Bazooka Charlie – WW2s Strangest Tank Buster
An evening pause: Today this man would likely be forbidden from doing this, regardless of its practicality. Modern military rules would be horrified at his independent action.
Hat tip lazarus long.
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Awesome! Reminds me of a rancher who attached a gun to his plane to shoot coyotes. Don’t freak out the Division of Wildlife does it all the time and actually have specific planes that they do it with. Don’t think it worked very well, but similar concept.
So he used a little plane to blow up tanks.
Civil Air Patrol used one to sink an entire sub!
(Much sarcasm, great story!)
This would actually be welcomed. The bureaucracy on the front lines gets ignored, and good ideas are good ideas. It would likely be taken over by a contractor for mass production, however, creativity in tactics and employment of weapons is encouraged.
The battlefield is one place where bureaucracy is NOT welcomed.
This Mark Felton is awesome, I recommend subscribing to his channel if you are into history.
This is the kind of ingenuity, drive, and bravery that defined the Greatest Generation
this is a perfect example of individual ingenuity that our troops showed to overcome problems on the battle field another good example was the hedgerow busters applied to tanks in normandy
One the last air to air victories in the ETO was in the L-4. Grasshopper pilots are an overlooked legacy to modern Army Aviation. Above the Best. r/ commander cobra See: https://worldwarwings.com/he-shot-down-the-enemy-with-a-colt-45-wwiis-weirdest-dogfight/
Hear Mr Zimmerman’s latest visit to TFG: https://www.spreaker.com/user/kgra/tfg101220kgra-task-force-gryphon-robert-
Wow, he was using a Grasshopper to go up against panzers. That really takes guts, considering there is no protection in that slow moving plane. He knocked out two panzers and not only came back for seconds, but for dessert as well with a third attack.
I have seen a working L-4 Grasshopper at the Fantasy of Flight Museum south of Orlando. That plane did not need much space to take off and land. I remember it weighed about a 1000 lbs with fuel.
Kyle-
ditto on the Mark Felton is awesome, thought.
(I consume a lot of ww-2 video, he’s definitely top-10 material.)
You found a VIDEO!!! COOL I posted a thing on Quora awhile back talking about this guy.
were planes used on D-Day to attack German defenses as the soldiers landed on the beach? OT, but always been curious why the allies did not first land tanks on the beach. Have an aircraft carrier off shore. Or beach naval gun ships that could provide heavy, close in gun fire.
Steve Richter: The answer is yes. And they also had many ships offshore pounding the defensive emplacements for hours prior to landing.
You might want to read some accounts of D-Day. They all outline these facts in great detail.
“… You might want to read some accounts of D-Day. They all outline these facts in great detail. …”
this video says 27 out of 29 tanks sunk while landing on Omaha beach
https://youtu.be/1WeTU5XvYS4?t=436
just thinking that the allies had complete control of air space at that point in the war. Could we have exploited that advantage more than was done? Prior to d-day, drop a sizeable airborne force a few miles inland. Setup a perimeter. Then use air power to protect that location from German attacks. The landed force then expands its territory back towards the coast. Which is then used as the landing zone.
Dad told me of a man who used a piper cub with sawed off shotguns mounted on swivels on each wing strut to shoot down eagles.
Those eagles were fond of feeding on baby lambs. And ranchers needed the lambs to live.
One would think that aiming would be difficult. The bazookas look fixed, so aiming them required aiming the plane – down. That creates a very limited firing window. Although, bazookas. Even misses were probably quite effective in breaking up a column’s progress.
Heir to the toothpaste fortune, Sterling Colgate fired (paper) rockets from a similar plane into tornadoes for research.
SOPHIA would be a great asset if modified to view thunderstorms.