerable to anti-aircraft fire and as the war went on survivability rates saw a constant increase interestingly Buford also writes in this book that by 1945 the mark 13 had seen so many improvements that during one occasion in the spring of 45 six Mark 13 Torpedoes were dropped at altitudes between five and seven thousand feet where five of the six were reported to run hot straight and true these developments changed the war for the U.S Navy and aided greatly in the sinking of many Mighty Ships for the Imperial Japanese Navy like the legendary battleship Yamato by the end of the conflict what was originally a faulty torpedo was finally universally considered the best in the world up next we will go to a story of one of the most important Avenger pilots in history and how he was shot down by the Japanese here he is any guesses this is none other than future president of the United States George H.W bush the young George Bush would join the U.S Navy early in 1943 and received his wings shortly thereafter in May of 1944 he found himself assigned to the USS San Jacinto a carrier in the Pacific where he was flying the Avenger he would see his first combat in May bombing Wake Island and for the next three months would serve very well he participated in many combat missions and on July 25th was even credited along with one other pilot with sinking a Japanese cargo ship on September 22nd of 1944 however he took off for a mission to bomb the Japanese island of chichijima in this Mission Bush's plane would take a direct hit from anti-aircraft fire it immediately caught fire but he pressed on with his attack according to the combat report his plane scored multiple hits on the Target and then was forced to fly away from the engagement while his plane continued to pour fire bush tried to fly far away from the island as he wanted to avoid capture by the Japanese one of the three crew members on board had already been killed by the anti-aircraft strike but Bush and the remaining crew member were able to bail out while George's parachute opened though his crew member was not so lucky as he floated down to the ocean he watched as the other shoot never deployed and the young American fell to his death George Bush a few minutes later would land in the water and floated in a raft for four hours until he was eventually rescued by a U.S submarine he stayed on board here for about a month before being returned to the San Jacinto where he continued to serve until he was eventually sent back to the States the future president would state that his experience in combat and specifically this date that his Avenger was shot down would shape him profoundly causing him to ask why had I been spared and what did God have for me finally the last item in today's countdown is quite possibly the most fascinating of all this is the tragic story of flight 19. now this event would actually take place after the conclusion of World War II on December 5th of 1945 and instead of combat it would involve a training incident off the coast of Florida on this date a group of four Avengers took off their Crews assigned to learn the skills of dead reckoning navigation they were escorted by their Mentor for this Mission Lieutenant Charles Carroll Taylor the instructor had already completed a combat tour in the Pacific and was a seasoned pilot for today's training exercise the group was supposed to fly out of Fort Lauderdale and Fly East for 55 miles to execute bombing practice and then to fly East for 67 more miles at this point they were to turn north flying over the Grand Bahama Island before eventually turning West and Landing back in Florida this Mission however would not go as planned in the exercise using dead reckoning navigation tracking the amount of time elapsed was key along with the usage of the in-aircraft compass however upon pre-flight check it was discovered that none of the Avengers had clocks this was not expected to be a major issue however because Pilots were expected to have their own watches as the training Mission commenced all went on as scheduled for the first leg of the trip the pilots took off at 2 10 in the afternoon and started heading east the group shortly after located the target area and released their bombs at 3 pm a radio transmission was recorded in which a pilot of the flight was asking permission to release his last bomb 40 minutes later however another flight instructor Lieutenant Robert Cox was forming up in a separate flight that was just starting the same training exercise he overheard a transmission from Taylor's flight 19. in this he heard an unknown crew member of the flight asking a student for his compass reading to which the student replied I don't know where we are we must have gotten lost after that last turn Cox asked if they needed help and received a reply from Taylor stating both my compasses are out and I am trying to find Fort Lauderdale Florida I'm over land but it's broken I'm sure I'm in the keys but I don't know how far down and I don't know how to get to Fort Lauderdale now this was strange because Taylor was now reporting that he was sure that he was in the Florida Keys which were nowhere near where he was supposed to be at this point he was supposed to be over the Grand Bahama Island East of Florida not the keys which were South Cox appropriately responded to this message though stating that if he were in the keys and lost to Simply put the sun on his Port wing and fly north up to the coast of Florida shortly after this though Taylor ran into more trouble he was asked to switch frequencies on his radio to communicate with search and rescue but he declined to do so as he was afraid of his flight becoming lost in the weather that was increasingly getting worse in addition he soon turned East at a heading of 90 degrees thinking that he might be in the Gulf of Mexico around this time a transmission was recorded from one of the students that said dang it if we could just fly West we would get home Head West dang it this difference in opinion led many to question later why the students did not simply Head West on their own but their decision to continue with Taylor was obviously attributed to military discipline following this the plane's location was finally triangulated as being within 100 miles of this location fairly close to where they were supposed to be the instructor Taylor was still confused however and continued to debate heading west or east at around 6 20 after about four hours in the air with Darkness quickly closing in the final message of Flight 19 was received Taylor was heard saying all planes close up tight we'll have to ditch in less landfall when the first plane drops below 10 gallons we all go down together as it became clear that Flight 19 was lost a rescue party was scrambled to try and guide them back home this would be a PBM Mariner seaplane with 13 crew members on board at 7 30 PM however this search and rescue plan would also send out its final radio message a routine communication after this it was never heard from again as night came about both Flight 19 and the rescue plane had vanished in the preceding investigations light was shed on to what actually happened in these tragic events first it was concluded that Flight 19 was led astray when their instructor Lieutenant Taylor mistakenly thought that they were over the keys instead of the Bahamas he believed taking the Northeast would get them back home but it simply took them out over the Atlantic even farther he was in a difficult situation however as their compasses had unexpectedly stopped working shortly after this investigation was released however the cause was changed to unknown so that Taylor himself was not blamed for the loss of all 14 lives supposedly his mother was not happy with the findings of the investigation and played a key role in getting this official cause changed what happened to the rescue plane though the investigation actually found that the Mariner likely exploded in midair there was a report from a U.S tanker in the area that reported seeing an explosion in the area and that they unsuccessfully looked for survivors in a pool of oil and Aviation gasoline on the water it's very easy to lose situational awareness and fly off in the wrong direction the only thing that's kind of that's kind of weird is the the radio calls right my compass is swinging around whatever so obviously something was affecting their compasses if if the Radio Calls were to be there but I think you know basically they got fouled up in their navigation and unfortunately they all went together despite the results of the investigation The Disappearance of Flight 19 and the rescue plane have been at the center of many theories about the Bermuda Triangle since none of the wreckage has ever been found so until more evidence is found the fate of the 14 aviators in Avenger Flight 19 and the 13 crew members on board the rescue plane will never definitively be determined thanks again to the commemorative Air Force Air Base Arizona for providing some great commentary for this video go check out their Avenger in Mesa Arizona today comment what plane I should cover next and please consider subscribing

Channel: TJ3 History

Views: 176,957

Keywords: Avenger Plane, TBF Avenger Documentary, Flight 19, Battle of Midway, Avenger Torpedo Bomber, TBF Avenger, Torpedo Bomber, TBD Devastator, Avenger Torpedo Bomber Documentary, TBM Avenger, IL-2 Sturmovik, IL2, Flight Sim, World War II Flight Sim, IL-2 Great Battles, George Bush, IL2 Game, IL-2 Highlights, IL-2 Flight Sim, Combat Flight Sim, War Thunder, Realistic, History Channel Dogfights, Historic, Documentary, Mark Felton, Yarnhub, TJ3 Gaming, Dark Skies, wW2 Air Combat

Id: 0eZUWZJTSWc

Length: 21min 35sec (1295 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 24 2023