"How far can you see another aircraft at night?" Topic

This seems to me a basic question but not easy to find a definite answer online.

With particular reference to WW2 night bombing operations – how far away would a night-fighter be able to spot a larger 4 engined bomber – and vice-versa?

Obviously if either were illuminated by a searchlight or on fire the range would be much greater – close to the same as daylight I guess. But in moonlight and against the sky/an illuminated cloud base I'm guessing not that far and very much depending on luck.

Any ideas?

I'm sure someone will be along with a more definite answer, but based on my reading you'd have to basically be right on top of an enemy aircraft to see it, baring pure dumb like the aircraft crossing the moon while you were watching.

-Will

With particular reference to WW2 night bombing operations – how far away would a night-fighter be able to spot a larger 4 engined bomber – and vice-versa?

A night fighter didn't need to see a bomber at any great distance. It was vectored onto the target by ground controllers using radar.

Sure – the RADAR got the nightfighter into position but you had to be able to 'see' it to shoot it. Likewise – the gunners could fire at the nightfighter but again they'd need to see it to shoot it.

Despite it being 'night' and 'dark' there is always some light too.

But as wminsing says – practically on top of each other seems to be a reasonable starting point.

Sure – the RADAR got the nightfighter into position but you had to be able to 'see' it to shoot it.

That's why I said: "at any great distance".

As to how far away you can actually visually spot another aircraft at night, it of course depends on a number of factors:

amount of cloud cover
other weather conditions
phase of the moon
paint colour of the target
what lights the target is showing
angle of view (i.e looking up against the sky / clouds or looking down against land / sea)
etc., etc.

Vision works both ways – bomber crews at night liked a certain amount of visibility even though it made them better targets – hence the term 'bombers moon.'

link

Really no fixed distance.

Imagine a bomber stream flying over cloudbank in bright moonlight. Many bomber crew were horrified by such conditions on some highly disastrous raids. Might as well have been daylight.

No moon, under cloud bank, vision might be limited to a hundred feet. Many pilots only knew how close they were behind another aircraft when the slipstream threw them violently off course.

I have just finished reading a number of bomber crew writings and am always amazed by the bomber crew who noticed the single engined fighter first by seeing one or two dimly lit dashboard lights. They simply avoided and flew apart and let sleeping dogs lie as it were.

If you are treating it for range for gaming, might I suggest you roll for weather, wind, sleet, cloud and moonlight conditions and then even still treat vision distance as a variable.

I have no real knowledge on the subject.
But there is talk about how far away you could b
see a candle in total darkness.
So as a night fighter pilot I figure you are trained and become experienced in what to see. I figure that pn Lancaster bombers the exhaust fro. Those big 12 cylinder Merlins would give off a good glow. I remembet the tractor exhaust at night. Plus it would be a bomber stream mainly vetsus a lone bomber plus a mentioned vectored I to the area to start with.
Definitely not easy but was done.

Those big 12 cylinder Merlins would give off a good glow.

A Lancaster bomber's engines were basically internal combustion engines. Does your car exhaust give off a glow at night?

IIRC some aircraft had searchlights that could be mounted. IIRC the Fiat CR.42 had detatchable searchlights powered by a wind generator that mounted below the wings. Presumably once the fighter was vectored in to the bomber's general location, these could be turned on to make precise gun runs…

Damon.

Although a model, looks like this CR.42 has the attached searchlights:

Actual photograph:

link

Damon.

"A Lancaster bomber's engines were basically internal combustion engines. Does your car exhaust give off a glow at night?"

Car engines have mufflers … aircraft engines didn't. Also, the exhaust stacks were extremely short, so some of the fuel-air mixture was still combusting when it was forced out of the cylinder.

However, night fighters and bombers had special flame dampers mounted.

"US airmen tested electric landing lights and flares without success, though the tests did reveal the need for illuminated instruments and flame dampers for engine exhausts." link

"With the Lancaster, the exhausts could only be seen when the fighter was flying directly astern and in line with it." link

"Early on in the Mosquito's operational life, the cooling intake shrouds that were to cool the exhausts on production aircraft overheated after a while. Flame dampers prevented exhaust glow on night operations, but they had an effect on performance." link

"Night was a shield against detection. An aircraft that was visible at five miles by day might only be detectable 2,000 feet away on a good night. In the polluted air over the Ruhr or London, visible distances were far less than that."

I strongly recommend reading Lee Brimmicombe-Wood's Nightfighting in World War II articles, linked from the page for his game Nightfighter link Lee is a tad obsessive compulsive.

The short answer to the original question is that there is no short answer.

It depends………

Seriously, I've done a lot of research on this subject, based primarily on anecdotal evidence provided in many RAF night bombing books, and those by various nightfighter pilots and their co-pilots/navigators (RAF, Luftwaffe, and USAAC).

It could be as little as 25 – 30 yds. on a very dark night, to over 1,000 yds. on very bright nights. Even more if a bomber is silhouetted against light colored clouds lit up by searchlights, or the light of the moon. Then, the bombers and other aircraft flying near that would be lit up like dark bugs on a white sheet.

They could also be seen well as above, when silhouetted against a burning city, or the moon itself, from a very long way away.

During the middle of the war, and after that, most RAF bombers avoided flying on nights with more than about 1/4 moon, due to that, once the German NF numbers increased, and they had more successes.

Average visibility on dark nights seems to have been about 100 – 300 yds., but again, when good conditions were present, could be significantly more.

Generally, it was harder for bombers to see NFs, since the latter were smaller, and tried to use tactics to accentuate this, e.g. approaching from the darkest portion(s) of the sky, while placing the bombers in the lightest portion(s).

Some of the accounts I have read of night fighters in the Pacific state they most were vectored by radar towards the Japanese bombers. Then they state that when told they were close to the bombers, they began looking for the bluish flame from the exhaust stacks in order to spot their targets. Once they spotted the exhaust, they had just enough time fire a deflection shot or to swing in behind their target and fire before losing track of it.
So I would have to go along with Mako11 and say a few hundred yards at best.

Thanks all for the helpful information and links.

I was looking for a baseline with a maximum minimum to work out my variables from. I think I have it now.

But any more comments always welcome.

I've heard as far as a mile, on bright nights, vs. 4-engine bombers.

I suspect even further, if against well-lit cloudcover, or if contrailing, since bombers could be seen out to about 8 miles, during the day (when not contrailing).

So, what are you working on, Skarper, e.g. scenario, house rules, other?

It's an extension for my home made B-17 rehash. I posted links to my blog a while back which has screenshots. I'll repost when I have screenshots of this extension.

I'm writing rules and building pieces for Lancaster Bomber raids in 1943-44. I have most of the nightfighters already and the Lancaster Bomber looks nice too. Just been doing searchlight pieces and having them sweep across the sky then lock on the bomber if they get within a certain radius is a nice effect.

I need to know the ranges for visibility to decide who gets to fire first and how far away the nightfighter can be and still spot the Lancaster.

I don't think it's going to be as interesting to play as the B-17/B-24 raids I've been doing up to now because there are even fewer decisions for the player to make. It's meant to be a solo game akin to patience though and I enjoy researching and deciding how to automate the various effects.

Thanks for your help on this and other threads I've posted.

Who gets to fire first is really dependant on who spots who first. Don't forget that the bomber crew had two to three members alone acting as gunners who were just usually 19-20 years old and just as paranoid as can be, at 14,000 feet over the Ruhr. If they are lucky enough to spot first, they can decide to evade or to corkscrew or to fire.

Now the .303 Browning might be considered a puny mg compared to the 0.50s or the 20mms. Keep two things in mind, they were normally firing into their slipstream and the rate of fire of those air force .303s was anywhere up to 1,200 rounds per minute each! Sometimes better rate of fire than the MG42.

Tail turrets tended to be four .303s. Mid upper turrets could be two or even four .303s as on some Halifaxes. Athough front turrets were normally two .303s, the utility of front turrets on night operations is in question about just how useful they really were.

Not all bombers but a number did have one or two 0.50 mgs in a belly mount. Very few people are aware of this.

Very late and post war production bombers even used 0.50 mgs!

Just to make your head spin, the RAF were pretty far advanced in equipping bombers with 'Monica', a tail mounted radar detector to warn of aircraft closing from behind.

The electronic side gets more crazy with all the airborne jamming and even the false ground controllers directions carried out by 100 Group.

One of my favourite books is written by Murray Peden, "A Thousand Shall Fall". A Canadian who did a tour on Stirlings and ended his time flying B17s at night for 100 Group. He says some incredibly complimentary things about the B17 being outstanding nevermind a great night flyer. Some of his escapades carrying the German speaking radio operator are pretty eye opening.

Sparker, don't forget the Germans used the master searchlights, the blue tinged ones, that were radar directed. Once locked on, hundreds of others would converge.

I know you must want to go for Bomber Command vs central Germany. Don't forget all the efforts of the Middle East bomber untis using Halifaxes and B24s ranging frm, Munich, Vienna, to Warsaw, to Ploesti to mining the Danube.

Equally forgotten is the bomber offensive against the Japanese from Bengal against Burma, Siam, Malaya, and Indochina. Later they moveed to the Cocos Islands and raided Indonesia. Daytime, night time, formation, individual, and stream raids, they did it all and so few know.

Sorry for being so long winded.
When I was born, the local vets mounted a Lancaster bomber on a plinthe in my home town. As a toddler I remember walking the length of that 32 foot bomb bay and it seemed to go on forever to this six year old.

The only thing more remarkable was the plaque in the garden in front of it with all those names.

Screenshots?

Does that mean you are working on a computer, or video game on the subject?

Would love to hear and see more on the subject of this, and the B-17 game, if you have a link to share.

Nightfighters will get the first attack, most of the time, since they are smaller, and harder to see against a dark background.

Occasionally though, the bombers do fire first, or at the same time as the NFs.

There was a radar-guided gun aid for the tail gunner (Village Inn – 1944 availability, I think), late in the war, but it was only in limited supply. Permitted the gunner to fire fairly accurately, without even spotting the enemy NF.

Many bombers never even saw a NF on their missions, and many were attacked from below, with either Schraege-Musik upward firing guns, or with the NFs making a "von Hinten" attack, e.g. climbing from below, and pulling the nose up sharply and firing, so the bomber flies through the projectiles fired from their weapons. Both were exceedingly deadly.

Just to be clear I'm sKarper not sParker. I think sparker has left the building – sorry forum – but I'd hate to usurp the credit for his posts….

Yes – it's a VASSAL module so not a video game more a computerised board game.

There are a lot of daylight mission screenshots on my blog

link

but nothing yet for nighttime missions.

I'll post a couple of test pics of of night mapboards and would welcome feedback – here or in the comments.

I also appreciate all the input – longwinded or short and pithy are both good.

I have no access to libraries/bookshops where I am [DaNang] so am trying to work with just online sources.

Ah, I see.

Nice looking stuff. Thanks for sharing your link.

Happy to help, if I can, if you have further questions on the subject.

From the RAF night fighter and bomber crew I knew (all now sadly passed on), exhaust glow was a reasonably common means of identifying other aircraft in the pitch dark. And anyone who has seen a WW2 aero engine – even in daylight – knows that they chuck out a lot of flame.

Very true, but with the exhaust covers in use on many aircraft (most), you only had a very limited arc from where you could view that (pretty much directly behind the aircraft), and you had to be pretty close in many cases as well.

Can't recall all the anecdotes on that, but seem to recall sightings I've read about lately on the order of only 100 – 150 yards, or so (don't quote me on that, since that may be at the low end of the vis range = don't remember for sure what the average, or max is for that).

I like how it looks – the graphics are mostly pinched off the internet and usually reduced in scale so I hope the artists wouldn't be too miffed. It is not for profit and as yet only for my personal use which salves my conscience a little.

I will likely have more questions – knowing next to nothing about the night bombing campaign and as I say unable to access anything not online (and free to boot).

One immediate question I have is about searchlights. How common were they and were they always used in concert with Flak or was Flak possible without searchlights?

I know the Germans had some radar directed flak and due to evasive maneuvers the most useful way to employ flak was by firing a 'box barrage' – so if the Flak batteries know bombers are overhead in a certain sector they can fire into it hoping for some hits. The daylight formations were probably a more lucrative target, logically at least.

I guess there would be some quite light and inaccurate Flak even without any searchlights and then heavier and more accurate [though hardly pinpoint] Flak if a bomber got caught in the 'X' of several searchlights. There is also the risk of being hit by Flak aimed at another bomber that was caught in an 'X'- because it was all so inaccurate anyway.

Input on this and anything else that seems relevant very welcome.

I would be willing to let people have copies of the VASSAL module for evaluation – though it does change every few days!

Too bad you can't get any books. I highly recommend Westermann's book "Flak: German Anti-Aircraft Defences, 1914-1945":

link

This is excellent on the kinds of thing you want, covering nightfighter tactics and searchlights as well as the guns.

Chris

Yes – just the thing! But I have been holding off ordering books due to worries they will be lost/delayed/taxed at customs. Much of this is really just paranoia so perhaps I should bite the bullet and risk it.

Searchlights were very prevalent, and were grouped together in batteries. There were thousands of searchlights, much like heavy flak guns (I think the numbers were roughly equivalent), and in one article I read, there were as many as sixteen S/Ls in a battery.

The Germans also used blue, master searchlights, which were radar controlled, to lock on to a bomber first, and then the others would join in to "cone" it. Then, the master S/L could search out, and lock on another bomber, to assist other S/Ls, and batteries in the target area.

Early in the war, there were large searchlight zones, which is essentially a fairly wide strip of terrain that the bombers had to cross to get to targets in Germany. Flak batteries were usually used in conjunction with them, and also with the nightfighters (especially very early in the war, before the NFs had airborne radar).

Later in the war, some of these searchlights and flak batteries were pulled back to protect major cities and industrial targets, since with the Himmelbett Zone creation, and airborne radar, the NFs could hunt for the bombers in the dark.

Usually, flak is paired with searchlights, though I imagine in some instances that may not always be the case, since they could be given radar guidance as well, up until at least July 1943 (Hamburg Raids, and the first use of Window jamming).

Light flak is limited in effectiveness, to around 10,000 – 12,000 feet in altitude. Useful for the bombing altitudes earlier in the war, to about mid-1943, but less so later, when the heavy bombers started flying above that, at 18,000 – 22,000 feet.

I have the impression that flak barrages were limited later in the war, at least at night, since they were thought to be wasteful vs. the RAF bomber stream.

Still, probably more likely to be used against USAAC daylight bombers, which flew in tight formations, so would be easier targets to hit with it.

Very helpful info – I have added blue searchlights and changed their shape to be narrower. I have yellow searchlights which basically just sweep about and may help (or perhaps hinder) a nightfighter and blue ones than bring the 'cones' that will then bring the Flak.

This is very much a trial and error process with no pretensions to being based on research.

More screenshots of updated effects coming soon.

Glad to be of help.

As far as the colors go, the blue ones should be a fairly pale blue, I suspect, but dark enough to notice the difference for the master searchlight beam, so the others could move towards it, when it catches a bomber.

I think most of the others appeared to be white, and not yellow, but that is based upon seeing B/W film, and on the very light gray camo./almost white, of their nightfigters.

I guess I need to peruse YouTube to see if there is any color footage of searchlights from the war, but now that I think of it, most still in use here for advertising cast a whitish glow.

Colour is a tricky one. I have found a few paintings online and most have yellow and blue beams – while one or two have white and blue.

Yellow for now looks good to my eyes – but it is easily changed later if I decide to go with the white.

Re detecting exhaust glow at night, I just read this:

"The night-time weather in Burma is beautiful in the winter and the Japanese normally took advantage of the full moon to mount their raids, so, on the night in question, the A.V.G. took all their aircraft to a nearby satellite strip and left Mingaladon to 17 Squadron. Bunny Stone and Jimmy Elsdon placed themselves on readiness and took off when the warning of a raid came through. They decided that Bunny would patrol above 20,000 feet and Jimmy below. Anti-aircraft fire was noticed, but they could not spot anything at first until Bunny saw what looked like a moving star and realised he was looking at the exhausts of two Japanese bombers flying in formation.

As he moved in for the kill, one of them opened fire, but this stopped as soon as Bunny also opened fire. He lined up on the other bomber and gave it a burst which sent it into a vertical dive, which he followed, firing at it until it burst into flames and crashed into the Irrawaddy."