Precious parachutes.
 

Is it possible for it to rip as you're jumping and not open? A few times i have leapt from a burning hurricane only to find the solace of a hard cliff.

Maybe a reason for not including the Fairey Battle is the bomb aimer had no parachute and this would seem mean?

I noticed when I played around with the chutes and bailing out, they failed about half the time. That's unrealistic. In real life parachutes are quite reliable. the landing animation is fun though.

You mean the pilot rolling up the windows before he hits the ground? Gives me the heebie jeebies...

JD
AKA_MattE

Modern parachutes are indeed very reliable, however were WW2 ones of the same "quality control" and superior materials/design?

Equally, it would depend on the condition of the bail out, bailing out of a burning bomber spinning down or a fighter with being sprayed with MG and cannon fire are very different situations compared to sports skydiving, equally opening a modern chute whilst able bodied and prepared is not particularly comparible to opening a chute whilst panicked/wounded/burning or otherwise being in an "unwanted" situation.

I'm not arguing here with regards to failure rates, as 50% is obviously too high, however I've not experienced such high failure myself, in about 100 virtual bailouts I've probably fallen to my virtual death twice, maybe three times: which does fall into the 2%-3% acceptable loss category that most military airborne ops during the war ran to: if it were to happen 50% of the time then I'd suspect something would be deeply wrong there and double check that I was actually equipping a parachute to my virtual self!

I can't remember where I read it however I believe that a lot of pilots woudl attempt to ditch or land their aircraft rather than risking a bail out if at all possible: I'm not sure if this is because of it's perceived as being less risky or perhaps because of trying to get their aricraft home? Or perhaps even that they woudl rather take the risk with their aircraft and their ability than to bail out and trust in the parachute/ chute rigger back at base? Who knows!

With the game I just wish they activate the proper bail out animation rather than the "appear" by your aircraft and fall that we currently have, and it would be reasonable to see/experience some burning chutes etc. too.

I'll leave this here:


V

Because your parachute was damaged.

I find they only fail 1 in 10 times.

Same here - maybe even 1 in 15 times. And it may sound strange but in the situations that it happens I am not really surprised about it.

My brother is in an Airborne unit in the US Army. He's done 42 jumps and pulled his reserve chute once. Now that I think about it... That doesn't sound so reliable :confused:

In The Wild Blue by Stephen Ambrose he mentions that WWII pilots received no parachute training. They just told em, if the time comes you'll figure it out.

The best way to get back on earth safely with a chute is to land it gently with it under your butt.. seated in your cockpit.

Once you start to rely on it, unpredictable things can be. just remind that war stories are narrated by the livings... not by the dead.

SO 100% of story about pilot hitting the silk are are the ones were the chute did open successfully (low G, speed relevant, safe alt, good opening etc...).