One thing I've never really understood is why people get injured by the tailplane of planes. When you look at parachutist jumping from a plane, they allways fall with the same forward speed as the plane, and they fall clear of the tail by several meters. I realise this has something to do with the speed the plane moves, as the distance to the tailsection will decrease with increasing speed. Some pilots even chose to step out on the wing if the plane was stable enough.
This is a quite dramatic allmost-bailout-story from an american Avenger-pilot operating from USS Ranger in Norway, 1943:
"The tracers that flashed by made a complete circle of the cockpit. Then, just before I pushed the bomb release over the ship, my engine took a direct hit. There was a small explosion with a brief flash of fire and smoke over the cockpit as I pushed the pickle releasing the two remaining bombs. One 500-pounder landed on the deck of the tanker. The ship exploded and ran aground as it burned.
Garner, my turret gunner, shouted, "We're on fire!" I hauled back on the stick to gain altitude, then picked up the mike and shouted over the intercom, "Bail Out!"
At about 800 feet, I opened the hatch, sprung my safety belt, and started to climb out of the cockpit. I had never bailed out of a plane before and in the confusion forgot to pull the radio cord from my helmet. Consequently, I heard a call from Garner. "Don't jump, don't jump. Jackson's popped his chute in the plane and he can't get out!" It seems that Jackson, in his excitement, had accidentally pulled his ripcord inside the belly of the TBF. The spring-loaded silk had let loose all over the place. He tried several times to bundle the slippery silk in his arms and work his way through the narrow door, but no such luck--he was trapped.
As I settled back into the cockpit, I picked up the mike and gave instructions to Jackson and Garner to fasten their safety belts and prepare for a crash landing. Our plane was still over the shipping lanes--not far from the burning tanker.
There was no way I could land on that rough, rocky shore of Norway, so I chose to make a water landing. I started letting down toward one of the small islands to make a wheels-up, full-stall water landing.
About then I realized that I was the lone target of concentrated AA fire. It got hotter as I lost altitude. I began to think I would never make it all the way down, so I shoved the throttle forward and headed toward the open sea, taking some violent evasive action to shake the gunners off my tail. It was a miracle that I wasn't hit again--or maybe I was.
At about two miles out I started climbing to gain altitude. The plane was still laying down a stream of smoke. I checked the cockpit instruments expecting to see several red warning lights, but there were none. Oil pressure, OK; cylinder head temperature, OK; tachometer and throttle, working. I was carrying about 30 inches of mercury--what a relief!"
The whole story is here:
http://www.airgroup4.com/book/indx/index1.htm
Skarphol