The 'Great Debate' - Spitfire vs BF109

[Sammi79]

Originally Posted by 5./JG27.Farber

This thread will be locked in time, I garentee it!

I hope not, so far it has remained light hearted, for more than 20 replies! this seems to me to be quite unusual at the moment!

Originally Posted by 5./JG27.Farber

THere is a difference to what a pilot wrote in a book years after an event and science fact. Im not saying any of the pilots were lying! I am saying somethings that they remembered as a first hand witness might not have been actually what was happening. Fear, adrenaline, perspective, where it was viewed from and many other things go into a memory. So without actual figures from instrument recorded flights then unfortunatley all pilot accounts are "hearsay".

I see your valid point and raise you a further consideration:

In the absence of the scientific information (which can also be flawed depending on the controls of the tests etc.) the best that can be done is a meta analysis of these first hand anecdotal accounts. the mean results of the combined whole of these accounts will be more accurate than any individual account, and if that is all that there is to go on, then we should go with that IMHO.

Regards,
Sam.